Royal Enfield has built a really good looking motorcycle with the new Royal Enfield Continental GT. Having gotten that out of the way, let me first touch upon how I happened to take a test ride on it. I landed up at the Royal Enfield Brand Store near my parents house with an intention of getting a test ride on the new Royal Enfield Bullet 500, the one with the carb.

The brand store did not have one available and since I had started filling out the form, I decided to ride this thing.

Cafe Racers have always had a place in my heart, given that I built both my Yamaha RD350 and Thunderbird 350 into them. So, I was a little skeptical about how a mass manufactured one would feel compared to the custom built one.

I’ll start with the seating position

The tank is long, but the lean to the handle bars is not really as extreme as a real racer/ sport bike. I am about 5’10” and the motorcycle felt really comfortable to sit on. Once I got moving, the pegs are also at a relaxed low position, which lets you ride this without having to get all scrunched up. That’s nice and I can see myself doing a long trip on it without too much trouble. If I can get a little luggage on it. Going through corners does not feel too unnatural. The twin down-tube cradle chassis makes it feel different, but in a better way.

Next comes the power

The motorcycle claims to makes a little over 29 bhp @ 5100 rpm and 44 Nm @ 4000 rpm. The motorcycle I rode, felt like had half of that. I really feel like I should be giving RE a little benefit of doubt that the test ride motorcycle has been detuned to save people from crashing it. There just cannot be another explanation to the way it sluggishly went up Jayadeva Flyover and gathered a little speed as it rolled down on the other side. That was how it felt when I opened it up on the longest stretch of the test ride. The stretch ended at a signal where I let the motorcycle idle which it did beautifully. And, without vibrations.

The rest of the test ride was on smaller roads, which I ride every day, and consequently took it easy.  I will wait till I have a proper ride on another motorcycle till I make up my mind on the power of this motorcycle.

 How comfortable is it?

I know this kind of overlaps with the section above, which speaks about the seating position. But, I wanted to let that have its own little section. The suspension is what I’d like to touch upon here. The front setup is 41mm forks with 110mm travel and the rear is “Paioli,Twin gas charged shock absorbers with adjustable preload, 80mm travel” according to the Official RE Continental GT website.

The suspension works really well, and when I rode through the smaller roads with broken tarmac and/ or speed bumps, it did not feel uncomfortable. I think this is a great direction for RE to have headed in and hope all their motorcycles achieve this level of comfort.

On the other hand, I did not really get to test it at higher speeds through long corners, given the urban and short nature of the ride.

A side note to the  comfort, the sound of the Continental GT is nicely muffled by the silencer. Design wise, I think its okay, given that it needs to pass all kinds of regulations.

Fit and Finish

Nice paint job and nicely integrated accessories make it one of the best RE motorcycles to have been produced. All the parts have a custom design feel to it and do not feel like its been tackily put together from the RE parts bin. The Red motorcycle that I rode casts lovely reflections and hope the paint keeps its quality for a few years at least.

Ugly part of Royal Enfield Continental GT

Two ugly parts actually:

1. The tank cap. Just hate the way the fuel cap juts out above the tank and feels like its a cheap tack-on. The cap while retaining the design, could have been integrated so much more beautifully onto the tank compared to what has been done. It may be a point to improve for version 2.0 of the RE Continental GT.
2. The mudguard extensions: This is something that can be fixed by the person who buys one of these motorcycles. They need to be removed and buried deep under ground.

Later one evening

Later one evening, I dropped by at another Royal Enfield showroom (remember why I went to the Brand Store in the first place?), which had a Continental GT with some more accessories. One of the best, which I really like is the bar end mirrors. Neat job Royal Enfield!

I would have really liked to check out the lights that missed in the road test above, but it was way past 7 p.m. and the test ride bikes had been packed up for the night.

Royal Enfield Continental GT – Test Route

The route through which I took this motorcycles is 5 kilometre loop starting at the marker at the left point. The longest stretch on the map goes up and down a flyover, and that’s where I get the acceleration feel from. The rest of the route is through 2-lane roads of BTM Layout and the roads around East End.

That’s a ridiculously short ride to actually gauge a motorcycle. But, that’s what we have for now. Maybe sometime else when I get one of these motorcycles for a longer ride.