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adjustment of riding style. Extremely rough tracks will see the suspension bottom out occasionally. It’ s nothing drastic, just annoying. Playing around a little more with the full manually adjusted suspension would’ ve fixed this somewhat. A great feature is the preload knob for the rear, it’ s easily reached and easy to turn while on the fly.
Moving, turning? Good. Stopping? Unbelievable! The V-Strom’ s braking system is amazing, as you’ d expect from the four-piston Tokico callipers and dual 310mm discs. The lever action is light, yet not too sensitive. Applying the brakes comes easy and provides plenty of feel, squeeze a little harder and the bike stops, it stops very quickly, yet the rider never feels like the tyres will lose traction, somewhat
helped by the‘ Motion Track’ braking system.
The front and rear brakes are linked, the system applies pressure to the rear when a certain level of pressure is applied to the front brakes. It’ s hard to determine when this comes into play however, just applying the front brakes under heavy conditions does see the bike stop well. The front brakes are great. The rears alone aren’ t so good and don’ t relay a feeling of confidence. Together the brakes are perfect.
Range from the V-Strom is reasonable at around 350- 400km from the 20-litre tank, we were averaging 18.8 kilometres per litre( 5.36 litres per 100km), making it comparable to many other bikes in the class.
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