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/128126
MV Agusta 350 Tre Cilindri Racer Test By ALAN CATHCART PHOTOS BY KYOICHI NAKAMURA Y had to have been there to really appreciate it - to have experienced the full majesty of musical might as expressed through a set of open megaphones, before the day the music died in 1976 with the introduction of those stupid silencers. But nobody who witnessed a Grand Prix racJ in those three vintage years of 1965-67 will ever forget it, when the two best-sounding and arguably most successful racebikes in Grand Prix history raced wheel to wheel for 350cc class honors, complete with supporting acts in the 250 and 500 events: the Honda six and the MV three. Which makes any man blessed with the opportunity to own a genuine OU 16 OCTOBER 17,2001 • cue. _ example of each of these legendary bikes truly fortunate, as well as perceptive, and there is indeed just one such person in the world today - Rob Iannucci, patron of America's bastion of historic bike sport, Team Obsolete. The chance to ride the team's ex-Giacomo Agostini MV-3 at Cadwell Park a few months after hearing the magnificent exhaust note of its triple megaphones echoing round the Daytona banking as former World Champion - on the Honda six, amongst others! - Jim Redman took the Italian thoroughbred to a dominant race victory in Cycle Week 2000, not only provided a musical milestone in my own track testing career, it also permitted a unique comparison with the four-cylinder bike which replaced it. n _ _ so For exactly four years previously at Mid-Ohio, I'd sampled the 350cc four on which Ago had scored MV's final GP victory in the class at Assen in 1976, now also owned by Team Obsolete and, like the triple, retained in well-prepared but substantially original guise, without significant updates. Though once again it's perfectly proportioned, so that until you sit aboard the MV-3 you have no idea it's so relatively diminutive - quite low, but also short - the triple is a little bigger in stature, more substantial in feel than the later four which succeeded it. The Tre Cilindri is a child of the '60s, rather than the '70s, and as such there's a little more space for a sixfoot rider, even though its 'anatomica' stance was tailored around the shorter Ago, with the graceful waisting of the flanks of the fuel tank for his arms, and the steeply dropped c1ip-ons whose grips are wrapped in red tape, as on all his bikes - 'Mino' didn't care for rubber ones, claiming the smoother finish of the tape gave him more precise control, and especially didn't lead to blisters. But the twist grip of the MV-3 incorporates a ridge in it, just as I remember my first 750 Ducati of the same era had, similarly fitted with Dell'Orto carbs, and this allows your forefingers to have some purchase in twisting the slides of the MV's three 31 mm carbs wide open. The bodywork is just wide enough to give good streamlining, with your shoulders adequately protected by the fairly broad screen as you wrap yourself around the 4.1-gallon fuel tank, and allow your eyes to peer at the white-faced Veglia 14,000 rpm tachometer - what else?1 - nestling in a cage welded on to the front of the upper triple clamp, itself hand-fabricated to hold the oildamped Ceriani forks which are adjustable for rebound and compres-