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/128307
Checa use s quite t ucked-in 'bars, which are fairly well dropped fo r a pretty aerodynamic stance that's in keeping with the overall layout of the M I, where you feel part of a motorcycle that seems altogether more dainty than any of the others. That' s not an adjective I eve r thought I'd use abo ut a 240-bhp MotoGP missile, but it's a fair description of the Yamaha's general arch itec ture - it de fini te ly feels compact, and it's no wide r than the VS Honda, which of course only has a maximum of th ree cylinders across the frame, rat her than the Yamaha's four. Also. t he MI seems shorter than t he Honda, where you feel more dra ped over a bike that is just as slim but doesn't feel as nimble-steering and agile as much leverage fro m the steering as on the Bayliss Desmosedici, but that's because the Yamaha is so agile in co mpariso n to the Italian bike, hence Checa's tight, steeply d ro pped handleb ars that co mbine with th e fairly high seat to throw quite a lot of your body weight fo rward onto the fro nt w hee l via your forearms - more than the Hon da or Ducati do, that's fo r sure. But where the Yamaha is less co nfide nce- inspiring is the way it seems to want to play tricks o n you in turns. First ly, there's a strange handling glitch at the apex of tighter corners you must brake deep into , as in the ones at Valencia, and secondly, the electronic engine management system has been set up to disguise complete- And w hatever happens, you must force yourself not to blip the thrott le as you change down for each gear, because the ECU is programmed to take car e of that for you - if you fo llow the habit of a lifetime and do it anyway, it' ll only throw the system into co nfusion. Just grip the front bra ke lever with a pair of fingers, nick the clutch lever in and out as you backshift through t he 'box, and you can hea r t he engine note rising and falling automatically as you do so, in order to take care of eliminating any trace of rea r w hee l chatter or of backing the Yamaha into the turn, wh ile you worry about cou nting down the gears, maintaining moment um while losing sufficient speed to make the turn, and hitting the Yamaha , Ou t o n the tra ck the Yamaha steers very well and has quite responsive handling for suc h a powerful bike , especia lly flicki ng from side to side in t he fast esses before the last turn at Valencia, w here it seems more like a 2S0 co mpared to the ot her two Moto GP mo nsters. It feels very balanced and together, poised even - maybe too much so: You do n't see many Yamaha riders ever backing into turns o r laying rubbe r ou t of t hem like t he Ducati and Ho nda brigade do , in spite of a power output that is certainly comparable with the Ho ndas, judging by the 20 I mph tra p speed clocked dow n Muge llo's fro nt straight in May by Checa and Meland ri - slightly faster on their Yamahas tha n any of their Honda rivals but slower than the speed -de mon Iy the fact tha t it's a four-str oke motorcy cle! There's no e ngine braking at all when you downshift while braking hard at the e nd of t he pit straight - and eve n heated up, t he Brembo car bon discs do n't see m to have as much bite as on the Ducati, with a more woode n feel in spite of being full-size nOmm ro to rs (the Duck uses 30Smm rotors) . Th e effect of Yamaha's ant ilock software is to have the MI freewh ee ling the apex cleanly befo re getting back on the gas again for t he dr ive out. T hat's w he n life Ducatis~ Does this pe rhaps mean that the YZFMI lacks the feel the rider needs to start spinning it up and hanging it all out? That's not a quest ion I'll ad mit to being able to answer in just a hand ful of laps on the MI but at my reduced pace t he Yamaha felt much easier changing directio n quickly on than the others. And because it's so nimble, it seemed ready to hold a higher turn speed through medium-speed and faster be nds like Valencia's t urn one than the more point 'n' squirt Ducati. There's not as into a tum on the overru n, even whe n you have a gear engaged and the clutch out, wh ich at first is pre tty discon ce rting 'til yo u pe rsuade yo urse lf to forget you're riding a one-liter four-stroke . But, unlike o n a two-stroke - wh ich the M I greatly resembles in this o ne aspec t you must keep fanning the strange, stubby, very short clutc h lever Checa opts for (so as to leave space for the thumb brake he also uses) whi le you backshift through the gearbox, Zing, zing, zing, zing - down four gears in succession fo r that second-gear sweeper at the end of the pit straight, just like a 'stro ke r, Th e big difference is tha t you have to keep working the clutch lever between each shift as you do so, rat her than hold it in as you zip down through the ratios all at once, 'stroker-sryle, because this is what triggers the software, not the act ion of your foot on the brake leve r, as with t he GSV- R Suzuki I tested a year ago. gets even more com- plicated on the MI than it was alread y, because th e re are two things you need to wa tch o ut fo r at this po int. On e , t he re's a definit e fee ling after you've t rail-braked into the apex, just as you ge t off t he brakes and sta rt to get back on t he throttl e again to accelerate out of the bend, that t he fro nt w hee l is going to fold unde r you as the Yamaha suddenly tips into the corner in a sudden display of overstee r that the Du cati Desom sedici hadn't shown any ten dency toward. I wonde r if this had anything to do with the standard quite -high idle speed of arou nd 3000 rpm reasserting itself after the electronic ICS/ldle Co ntrol System had sw itched itself off from con trolling eng ine braking on two of the four cylinders? O r maybe the effects of weight tra nsfer com pleting their transition befor e www.cyclenews.com I co uld get back on the t hrottle again with co nfidence? O r even the M I's unusual backward rota tion of the crankshaft? Felt funny, w hatever it was . T he sec ond thing was quite different, t hough: the Yamaha's aggressive power del ivery at higher rp m, which makes fourth-gear w hee lies a fact of life exiting the last turn o ut of the infield at Valencia o nto the pit straight. Every lap I'd have the front wheel aviating aro und my chin if I tried to accelerate hard on the th ro tt le o ut of the left-hand bend w ith its downh ill entry. To start with, I was using first gear for t he act ual corner, and in fact the power del ivery is pre tty manageab le in the bot to m three gears, thanks presumably to Yama ha's system of t racti o n con trol. Th e front w hee l lifts quite noticeably: it's all fairly controllable , and yo u can mostly co unte r this anyway by thum bing the rear brake lever to kee p the w hee l on t he deck. But the bo tto m fou r gea r ra tios are pretty close together, obviously in a bid to maximize accelerat ion. and in no time at all you 've hit fourth - and that's when life gets a lot more exciting. There' s a sudde n big rush of power aro und 12,000 rpm as you shift up wide open on the smooth-action race- pattern powershifter, and the fro nt wheel stands right up on you , much higher than it did in the bottom t hree ratios. That's when you really appreciate the Yamaha's significant power output. It feels like every one of t he 240 horses tha t Yoda-san declares the MI motor delive rs are all present and correct, but on ly in the upper reac hes of the powerband, so you feel you need to keep t he engine revving hard all the t ime. And it really acce lerates well, with truly impressive top-e nd per- CYCLE NEWS • JANUARY 2 1, 2004 31