Great Day At Triumph North London

The new Triumph North London dealership - now part of the Lind group - had a grand opening yesterday... a series of group rides, a lovely hog roast, music and general frivolity. They had struggled to find group ride leaders and tailgunners/marshals, and called me a few days ago to see if I'd be prepared to help out with the latter. Naturally I said yes, so as well as enjoying a really fun day I ended up going out multiple times on both a Bobber and Street Cup.

I loved the Bobber in terms of comfort and its relaxed riding position, and its certainly a torquey thing with plenty of power throughout the band (nowhere near as pokey as my 9T, though). However, on the twisties when I was trying to keep up with the pack I repeatedly found myself scraping the pegs, and I was certainly not pushing it particularly hard. My conclusion is that - for me at least - it would have to be a second bike, used only for genteel cruising. I kind of felt like I was on a Harley or something, though... very much enjoyed trying it out.

The Street Cup (which as I'm sure you know is a cafe-racer styled Bonneville with Triumph's 900cc HT engine) was a completely different experience... much more aggressive and a beautiful ride at any kind of speed. However, I didn't enjoy the clip-ons at all when poodling around in traffic, and the bike required much more input at slow speed than I'm used to. It certainly made me think about the lust I currently feel for the Thruxton R and - again - I'm thinking that the Thruxton might be better as a second bike. I'll have along test on one when I can.

All in all the day made me realise how much the R9T is the right bike for me - riding home on it was a joy after spending hours on the others. It was a great day too - the manager and sales team from the old Hertfordshire Triumph all came across to Lind, and they're a really good bunch.