The Triumph accelerated so fast that inevitably no sooner was a highly illegal speed gained than it had to be lost! The triple discs so powerful that I kept banging my crash helmet into the back of the owner's. If he was in a really bad mood I'd end up yo-yoing back and forth under the mad acceleration and retardation. Impressions of the triple were of a firm, stable ride, gorgeous exhaust noise, quite vibratory but not in a destructive way and mind bendingly fast!
Quite a few pillion rides followed. About six months down the line he was ready to move on to another machine and I admitted to some interest in buying the bike, stories of alloy frame break-ups not withstanding. A long weekend of testing followed. My own bike was an XS650, so the differences between the two machines, and their on the road speeds, were huge! But the T595 wasn't a difficult bike to ride, just one on which I had to be very careful how I played with the throttle and the sensitive triple discs. The riding position was radical to my own tastes, but after a couple of hours I became used to it.
Blasting the bike through my favourite A-roads, I was continually amazed at what I could get away with! Not just speed, but how far I could bank the Triumph over and how late I could brake. Such was the ferocity of the latter, that I'm sure similar forces on the XS650 would've broken the headstock off! The exhaust wail was almost as exhilarating as the outright acceleration. A couple of times I messed up the corners but the T595 was able to pull me out of trouble - I did have a lot of hassle working out if the fat, sticky Metz’s had any limits or not. A whole new world...
The other side of the coin was about 30mpg and, according to the owner, back tyres that lasted for less than 2500 miles - all that triple torque. After a day's riding of around 450 miles, I had great difficulty standing upright - the bike was so exciting to ride that I didn't really notice any pain until the day was at an end! The wife reckoned I would soon have a hunchback. I would still have gone for the bike, save that the wife was giving me death glances. Sex or the Triumph? Guess which won.
Many months later, another mate was selling his 1595 and I had the chance to get acquainted again. The wife was in a better mood, the price under five grand for a twelve thousand miler, and a large amount of dosh in the bank from me doing the overtime blues. This one had had some igniter problems, fixed under warranty but it still felt a rather disgruntled beast below 5000 revs. I was told to give it a bit of throttle to keep the mill running cleanly. In the meantime, the XS had been replaced by a GPz550, so I was at least in the right sporting frame of mind.
I broke through the 150mph barrier for the first time, and think I saw God in the mirrors... no, it was probably just the distortion! An absolute buzz to blast about on a sunny day but a bit of rain on the road had me half scared to death about laying down an excessive amount of the awesome torque, trundling along at slower speeds than the GPz could manage. The same is true for all the Jap hyperbikes, but in real world conditions something like a GPz550 is more than fast enough.
I thought about the deal long and hard. The temptation to buy something really outrageous like the T595 was very high, but the more I thought about it the more I inclined towards keeping the GPz and spending the dosh on along, long holiday. The wife wasn't too happy until I said she could have half the money to go on her dream holiday on her own. So the next few months I'm off on an adventure on a thoroughly old fashioned motorcycle but it has all that I need and its frugality will add up to more than twice the distance covered if I'd done it on the Triumph (not to mention relative armchair comfort) for the same money spent on fuel, consumables, servicing, etc. Worth thinking about, eh?
But I think I might record the Triumph's wail and play it back through my Walkman, it has to be the best sounding motorcycle in the world!
Dave Osborne