Four
bikes, four testers, one reace track and one whole day of
utter mayhem, Welcome to the inaugural bike track test of
the year, a test of man, machine and man against machine.
A test of limits of a motorcycle, size of the rider's family
jewels and the endurance of both. Say hello to this fast
and diverse field of which there are no losers
but only one winner.
 The
brief was simple, desperately simple. You see, everybody
has an opinion, is entitled to one. The trouble being that
among nutter bikers an opinion once formed ain't gonna change,
come what may. A two-stroke addict will dig his own grave
rather than trade in his stink wheel for a four-stroke.
Much in the same way that a CBZ-owner (crazed fanatics these
guys are, mind) will never accept that a Pulsar can or will
out-gun his set of wheels. And forget about fiery Fiero
owners ever ascending to being second best. Bringing us
to the brief.
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| ADIL
JAL DARUKHANAWALA: The boss's been riding for
the past 35 years and writing about it for the last
25 years. Been there, ridden and written that. |
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| ASPI
BHATHENA: Our read test chief has ridden, tuned
and raced anything and everything he could lay his hands
on. Been there, raced that. |
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| SIRISH
CHANDRAN: The lads trying to make his humour
and charm work on the race track, can't say it's working
though. Getting there, riding everywhere. |
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| PREETHAM
MOSES: And Moses walked into the TVS race shop
and proclaimed, "behold I shall lead thee to the
promised land. (At least I hope I can!!!)" |
A bike with more cee-cees equates
to more bee-aitch-pees equating to more kay-em-pee-aitchs
at the top end. And so should settle the debate on the fastest
bike in the country. If only things were so simple. Fact of
the matter is that figures on paper don't burn rubber On
the Road and so began the quest to finally settle the
debate on the fastest bike in the country. Fastest not in
a straight line but through corners, corners of varying radii
at that, a series of esses, bumps, undulations and that obligatory
straight of course.
So we found ourselves zipping up our leathers, fastening
helmet D-rings, zipping boots and adjusting gloves one gloriously
fine day at the MMSC's Sriperumbudur race track, the one
and only race track in the country. A track that Aspi loves
to describe as "a circuit with 18 corners but no straights."
That opinion is attributable to the fact that he raced 90bhp,
250kmph (though capable of only 200kmph on this track) Yamaha
TZ250s in his heyday out here. For the bikes we have on
hand, none of which kick out more than 15 horses, the two
straights will be more than adequate, though still not sufficient
for garnering the top speed of these bikes.
Choosing the bikes for the test was a simple task in itself.
The fastest Indian bike that we have tested in a while had
to be included, no? The motorbike that raised the level
of four-stroke motorcycles from mere econo-misers to script
a style and Performance statement
was naturally drafted in. And to give it company came along
the mobike that showed that solid engineering could sell
bikes in the aforementioned category even if it looked a
bit like a moped. Finally, since we all are nutters flashing
back into the past without rhyme or reason, could we forget
a bike from the stables of the original Performance daddy, Yamaha? Thus lining up under the famous MRF arch
on the main straight of the MMSC track was the Bajaj Pulsar
180, Hero Honda CBZ, TVS Fiero and Yamaha RXZ. We didn't
want to include any vintage bikes in this test so we settled
on the current two-stroke flagship from Yamaha's stables,
the RXZ, evolution of the RX-100 and little more that an
RX-135 in drag, sporting a mandatory disc brake. I won't
insult your intelligence by going into reasons why no Bullet
was included in the test and suffice to say that Kinetic
Engineering weren't confident enough to lend us a GF125
for this test.
At this juncture we have
to thank TVS Racing boss Arvind Pangaonkar and his entire
team for back-up, logistical help and of course that wonderful
lunch. Being a professional outfit beers were out of the menu.
Probably a good thing that else our test session would have
ended prematurely. Also all of our friends at Chennai who
turned up in such large numbers prompting one of the regular
racers to comment that the actual races these days don't witness
such large crowds!
As I mentioned earlier there can be no losers in this test.
It is just not right that a 135cc machine has to slug it out
with two 150cc machines, all three chasing a 180cc machine
round the track. But there has to a winner and for once I
shall dispel all suspense and declare right from the start
that it was the Pulsar 180 that climbed to the top step of
the podium. Obvious since it had an outright cc and bhp advantage
but it was run very close, closer than that outright cc and
bhp advantage should have permitted. Read on since there were
quite a few surprises along the way to the podium. Surprise
us it did, the results of seven hours of bike testing on the
race track.
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Introduction
