Of Sportbikes and Cruisers

[OTB]

Went out Saturday on a Virago Sevenfiddy for a couple hundred miles:

Nice bike, shaft drive, on first impression decent ergos; nothing extreme.
Nice fit and finish. Lotsa low-end power, nice sound, smooth shifting (this one has about 10k on the clock).

Sportbikes usually have motors that love to be revved and with many you can be just cruising along and look down and be stunned to find yourself waaayyy over the speedlimit. Not so, Ms. Virago (Dictionary defines virago as a " A woman regarded as noisy, scolding, or domineering "...synonyms are fishwife, fury, harpy, shrew...hmmmmm). The harder you rev it, the less it likes it. This bike is the quintessential cruiser, happiest just burbling around town or short hops down the freeway.

I know many folks luuuvv their cruisers, but I am not one of the fan club. I've had Harleys old and new, a Yamaha (now Star) a Honda Shadow, and a older Suzuki "L" model. It may have something to do with my 6'2" height, but I found anything more than 45-60 minutes in the saddle to be arduous; the sculpted or stepped saddles lock me into ONE position and one position only, coupled with the slightly forward footpegs that are neither straight out in front nor directly underneath, they have my thigh muscles aching in short order. Because of the odd seating position, most of the rider's torso weight bears directly down on the seat and because the way the seat is sculpted pressure points soon develop, about which the rider can do nothing. The thought of having to ride these things across country makes my butt hurt just in contemplation.

The Yamaha is overall a nicely finished and thought out bike, but not my cuppa. Now I remember why I prefer sportbikes and standards...flexible ergos, widely usable motors, and the ability to fly down squiggly roads. I took this bike through some of the roads around Baltimore county and Carroll county horse country; it's been a while since I've washed out a bikes front end; after a couple of scarier moments I dialed it waaayyy back and just putted. And that's the problem with a cruiser; you can dial it way back on a sportbike; but you really can't dial it very far up on a cruiser.

JMHO