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/128082
Test verda Black Strike 750 Cafe Racer The Laverda Black Strike is of improved quality than previou s Laverdas, and less "lazy" than the Ducati Monster. • • Putting the racer in cafe racer ' I had an un expected illus tration of the Strike's competitive side before I even sat on the bike, when first lapping Rijeka aboard the works 750cc Formula endurance racer, fresh from competi ng in the 1999 Bol d'Or 24 Ho urs. One of Laverda's duo of you thful factory testers came ou t of pit lane just ahead of me on the nak ed streetbike, fitted with the exact same Metzeler MeZ3 tires as the racer, and - ah em, proceeded to pull away from me wit hout getting at all out of shape. Very emba rrassin g. Okay, then came the long front straight, an d my fully faired racer pulled back a few yards - only to lose ou t again big time w hen we came to the twisty stuff at the far end of the circuit. I was both impressed , and humbled - until we switched seats and it was my turn to straddle the Strike, wh en the tables were turn ed and I pulled away from him mounted aboa rd the endur ance racer. Phew - honor saved: but how come? Well, apa rt from the fact tha t the endurance engi ne's enti re concessio n to race tuning consists of bolting a different exhaust pipe on to the stock engine and slightly remap ping the EFI to suit, the motor in the Cafe Racer is essenially identical in performance. But the Black Strike is simply more agile and easier to steer in a succession of turns along Racer Road , and has a bette r suspension setu p "to cope with the bu mps in a Rijeka sur face that hasn' t seen much maintenance during a decade of Yugoslavian conflict. The ride quality from the Paioli sus pension is excellent, an d provides good front-end grip that allows you to keep up corner speed while levering on the bars to change direction. And there's good grip from the rear thanks to a combination of the fully adjustable Paioli shock with remo te nitrogen reservoir tha t allows you to easily dial up any chang es, and a progressive rear link. Couple that with the revised steering geometry introduced earli er this year, which saw Laverda steepen the head angle and move the radiator farther back to suit , thus sharpening the steering still further but with extra trail to preserve stability, and you have a fine-handling package that arguably sets new standards for toda y's street "nudie" class. It's nimble yet poised, fast-steering yet improbably stab le for a bike with a short 55-inch wheelbase that's worthy of a 250cc GP racer. And then you have another reason the Black Strike could wa lk away from the Endurance racer - braking. Thoug h both have the same Brembo package with 320mm semi-floating d iscs ma tched with top-spec fou r-pot calipe rs a nd braided stainless-steel lines, the Strike stop ped far better at the end of the straight, thanks mainly to d ifferent pad s an d an altered d isc spec, all giving more bite on the lever. When I first saw the Cafe Racer logo ado rni ng the sidecover, I'll ad mit to sniffing at it as a marketing rip-off. But, in fact, the peerless handling of the Strike's Bakker-based fram e - argu ably the finest-steerin g series-p roduction chassis currently produced by any manufacturer - allows it to stand worthil y in the footsteps of the cafe-racer tradition. 28 even then, you 're still dependent on a hap py blend to create a qua lity product. It's like carefully ga the ring fresh produce and ingredients to concoct the perfect pi zza - onl y to be let down by a flawed recipe that plain d oesn 't work. Like Triumph , Laverda has spent most of th e 1990s bu ilding a 'range of motorcycles via mo dula r makings, incurring in the process some rich experience in ma king opposites attract. By juggling various comb inations of engine forma t, chassis design, pe rformance level and sty ling dynamics , the born aga in Italian manu factur er has succeeded in concocting (alo ngside th e occa sional flop - 650 Ghos t, 668 Diarnan te) so m e ve ry successfu l li mited -editio n models aimed at niche markets - motorcycles tha t work for th eir un exp ectedness and thei r imaginati veness. A g oo d exa m p le of that is the batch of 50 carbon -clad Black Strike 650 Cafe Racer s built in the past year, powered by the company's venerable air-cooled, 668cc, eightvalve parall el-twin eng ine. These go t sna p pe d u p so fas t, th ey' ve become collec tors' items . Appropriate, in th a t th e eng ine tha t power s them re presents hist or y on w hee ls . Th e y ha ve a lso fina lly been phased ou t for the Za ne factory's newmillenniu m lineu p in favor of Suz u ki' s