Because I have the impulse control of a Gnat and the local Duc Dealer knows that he let me take out the Multi Strada last summer . Here is what I wrote in another forum.
Ok so I am a test ride hoe, Today was my early day at work so the ride home takes me past a Ducati dealership and I stopped. Just to poke through the used section. Jake the sales manager knows I have the impulse control of a gnat and tries very hard to get me on to a used Sport 1000 but I just wasn’t feeling it. Then he points at a Red 1200 Multistrada and says why don’t you take this out? I exercise all of my self restraint and say No.
Then the evil little guy starts playing dirty and says” I have to have 900 miles to sell it as a demo anyway why don’t you take it out for and hour and let me know what you think?” Well as I noted above I had already used up all my self restraint so I said OK,,
So the he grabs a dealer plat and puts it on then walks me through the bike
Keyless ignition Key/Fob thing has to be near the bike and you press the button in the center of the Bars to get the system powered on, then you hit the starter button that is right where you expect it to be.
Now you can pick between modes
Sport reportedly gives you all 150 hp (crank number)
Touring gives you 135 hp
Rain 120 hp
Enduro 100 hp
Then as you go into setting you can customize thresholds for the ABS and traction control system, I did not get into these but this should allow you to personalize the settings the way you want.
Ergos
As I swung a leg over I realized just how high this bike is but once over and seated I was immediately reminded of my old V Strom 1k High seating wide bars and pegs just a bit of your hips tell you that you are on a machine that should handle a dirt road ( I will get to that) At 6’1 I have no trouble flat footing this bike. It feels very narrow and very light. Center of gravity is high, but that said it is well balanced. I fire her up and there is the rattle that tells you you are on a Duc .
The Ride
Easing it out into traffic the chassis is light and feels bolted down , this bike is easy to move around but not quite as flickable as my old 999. As it rolls up the road and through the first few corners I am reminded that when you have bike this tall you lean angles get insane rather quickly. This is a fun bike! There is of course torque all the way through the band but the sweet spot seems to start about 5500 and pull strongly through 8500. On secondary roads the last 2 gears are pointless . The bike is a hoot to ride on the asphalt not a sport bike but clearly a sporty bike it has no trouble eating up the corners and racing to triple digits in the straights without a second thought. Clearly this bike that may move to the head of its class. Just for giggles on a secondary road I tried to lock up the brakes,,, couldn’t do it, but couldn’t perceive when the ABS was taking over either . These systems seem to have improved a lot in the past few years or Ducati has a particularly good one
Ok so this is a Multistarada so after hunting around a bit I found a dirt road crossing between two fields and back up on to a ridgeline then back to that asphalt . After stopping and resetting the mode to endoro I rode it a few time it has been decades since I did any real hard dirt riding. After a couple runs up and down the road I got a little braver and found this thing like it , A Lot. The endoro mode seems to mellow the throttle response just enough the bike doesn’t feel sluggish just more a gentler torque curve. Again I am not a hard core adventure rider but this could keep me trying.
After this little episode I headed over to see a friend at his work place, he is under the misguided idea that I am the kind of guy that would just impulsively buy a bike like this but after a few minutes I convinced him I hadn’t . He looked the bike over (perhaps he will comment on it later, and then because clouds were closing in I switched it back to sport mode and hit the interstate to bring it back. Here it again reminded me of the V Strom by repeating the one thing I disliked about the Strom. The windshield is set up so that from about 65 on up to 85 it buffets my head terribly. On the secondary roads that is not a real issue but on the highway this gets annoying .
Impressions
If I were in the market for an adventure bike this would move to the top of my list ahead the GS1200 (Much lighter )and just a bit ahead of the 990 adventure(nice engine). I am not sure I need all the high tech but they are on the bike so might as well use them.
