FIRST RIDE
P60
2014 HONDA GROM
(Right) A fuelinjected 125cc
four-stroke
powers the
little bike from
Honda.
The Grom comes in red and black.
(fully fueled, etc.) to a stop. The
hooligans amongst us also had
no problems doing nice big stoppies on the Grom, the front brake
nicely paired with a fat (120/70-12)
front tire – almost as if the designer had stoppies in mind. Wheelies
were tougher, but also doable, but
only in a closed-course environment (more winking here).
The Grom handles well and
turns on a dime with its short
wheelbase of 47.4 inches, but
it's also plenty stable in a straight
line at speed. And what is that top
speed? Right around 60 mph.
Newbies and the vertically challenged will find the low 30.1-inch
seat height a real bonus with the
Grom. The seat is also comfortable and the bike will carry two
people (it comes with passenger
pegs), though you better be two
small people – i.e. under 300
pounds combined. Put it this way,
it will make you a bit more picky
when picking up hitchhikers.
Although the tendency at times
is to ride the Grom like a dirt bike,
it's definitely all street with an LCD
digital dash that gets a speedometer, odometer with A&B trip meters, clock and fuel gauge.
Speaking of fuel, the Grom has
a 1.45-gallon tank. Though we
didn't get a chance to see what
sort of mileage it gets, there's a
pretty good chance it's a lot. Our
down to the beach and back, the
digital gauge never moved.
The Grom comes in two colors
– Pearl Red and Metallic Black –
