Review: 2017 Triumph T100 and Street Cup

I have no idea what I’m doing.

As I reach over and adjust the mirrors on the brand new T100 I catch a glimpse of an ex-superbike world champion riding behind me. He blips the throttle and with a tug of his arms has the nose of the Bonneville pointing towards the sky.

In front of me, a seasoned motorcycle journalist and part-time racer weaves from side to side, scraping his pegs at nearly a walking pace.

In between them is me. Bolt upright, hands gripped tight on the bars and riding dead straight. Marlon Slack from Pipeburn – commuter, tourer, sometime weekend scratcher. I’m not a racer. I’m not thinking about stoppies or wheelies or burnouts. What am I thinking?

Don’t Drop The Bike.

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I was in Tasmania for five days riding the new Triumph T100 and Speed Cup on Triumph’s money. Hard gig, I know. I was probably there because no-one else could make it, but I like to think I was mixing with hardened veterans of the motorcycle industry because I owned one of the old outgoing air-cooled Bonnevilles for a number of years. I did over 40,000 underwhelming kilometers on it before I sold it without a moment’s regret.

Because it was a turd. It was awkwardly balanced and top-heavy, crippled by snatchy fuel injection and relying on the same old tired narrative about Steve McQueen and Mother England and Crumpets to excuse it’s shortfalls. Which were many. What little power it put on the tarmac it did so without any kind of personality or charm. It was a Universal Japanese Motorcycle – and a slow one at that.

Sneakily I was looking forward to the release of the T100 and Speed Cup so I could shit all over them (metaphorically) and get thousands of page views from an audience here on Pipeburn who might appreciate the contrarian snark that I like to push. And all with Triumph footing the bill.

And a considerable bill at that. Just flying us all down to Tasmania would have cost a fortune.

Tasmania is a tiny little island state south of Melbourne, Australia. It’s isolation, depression and lack of work has it largely stuck in both the best and worst parts of the 1980’s. Huge parts of the state are unpopulated, covered in tall old growth forests and the rest is dotted by the most eccentric and isolated characters you’ll find in the country. We call them ‘Taswegians’. They call us ‘Mainlanders’ – pronounced ‘Mahnlandahs’ in their native tongue.

Read the full review at www.pipeburn.com