This is the Yamaha MT09 Street Rally
A radical looking roadster driven by a rough three cylinder
In short, a nice bike made to throttle as hell !
In Street Rally, there’s rally
Messing hair up isn’t it ?
Caution though, he who says rally doesn’t say road rally
Alright ?! There’s rallycross too
Taking your breath away isn’t it ?
And this is not all: why not rally raid too ?
There’s street rally written on it yes or no ?
crusty isn’t it ?
Ok let’s not waste time:
forget about any practical aspect protection or comfort
This MT09 is not made to fool around
And that’s a nice thing as we did not came here for this
Being shoved between corners thrown into large curves
Get out of hairpin bends at full throttle
The Street Rally loves it
That’s its thing, its stuff Its purpose of being
So we brutalize the Japanese
We mess up with it
And we delight from the tortuous roads...drooling
Just like here with a machine equipped with
extra soft Michelin Power Cup tires
literally nailing the bike to the ground
Inside the beast lies a sensations factory
A huge heart making you say at every wrist rotation
Holy shit that’s good !
This three cylinder is a dynamite stick
There’s life inside of it
power that tumbles at low speed already
and a sturdy temper
One advice: If you are the throttle generous kind
keep one foot above the rear brake
as the MT09 only ask for wheelings
Only flaw on the hard pushing board:
The overly soft suspensions
Although not damaging the road handling
as long as the tar is perfect
Be aware that on bumpy roads they can give the bike some motion
We can feel some jerkings when accelerating too
mainly after tight corners
Too see if the whole set is efficient
we looked for a guy going really fast
Here on the Col du Chêne special that Julien has done several times
the Street Rally will find someone to talk to
And here it goes for a road piloting lesson
So ? what if we’d give it to you
for a round in the French rally championship ?
What is to be done ?
Well for time attacking I’d make the fork prepared
I’d put another shock behind
And further into details I’d put Beringer brakes
But either ways it stays a good stock bike
In terms of power there’s enough though ?
As a confidence I only ride on the standard mode in rally specials
because the A-mode is too much for me
Ok before getting to the dirty, the trash
to the great foolishness
let’s have a quick stop by the waterfront
If the majority of the machine is identical to the standard MT09
We can take note of some esthetical arrivals
Like the hum… well this plastic thing above the handlebar
There’s also a belly pan
A pair of hand protectors
Or even this supermoto style straight saddle
Gear wise, it’s really sport
and minimalist:
Four pistons radial mount calipers
Large fork adjustable in pre-load and rebound but only on one stanchion
Super small dashboard
And three engine modes adjustable at the handle
For the record, the standard mode is already spicy
As for the A-mode… it’s nearly impossible to ride
Seeing how fast the power comes
Ok, so much for quietness and serenity
And this water falling noise doesn’t it gives you guys the urge to piss ?
Ok back to business
For this review we’ve seen things in big
In enormous even
As he did the promotional Street Rally video in his ranch near Tavullia
Hey ! It was plain logic that he joined us
Yes that’s right ! Our second reviewer is him
The Doctor in person ! Valentino Rossi !
Joke ! It’s Serge Nuques in fact
Ok he’s not so young
but a green plants based cure that he keeps the secret
gives him the everlasting energy of a pimple faced teen
And on the Faleyras cross track
Sergei stoke us
with rain tires mounted and ABS fuse tossed away
It did not take Serge too long to handle the Yamaha
and play the fool with it
Sliding all the way
Constantly flirting with the limit
our knight found how to play with the Yamaha's 193 kg
and master the 113 hp measured at the crankshaft
Without forgetting to go for the show obviously
Which bothered a little the car pilots present this day
How old is he Serge Nuques ?
He must be about 55-60 years
So the Street Rally on a rally cross track ?
It’s great, it’s cool
A really nice bike because you can make it slide entering as well as exiting
with an engine that has a lot of torque
It’s very easy to find the right speed, the right grip
It’s awesome
On this kind of track would you go faster than the cars ?
I’d wipe them car-ish off with a hand behind the back
Am I right you sissies ?
Holy shit !
You bet ! better not piss the natives
Vincent Priat behind the wheel of his sprintcar motioned by a Yamaha R6 engine
Henri Navail at the controls of a Nissan 3.5l and 420 hp
engine powered Peugeot 207
Like two starving beasts they chased our poor Grolandaise antelope
That had to give it all to flee their sharp claws
To be fair, the two car-ish were not at their maximum
But hey ! That’s a Moto Journal video so it’s legitimate that the bike wins
Him ! that’s Cyril Despres
But the true one this time
Multiple Dakar winner
An as nice as talented pilot
He agreed to play the game
and test the Street Rally’s endurance
The least we can say is that Cyril Despres is an acrobat
And a damn bully
Fankly
We wouldn’t have guessed that a heavy roadster
could be so fast off-road
or even face such shocks
As the ground clearance quickly showed its limits
For the record we immediately put the bike on B-mode
Not that Cyril would have been outpowered by the torque
But we feared that the re-worked rain tire could not accept the 8.5 mkg
Although he did
And allowed Cyril to get to the end of his review
So ? could you win the Dakar with this Rally ?
There’s power sure
You know I’m used to 450cc
so here the engine is twice bigger
Twice bigger and twice as powerful
And there’s fun also…
yeah it’s definitely good
Not too heavy though ?
You must be careful on water puddle yes
But it plunges a bit forward though
And the roadbook is missing
And a GPS, a dash, a windshield and all this
But otherwise it’s nice
So a few things to add and you're good for a rally raid ?
Yes that’s right
Anyway I tested it for you and it works
Road rally, rallycross, rally raid
The MT09 Street Rally earned its name
And more than its engine temper
or its chassis quality
That is its toughness that impressed us
since, as you have seen it
we did not give the poor Yamaha any rest
On the Yamaha MT09 Street Rally
We liked
The engine’s really alive temper
The riding position supermoto style
The fun factor of the bike
To look at what the pros can do with it
We disliked
The weird looking headlights
The jerkings when throttling
The slightly too soft suspensions