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/128165
Mondial Piega 7Jid~a!y 2Ju1fda 2Jelfer JIOnda.? By ALAN CATHCART PHOTOS BY STEFANO GADDA 11 ne year after becoming the first C1 person to ride the born-again Mondial V-twin on its world debut in action, when I demonstrated the freshly built prototype Piega in front of 35,000 Spanish spectators during the opening round of the 2001 World Superbike Championship at Valencia, I've now been able to spend a full day in the Italian spring sunshine aboard the customer Piega now entering production, riding on the new, very grippy, 1.67-mile Adria test circuit south of Venice. In doing so, I had a unique chance to mark the Mondial development team's report card on their past year's work, spent creating what's 36 JULv31,2002' cue I • intended to be not just a much betterlooking as well as more costly Honda V-twin sportbike, but also a more satisfying one to ride. Well, they did it: score Grade A+ for R&D work, with a distinction in handling and steering. In fact, just looking at the Piega in the metal before you throw a leg over it certainly gives you the expectation that Ziletti & Co. have succeeded in their objective because, while retaining the same engine and fuel-injection package as Honda's own SP-l /SP-2 donor model, the Mondial R&D men have created an extremely slim, small, svelte-looking sportbike which just oozes allure and reeks of Italian style. Painted in the marque's traditional colors of blue and silver, with a car- n • _ 51 bon-fiber option in which the line of the weave has been carefully calculated to accord with the styling (well, this is an Italian motorcycle, after all!), the pre-production bikes brought to the track for testing had no wire-mesh protection for the pair of radiators, nor the MV F4-style mirrors incorporating the turn signals created by Giugiaro Design which will be fitted to customer version. Still, the finished version looks considerably more classy than the prototype Piega I rode a year ago. When you actually sit on the bike" however, there's one thing that hasn t changed, and that's the rather wide-looking fuel tank, seemingly at odds with the Piega's pert, narrow posture. Even so, it's an aluminum masterpiece of metal-bashing (or, carbon-fiber weaving!), beautifully baffled inside to eliminate fuel surge, and thus weight transfer, under braking. This is because Roberto Ziletti insisted on a 5.2-gallon fuel capacity, 10-percent bigger than a Ducati, Aprilia or indeed a Honda V-twin - and while the broad, flat top to the tank seems at odds with the rest of such a shapeIy styled bike, you don't honestly notice it once you're on the move, thanks to your knees being tucked in tight to the flanks of the fuel tankcum-airbox shroud, helping accentu- A better ReS1? The Honda-powered Mondial Plega Is currently entering production.