Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127768
FIRST LOOK ยท 1997 Honda Valkyrie 8 ar ley D a vi;i s o n h as b een bu ild ing a m ot orcycle th at wo uld loosely fit th e d e scr ipti o n "powe r cr u ise r" since such mod els were first conceived . Take, fo r insta nce, the Fa t Boy or H erit ag e Softa iI - old concepts, new m oto rcycl es, bi g m a rk e t share. An d w hen motorcycles sell the way Harleys h a v e bee n selli ng, other co mpanies can' t he lp but sit up an d take notice. Bot h Yama ha and Kaw asaki h ave presente d their own entries - the Royal Star and Vulcan 1500 Classic - int o the lucrative, nostalgia-driven mar ket that seems to have becom e the new wave of cruising. An d the market shall swell to accept one more...or so H onda hopes with the introduction of the 1997 Honda Valkyrie "po we r cru iser." It's odd, but th e n am e of th is cycle ha s a fam il iar rin g ... "Va lkyrie" w as cho sen with ins pir a tio n fro m Norse mythology. - a Valkyrie is an ange l-like being that com es to take th e so uls of fallen warriors to Valhallah, the hall of Odin, a N orse go d . H onda says th e Valkyrie is yo ur ride to heaven. Th at' s it. N o d oubt so mewh at env io us o f Harley-David son' s success in bu ild ing its particular brand of motorcycle, other manufacturers ha ve ste p pe d up wi th the ir own interpre tation o f w h a t Harley ' s kind o f cash -ri ch cus to mer wants. Honda came ou t with the Sha d ow American Classic Edition in 1995. It had every thing a Ha rley d id, including the fact th at it wa s m ad e in Am er ica. Hec k, it wa s even slow. Then Yamaha released its Royal Star, and suddenly the ACE looked like a joker. Honda is hitting back. The Valkyrie enters the rin g with the largest-d ispl acement engine Honda has ever made for a motorcycle - the 1520cc flat six that started life in the Gold Wing. Hond a wo uld o n ly cl a im th at the ou tput fro m th e rew orked p ow erp lan t was " ove r 100 ' horsepower." The Valkyrie will not be slow . Nor will it be called a Harley clone - engi ne archi tect ure and a six-i nto-six exha ust sys tem ensu re that. H ond a ackno w ledged the de bt the Valkyrie owes to Harl ey-David son, but tempered the adm ission with the notion that Honda had he lpe d right back. How, p ray tell, did they help Har ley? According to a spokesperso n, Hond a "seeded" the mar ket with the Rebel. No, we're not making that up . Who knows, ma ybe it's true that the big guy with the beard that just rode by on tha t b lack Wide Glide started out on a Rebel 250. But h e ' d never ad m it it. Will the Valkyrie be a success? Onl y the future w ill bear th is out, but we' ll have a better idea after we are given the opportu nity to actually rid e th e beast. Our form al introd u ction to the machine took place in Chi cago, this month - not ideal riding weather. The Valkyrie ha s a few th in gs in its favo r, th e fo rem ost being th at it's a Honda. So it's bound to work wel l. But the cru iser market is a s tra nge one, where sea m less per formance isn 't always the key to success. In presentin g th e Val k y ri e t o th e world's journalists, Honda tells a story that it says began in 1991, when a man named Mak oto Kit ag awa sketched a design for a performance cruiser with a