this is the husqvarna 701 enduro lr and it retails in the uk for 10 699 pounds and it is
a long range lr stands for long-range long-range enduro stroke adventure bike we'll come to this
now it's a single cylinder liquid called engine it's the most powerful single cylinder production
engine on a motorcycle in the world and it produces 74 brake horsepower at 8 000
rpm and 73.5 newton meters of torque at the peak of six and a half thousand rpm
and it's an immensely powerful and blindingly quick accelerating motorcycle on the road
now what sets this bike apart from all the others it's got two petrol tanks you've got one at the
rear which the standard 701 enduro has and it's basically all under here but this also has the
front tank here which basically is all of this and you can switch with a little switch on the
handlebars between each tank so you can start with one and go to the other or if you are just
riding short distances you can just use one tank only but the amazing thing about this bike is its
range it does 67 miles per gallon which is pretty darn good and in a real world that gives you 310
miles on of the tanks or that's about 500 kilometers so that's a phenomenal range
and this makes this bike somewhat of an adventure bike even though it is not supposed to be an
adventure bike but with this kind of range you can go on some seriously long journeys and then
find yourself off-road exploring uh the wilderness the outback not that the uk's got any wilderness
most of it's been dropped down but um you know there are places you can go like we are here
i found ourselves in a wood near silverstone uh motorizing circuit
now i love the simplicity of this bike it's basically got two rider modes which you can
select by a little switch down here on the handlebars you've got one and two and you hold
it in it lights up and basically one is a sporty ride for the road and two would be more suitable
for off-road it numbs the parallel but makes it a little bit smoother so that you're not going to be
cracking open all that power off-road in slippery conditions and it's got abs
and traction control which you can also turn off
you've got proper knobbly tyres on this these are the continental twin zero tires 18 inch at the
rear 21 on the front and that's the optimal size for off-road riding sitting on this bike you get a
lovely view of the road because there's nothing in the way so you can basically see your front um mud
guard there or fender and you've got a fantastic view of the trailer head like most bikes these
days you've got a ride-by-wire throttle and um that gives a variable output depending on
the sensors that are going on in the bike and what the wheels and what have you are doing
this bike weighs only 155 kilograms without the fuel and to put that into perspective
a week or two ago we test rode a sort of uh one two five cool adventure bikes not really in the
retro bike but nevertheless that was 150 kilos on a one two five this is 155 kilos on a 701 cc
and with 745 horsepower so you can imagine the difference between this and a one two five with
only like 11 horsepower so this is phenomenal the seat height on this is 925 millimeters
or 36 inches and for someone like myself who's six foot three that's just fine if
you're a shorter say five foot ten or below this bike might be a bit too tall for you suspension
travel is 9.8 inches front and rear which is a fair amount for a bike that's road legal
it's nearly as much as a motocross or full enduro bike and this obviously allows for some seriously
good off-road riding and let me tell you this bike is supremely capable off-road and you can
pretty much do anything on his bike it's not just a sort of a green lane bike you could go over some
serious terrain in this bike you could get off the beaten track and forward your way where allowed
and this bike would handle it and absolutely beautifully so i mean it's a phenomenal
motorcycle off-road and um i can't think of anything like it on the market what i mean it's
a wonderful piece of machinery with the long-range tanks and the geometry that it
has this is a pucker proper off-road motorcycle with touring ability what else is there like that
now i've been on a sort of a quest uh in recent years um trying to find a bike that
would be suitable for uh trail riding something that's also road legal and good on the road
and this does it in bucket loads because the acceleration on the road when you open
this up is phenomenal this really is a quick bike
wow this place
and um it's also very maneuverable you can chuck it around it takes the corners nicely
it's a lovely engine it's got a super gearbox and let me tell you about the gearbox it's got a
quick shifter and if you've never used one there's nothing like it you can open the throttle out and
keep it pinned and change gear and it goes it goes through the gears like absolutely incredible so
i've never known anything like that up and down um this is a beautiful bike to ride on the road and
as i said as soon as you get off-road it's like almost being on a fully fledged motocross bike
it's so good off-road um there's nothing like it so i've been trying to find a bike like this for
myself and um so far to date this is the closest bike i have found to something i could use as a
sort of a fun bike to go off-road exploring and also to go on a bit of a journey to get there so
you've got the fuel range with the front and the rear tanks love it this has a 6200 mile service
interval which is very good and uh the one amazing thing about this bike um is there's a dedicated
map for a2 license compatibility so you can reduce the power etc to come in to the legislation for
excuse me the a2 license and you can have this bike once you've passed your a2 license and then
obviously once you then gain some experience on it and take your full license you could just go
back to the full power mode that it has and you've got another bike because you know it opens it up
far more so this is a bike you could sort of take with you as you progress through your licenses
now the brakes are very good on this you've got a single disc at the front and obviously at the
rear and it's got abs and cornering abs so if you're laying the bike into a corner and you
have to brake it's not going to lock the wheels up and throw off so that's a very good feature
it's a beautiful looking bike i absolutely love the look of it
it's a beautiful looking bike as well you've got the um guards here and it's a minimalistic
looking bike it looks like a proper enduro bike and it's really basically only one step away from
a proper enduro bike so this is about you can use on the road as well for protection you've got a
little exhaust guard there and underneath you've got a skid plate which is made of a hard plastic
it's not metal but that's perfectly fine and the um the chassis is there the engine is a stressed
member of the uh the frame now i love the look of this bike this sort of tank that goes up like that
reminds me of the sort of motocross bikes from the 1980s where they had the seat going up the tank
like that and i think that's a very beautiful design it's a a wonderful bike to look at
and um i'm i'm struggling to find any faults with it in fact there aren't any
now here's a bit of a dilemma if you are thinking of an adventure bike
then think to yourself why do you want an adventure bike if it's to go green laning
and just sort of ride 20 miles somewhere and go off-road a bit get this this is phenomenal
an adventure bike on adventure bike is a heavy type of machine they're very good on long journeys
because of their bigger capacity engine and you know because of the cruising ability at uh
uh with a bigger engine is is good but they are very compromised off-road um we just test rode
the husqv sorry the ktm 790 adventure r which is a very capable off-road motorcycle this would
be better off-road than that being much lighter and more nimble and there's less of it to uh to
sort of move about so if you want something for off-road green laning and some adventure riding
this is probably the better bike because you have the long range tank if you were going to
go extreme distances then being a single cylinder the way it's geared more for off-road than road
it's going to be revving you know quite high at long sustained motorway speeds for a long time
um but that's that's just something you could you could live with or just say no i need adventure
bike but um if you want uh something that's more for for the fan off-road then look no further
noise-wise this isn't too loud it's got a nice tone to it but it's not very loud so
um obviously if you are riding somewhere off-road you're not going to upset anybody
um you can obviously change the um the end can hear and get a louder more snappy sounding pipe
um but it's perfectly good for what it does now in the past i used to do motocross and i've owned
proper enduro bikes and uh on the road a more race um ready enduro or motocross bike is is not very
nice on the road because they're very snappy this is a good very good road bike and it sort of takes
away that snappiness that you get with a racing bike gives you a very usable but very powerful
road bike and a very good off-road bike and the verdict on this bike as you can probably tell it's
absolutely wonderful one of the nicest motorcycles i've ever had the privilege to ride and
you know it's this get one seriously it's so good i can't tell you it's wonderful i'm amazing and
i'll be sad to give it back
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husqvarna 701 enduro lr and obviously we love it
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