MOTOR-CAR SPORT

We’ll soon know more about  Suzuki ’s 2014 MotoGP bike, as that Japanese company plans three public and two private European tests beginning in June. About the current machine, factory test rider and GP veteran Nobuatsu Aoki is quoted as saying, “They made a lot of design changes.” Differences we can see in these recent photos are that the former two exhaust megaphones have become one, and that the starter-access door, previously seen on the right side of the fairing, is gone. Since our Japanese source still says, “Same sound as  Yamaha  YZR-M1,” we know the single megaphone does not mean the prototype has reverted to an even-fire 180-degree crankshaft. Absence of the starter door suggests Suzuki has caught up with slipper-clutch technology, allowing the bike to be fired in the same manner as the  Honda  and Yamaha by driving the rear wheel. MORE  CW  SPY SHOTS SPIED! 2014 SUZUKI MOTOGP PROTOTYPE! Read and see photos from Part I of K...

     2013 BMW F800GT – FIRST RIDE It’s all in the initials. With the F800ST that  BMW  has been producing since 2007, the “ST” stands for “sport-touring.” But for 2013, the company rethought and redesigned the ST to provide a little less of the “S” and more of the “T,” then renamed it “GT” for “grand touring.” If any model sold as poorly as the F800ST has in recent years, most companies would have punted it from the lineup for good. But BMW stuck to its guns, still convinced there is a viable market for a sporty middleweight with long-ride capabilities. “Rider feedback told us they liked the idea of the F800ST,” says Sergio Carvajal, BMW’s Motorcycle Product Manager. “It’s a ‘right-sized’ bike. But they wanted something more comfortable and practical.” Based on my 200-mile ride over a wide variety of roads as part of the U.S. press launch of the F800GT, BMW seems to have succeeded. The GT is more accommodating than the ST, with revised ergono...

2014 TRIUMPH EXPLORER XC – FIRST RIDE It’s all about the whiskey and the wool here in the Scottish Highlands…and of course, the wide-open spaces that nurture the requisite barley and sheep. Those same rolling hills and lush glens are also brilliant for adventuring. Just ask James Bond. And  Triumph  Motorcycle’s product manager,  Simon Warburton , who’s invited us to the top floor of the United Kingdom to sample the new 1200 Tiger Explorer XC. In almost every sense this is the same Explorer we already know and love. It’s incredibly easy to ride, very agile, with the 1215cc Triple happily—and quickly—bringing you to digits double the average legal U.S. highway limits (hey, we’re in James Bond territory…with only sheep as witnesses). Meanwhile, if you’re not in a rush to overtake a bustling lorry, the same mill will plug off a stop in second gear, and with equal heart, dawdle about the countryside in its leggy third cog. We love this engine. Shifting is slick,...