Thursday, April 19, 2007

This is a KTM SuperDuke and it's toolkit bottle opener.
Over on Pashnit.com, a guy who owns a Tuono compares the two machines...
I knew two of my friends had bought the duke and it would only be a matter of time before I crossed paths on the crater with them. I had been at the upper look out for about 15 minutes today waiting for a break in traffic when the distant sound of a Vtwin on the gas was first heard. There were about 4 guys up there at the time and I called it right off the bat. "That's a superduke coming up the road". He was still a few miles away but I knew. The other guys peered down the mountain trying to get a glimpes of the orange KTM coming up solo. Sure enough he came into view and I was right ( I always am but you knew that). A few moments later my friend is pulling up. I had already checked his bike out a week or so ago at his shop. Not waisting time he had already installed a full Akrapovic system, PC3, and a few carbon bits and gone +3 on the rear sprocket. As a comparison the Tuono has a set of Leo slip ons, map #2 activated and is -1/+2 on the sprocket.

So we enter into what is surely SuperDuke territory. One of the super twisty sections of road we have here. 2nd gear for miles cresting hills on the back tire crossed up looking at grabbing the front brake and setting a knee down to wrestle my Tuono around a dog leg turn. It's like that for 20 minutes or so with little traffic. The elevation changes are just wild on this road too. Even the Busa transitions a few turns out there floating the front tire down the back side of a hill. The Tuono is just silly on this road. Leaning a turn with a foot of air under the front watching the road drop away is very fun. Especially with two Superdukes in the mirrors. But life is too serious sometimes and after a quick ice cream stop, we went back to screwing around...ok, life is not serious, I just wanted an ice cream cone...One of the first comments that I thought might be of interest was the guy on the black duke was saying it looks like the Tuono has a noticeable power advantage.


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