I put my beloved BMW F800GS up on the market final week. I purchased it almost a yr and a half in the past for the identical cause anybody buys an journey bike: That dream of someday getting on the market, away from all the things, simply you and your metal horse in opposition to the plush, inexperienced world.
After shopping for the GS — my second journey bike from BMW — I joined ADV boards, pored over path maps for multi-day filth rides, even began understanding the specifics of bike tenting. I’ve labored my manner into the place of Jalopnik’s resident ADV girlie. However I by no means did these multi-day rides, I by no means obtained round to motocamping. Even when I had, I purchased the flawed bike for them.
I do know, I do know, ADVs are purported to be good. They’re so scorching proper now, with everybody from Yamaha and Royal Enfield to Triumph and Ducati seeking to get a chunk of the pie first baked by BMW in Eighties. They will do something, go wherever, from the race observe to the Erzbergrodeo. In the event you want one bike for all events, an ADV is the one approach to go.
I name bullshit.
An ADV will do almost any process, on this level I gained’t argue. You’ll be able to observe them, tour on them, take them to the best peaks and lowest valleys. The issue is that, having accomplished a little bit of all the things on this GS, I’ve realized there’s no scenario through which it’s the bike I truly need to be on for no matter I’m doing.
Most of my using occurs inside Brooklyn, the place I’m touring stoplight to stoplight at what my GS says is a median of 10 complete miles per hour. At these speeds, a 500-pound bike that sits its weight over ten and a half inches off the bottom is a tippy, clumsy proposition — I’d quite be on an upright bare bike. Or a supermoto, if I need to go on to curb-hopping asshole jail.
On observe, the GS continues to be massive and heavy, however observe using provides extra grievances to the record. The faux tank’s cutouts aren’t nice for hooking a knee into whereas leaning, the engine doesn’t make aggressive energy, the tires are solely rated to 99 miles an hour once you’re making an attempt to do 105 down the entrance straight within the rain — I’d quite be on a sportbike, positive, however even one thing with wider bars on a sportbike body could be a step in the precise route.
But, once you’re offroad, journey bikes are nonetheless massive and heavy. Filth bikes usually have a single cylinder, and this twin-cylinder tourer with all its gas capability weighs almost double what even a giant filth bike does. That’s extra weight to hustle by means of tight trails, extra weight to choose up once you inevitably drop the bike — I’d quite be on a real twin sport, with a single cylinder and a license plate.
The closest the GS will get to feeling prefer it’s in its ingredient is the freeway, the place the oft-omitted again half of the journey touring title makes itself identified. I can load the bike up with baggage, hit the freeway, and let that 360-degree parallel twin lope alongside for hours. The windscreen leaves a little bit of consolation to be desired, positive, particularly in my highly-vented journey helmet, however to enhance on that you just’d want one thing like a Gold Wing or a dresser. Which you may get, and for lower than this BMW price me.
Mash the classes collectively, and also you get different cross-market bikes that exist already. A metropolis/observe rider could be higher served by a unadorned, with a sportbike body and extra upright bars. A observe/touring rider wants a sport tourer, as does a metropolis rider — although extra for the agility between stoplights there than the uncooked energy. A metropolis/offroad rider wants a twin sport, possibly one of many roughly 6,000 KLR650s on the streets of New York at any given time, whereas a observe/offroad rider wants one thing like a 701 or 690 Enduro with a spare set of supermoto wheels to strap to the again.
The one place an ADV is smart — a very purpose-built ADV, one thing larger than a Versys 650 — is for a rider who primarily excursions however nonetheless desires some offroad functionality. That’s good for Ewan and Charley, positive, however how many individuals can actually say that’s their real use case? How many individuals commute 100 miles every manner on daily basis, hit the filth on the weekends, and don’t have the storage house for a second bike?
However, in fact, we don’t purchase bikes based mostly on what we want. To cut back a motorcycle to a use case is to disregard your entire emotional aspect of bike shopping for, and that’s the place journey bikes actually shine. You don’t purchase a GS since you spend your weekdays chewing by means of Iron Butts and your weekends on the Trans-America Path — you purchase a GS since you may.
An journey bike, within the thoughts of its rider, is a ticket to wherever at any time for any cause. The theoretical capacity to do something and all the things — even when you already know it gained’t do it completely — makes all of the compromises value it to some individuals. Simply, to not me.
But, I’m glad I purchased this GS. A pair paragraphs in the past I specified that my working definition of an ADV right here is one thing larger than a Versys 650, and that’s as a result of I stand by what I stated about journey bikes final yr. An ADV’s capacity to perform a little little bit of all the things permits you to see dip your toes into loads of ponds, it helps you determine what you do and don’t like on two wheels. My F800GS, with all its specialization, nonetheless managed to show me one thing I don’t like: This pair of wheels.
Sometime, in my future, there’s a retro-styled bare bike ready for me. An XSR, a Z900RS, one thing smaller and lighter and nimbler than a lumbering ADV. I’ll keep in mind my GS fondly, however the purpose now’s to keep in mind it — to not proceed experiencing it. So, after a thousand phrases of me saying why you shouldn’t, anybody wanna purchase an journey bike?
