What Do You See?

There is a moment in seminal 1990s action movie ‘Point Break’ when Patrick Swayze’s colead character – the mysterious Bohdi – dissects the spirituality of riding waves. “It’s a state of mind: that place where you lose yourself and you find yourself,” he explains. For decades, from a range of motorsport and cultural idols and icons, there has been a stream of thinking, philosophy and meditation of existence on the racetrack. Mostly connected with the feeling or sensation of finding (or ‘losing’) oneself in the ‘zone’ or being immersed in a world of extreme competition.

We can all watch and appreciate that going fast within the boundaries of a circuit takes extreme focus and concentration. It also looks formulaic, with similar lines and actions from those attempting to live within fractions of a second of each other. Like any skill it takes practice for a degree of competence. Unlike many pastimes, circuit riding comes with an alarming sense of urgency, trepidation, occasional panic and – buried away somewhere and not spoken about – fear.

There was a moment at the recent 2020 KTM 1290 SU- PER DUKE R launch in Portugal where a colleague in the British group of journalists and testers commented “your first time on a track is at Portimao with a SUPER DUKE?! Fair play…”. Perhaps the decision to unearth the possibilities of the Austrians’ 180hp and 140Nm of torque – the ‘ultimate’ naked bike – for first-time dip around a course that former MotoGP ace, track day master-instructor and key KTM bike developer Jeremy McWilliams described as “one of the hardest in the world” the previous evening during the media call was not the most lucid.

Slightly nervous, slightly overwhelmed by the ability of the company I was keeping and extremely curious for the first of six twenty-minute sessions in fantastic sunshine and twentydegree temperatures the moment of truth came closer. Luckily a two-hour morning jaunt around the surrounding roads of Portimao gave a valuable introduction to the new SUPER DUKE and the third generation of the 1290 ‘Beast’. 90% new for 2020 the thrilling amounts of torque from the v-twin was matched with a robust and stable chassis that genuinely inspired confidence. The bike tractored out of the tightest country lane with ease and a handful of throttle was met with the feeling that the bike could shift to another line at will.

At Portimao the road-going 1290s were parked outside the pitboxes. A walk through the garage delivered the sight of another set of Beasts; this time in track trim, with four models in full PowerParts race guise adorned with slick tyres and warmers attached. With the bikes warm and almost ready to go it was at this point that the words and guidance of McWilliams offered something akin to a soothing effect. The 55 year old has already spun a number of test and demo laps at Portimao on the launch and thanks to the prompting of KTM personnel like Street Marketing Manager Riaan Neveling and Product Manager Adriaan Sinke has agreed to act as a point of guidance. I casually ask if he remembers his ‘first time’.

“It must have been thirty-five/ six years ago; at the aptlynamed Nutts Corner raceway, close to where I live,” the Irishman smiles. “We had production bikes with street tyres and it was quite a special moment. We had no restrictions, no traffic and could go as fast as we wanted without worrying about speed traps or getting pulled-over. I had no idea what I was doing! If I went back today then I would have sought some instruction or direction beforehand. It was pretty special: getting out there and getting my knee down for the first time! I burnt a hole through my jeans! I don’t think anybody would get on a circuit now with a pair of jeans. At that point I realised I really wanted to do more. We also ventured down south to a circuit near Dublin called Mondello Park. It was a little better. Then Kirkistown. They are all within a couple of hours of each other.”

I’m doing my best ‘all the gear, no idea’ impersonation thanks to the people at Alpinestars. My Techair-ready Specter jacket is the ideal fit and the V2 pants with knee sliders (being optimistic) could not be any more comfortable. Black and white SMX V2 boots complete the compulsory outfit and must rank as the snuggest and easiest set of footwear I’ve worn on a motorcycle. Absolutely no complaints.

As I climb on one of the racespec 1290s and speed after McWilliams down the pitlane it’s impossible not to feel a ‘little MotoGP’ and get excited. I mean, how often do you gas a motorcycle in the knowledge that there isn’t an immediate car, pedestrian or traffic hazard to look out for? A few deep breaths and pitlane exit means hard throttling and into another environment. The plan is to take a few laps to follow Jeremy and see which way Portimao winds. Almost instantly the world is much faster and there is less time to get things done. I find myself doing daft things like flicking my gaze towards an imaginary mirror before tipping into a corner and the fact that Jeremy is ahead and seemingly cruising with one hand controlling the bike and the other pointing at lines and zones I should hit is even more humbling when I have the sensation that I am abusing the SUPER DUKE far more than I would on the road.

It’s hard to fully commit and lean into corners. The track is between 10-15 metres wide but it seems like 100; it’s tricky to know exactly where I should be and where I should be braking, tipping and aiming. At the same moment it’s utterly thrilling. The swoop into the downhill final turn that winds up to the main straight is like a rollercoaster g-out. The speed up to sixth gear makes my head shake, my vision blurry and I hold onto the SUPER DUKE with all the power in my arms and with the alarm that I might get sucked off the back.

Turn 1 is a challenge and remains so for the entire day. The dip into the braking zone makes my stomach roll and the apex of the right hander comes alarmingly into view and quicker than I’d like. Jeremy tells me to brake when he brakes but I have no recollection of trusting my skills and courage as well as the bike throughout the day. With more and more laps I’m learning that the Brembos of the 1290 SUPER DUKE are pretty damn good and I slowly get a bit later and a bit closer. Ironically, one of the most daunting parts of the circuit – Turn 1 - leads immediately into one of the best: another right-handed kink where you can feed the power of the bike in, slide a little bit, and then test braking prowess again for a tight right Turn 4. The section becomes a meaty challenge throughout the whole experience. Twenty minutes feels like twenty seconds.

Following Jeremy back to the pitlane the sensations are one of exhilaration, education, humility and wider understanding of the art behind track riding.

Dad’s Superbike at Grant Raceway in Michigan and everything was too fast and everything happens too quick, you don’t feel comfortable, you don’t trust the tyres: there are so many different things going on. It’s foreign!” Chris Fillmore, former AMA Superbike competitor, Pikes Peak winner and long-term KTM rider is another racer at the launch. “I grew up racing motocross and hadn’t touched supermoto yet. So, you had to develop trust between the pavement and the tyre. Some people have it quite naturally. Maybe ignorance is bliss! Some people never do.”

Second time out and we keep the traction control on the TRACK setting near the top and anti-wheel engaged. With the barrage on the senses fractionally diminished it is now easier to concentrate on doing things a bit better and thinking about positioning. I move more on the bike and progressively trust the tyres to enter corners a little faster and a little more committed. “I did a lot of road riding and it is quite different when you get on a circuit,” explains McWilliams. “You are looking at completely different things and obviously don’t have those reference things that are on a road. On a circuit the most important thing is teeing the point you have to hit before turning in or braking or even accelerating.”

As the afternoon goes on the confidence rises, as does the appreciation for how road racers go about their task. It is also easy to comprehend how the lightest gesture of braking, positioning or acceleration can alter fractions of a second of a lap-time. As for the racing itself I didn’t come close to overtaking anybody all day, so that’s another aspect that remains undiscovered. Chopping up the track into sections and working out which areas feel slow or harder compared to others – instead of just riding around and around - becomes part of the routine. Bizarrely it starts to feel a bit like tennis or golf: a process of hitting a few good shots, followed by fist-gnawing ineptitude. “That’s a pretty good analogy actually,” McWilliams says. “What makes a good circuit rider? Somebody who is very consistent, very smooth and learns good throttle control. A lot of things you don’t learn for the road you must for the circuit, like brake management and how hard you can pull it and how hard you can push the front tyre into the turn, how much throttle you give when you are in the turn. A lot of guys will go into a road turn and opening the throttle when they want to get out: that’s not what we do and not how we go faster, it’s the opposite actually and our rolling speed is much higher than it would ever be on-road. It’s another level.”

“I can only speak from the opposite direction actually; so being comfortable on a racetrack and going onto the street,” comments Fillmore by way of a contrast. “As a racer you hone your skills on slicks with tyre warmers and we push the limits. We understand them. On a surface that is unpredictable then that is another thing. For a person coming from the street to the racetrack there are a bunch of ‘red flags’ and it was the same for me getting on a street bike where I wanted to be much more cautious: there was traffic, white lines, guard rails and the knowledge that the road surface could change at any time or you didn’t know what was around a corner. On a track you know, for the most part, it is in a certain condition and there are track marshals to let you know if there is something wrong. So, you start to ‘turn-off’ all those little signals in your head that might make you hold back a little bit.”

Even from my very limited time there was a parallel with track riding and other sports in terms of the mental void where you think about nothing except when you are doing. For the most part - before I knew it - the track’s lighting system was flashing to indicate another session had ended. By the time of the last outing I’m still trying to digest what I’m doing. Jeremy runs as a guide again and gets even more specific with track markers and speed but gradually I’m also thinking about laptime and how much quicker I must be compared to the first try. In the last twenty minutes I’m shifting as much as I dare off the bike to try and get a scuff on the knee slider…but without success. I know I have marginally improved – even in conviction alone and gained a much deeper impression of the KTM 1290 SUPER DUKE R and its capabilities – but have also realised how potentially addictive this can be. McWilliams instantly agrees back in the pitbox. “It is something that starts as a hobby and it can become an obsession,” he claims. “There are people I coach on track that I see becoming quite obsessed. I think it tests everything: your brain power, your physical shape. You have to use many ‘inputs’ at the same time. It is not the easiest thing to learn in a short space of time and every time you come back then you can improve. The more you ride the better you become. Why do we keep coming back? Probably because we never really crack it.”

“Everyone is different,” says 33-year-old Fillmore, an avid surfer and fan of extreme sports (a ‘Bodhi’ if you will), when I ask him if there an added sense of spirituality attached to an activity that is hazardous and could be costly but then seems to ‘pay back’. “I’m competitive and I like pushing the limit of things and feeling like I am a little bit on the edge. I like to do things that scare me. It opens me up and lets me live a bit. It’s how I enjoy experiencing life.”

A portion of what he says strikes a chord. It must explain why track days seem like the domain of an exclusive club but remain popular draws. I cannot help but feel that my experience was helped by the use of the SUPER DUKE. The bike felt like a missile although the torque meant it was a blast and a whole lap became a simplistic process of flicking between 3rd, 4th and 5th until the straight. “You have more torque on this motorcycle than I think anything else out there on the market today,” Jeremy said. “Torque is our friend: when you have that much on-tap it makes the riding experience that much more fun. It doesn’t really matter what gear you exit the corner on this bike, we never use second gear here. We don’t need it because third has so much push to get it off the corner at any speed.You can become a bit of a hooligan on this and you can also ride it as sedately as you want. There is a lot of variety thanks to the electronic settings. A lot of options.”

On the last run I had the traction control down to 4 from 9 and the anti-wheelie disengaged and revelled in the brief laps with the bike giving marginally more movement. It still felt wild. The naked bike seems simple and almost pure in form but the 1290 is a sophisticated piece of kit. The slick tyres were another dimension; where a slide never felt too unsettling. “On any bike, of course, you always have the input of the rider to the rear wheel through the engine and you have to control the engine through the electronics: what we tried to do is give back the rider a lot more feeling for what the engine is doing and what the traction control is doing and this has been a large part of the development,” reveals Sinke of the 2020 model. “We now have a 6D lean angle sensor. We’ve had cornering ABS and traction control for a while with a lean sensor that measures the side-to-side and front to back motion of the bike and this one also detects the drift motion of the bike and it helps us to determine whether a certain loss of traction of the rear. Is it information to make that connection between rider and bike that much better.”

Portimao permitted a more extensive exploration of the SUPER DUKE and its new virtues. The satisfying part was the fact that I’d ridden the 2019 model for almost two months the previous summer and could already detect the improvements on the road (the quicker and shorter gearbox among various upgrades); the amplified limits of the track just increased the fondness and admiration for the bike.

“We are here just to show how good the SUPER DUKE is,” Sinke says. “There are people that use these bikes just for the track and we love that because it shows just how capable they are and how superbikes can be scared! If you are a good rider then you can be very fast on a SUPER DUKE. The chassis, torque and brakes: it’s a really good package and we hope we might be able to convince a few track riders to pick it up and I’m sure we will. You will ride the SUPER DUKE on the streets but if you want to go to the track then you won’t need two bikes.”

The 1290 lacks a fairing but that makes it even more brazen in terms of its sporting potential. “It is more of a hybrid: a race bike but more for the street,” ponders Fillmore. “The first thing I noticed was that you could really plant and put a lot of energy into the front tyre and trail brake. I think that was a bit more of a struggle on the previous generation. Coming out of the corner it is really good. It is one of those bikes where now you can grab a handful and feel like you are pushing forward. It’s an improvement. One of the most impressive parts was the chassis and when we went onto the street I was thinking ‘it’s stiffer so it’s going to be more harsh’ but the feeling was the complete opposite. They did a great job of making it so compliant for the street.”

According to Project Leader and creator – the man who fashioned the first 990 SUPER DUKE back in 2005 – Hermann Sporn, the traits of the 1290’s performance were born from some serious mileage on-track and with the likes of McWilliams providing technical affirmation for electronics, handling (the chassis is threetimes stiffer with a freshlypositioned engine) and even moulding the new Bridgestone S22 tyre with a compound especially made for the Beast. “We were given a free hand to make our brief for the new bike, and we had some discussions with management when they saw the amount of tests we were making on the track,” the Austrian explains. “We said: ‘that doesn’t mean it will be worse for the street…we have to feel the limit to know what the tyre is doing and so on’. You can sometimes only make discoveries at the maximum. 95 or even 99% is not enough. It has to be at 100. The work goes on.”

“For me it is always about testing the limits of what you have,” says Fillmore of choice of machinery for the circuit. “Right now we have the street and the track versions of the SUPER DUKE and they are pretty much the same except for some suspension, but the biggest thing are the tyres. A slick tyre just feels different and you need to get up to speed and get to know them. The limits are similar…but you still need to find them.”

“The lovely thing about riding on the circuit is the idea you have a lot more freedom and that you can ‘test’ everything that the bike is a lot more capable of,” says McWilliams, a man who has battled on Irish streets, against Valentino Rossi and still troubles the stopwatches. “You’d never be able to do that on the road. Today’s machinery is so far advanced and with horsepower figures right up into the 200s; it is not something you can really use on the road. There are guys that are only riding circuits now and forgetting about the road.”

The search for precision, seconds, betterment, a strain on the bike’s potential and even the eye-widening effects of speed seems to be what it is all about. I couldn’t recommend it enough.

Constructed in 2008 and only ten miles from the rolling waves of the Atlantic, 4.6km Portimao has been a regular on the WorldSBK calendar since ‘08 and has been described as one of the most technical racetracks on the continent. Current BMW racer Eugene Laverty has previously likened Portimao as a ‘motocross track covered in asphalt’. The 15-14 corners (depending on configuration) and the undulations make for some thrilling and difficult sections with blind corner entry and cambered turns constituting frequent obstacles. Apparently Portimao could host it first round of MotoGP as early as 2022.