My rides on the R NineT Urban G/S consisted of some open rural highway to kick off the day, followed by some more sports-bike oriented roads later in the day, then with a pillion loaded onto the rear seat to evaluate its ability to take your significant other along.
Initially it was a little drizzly, with light misty rain falling and wet roads to test out the grip of the Continental TKC80 knobby style tyres. I was frankly a little surprised as to the grip levels of the Continental tyres. They really are quite an aggressive off road style of tyre, however they performed remarkably well on wet tarmac. Not once did they lose grip, meaning the traction control was never forced into action.
The Conti tyres also gave very good feedback, feeling planted and confidence inspiring, despite the impression one might gather from initial looks. The lean angles I was able to achieve were way higher than I had expected across a variety of road surfaces from glassy smooth polished tarmac right through to coarse and grainy freshly laid blacktop.
Without a fairing, there is some wind pressure on the rider at speed, however the small headlight surround fairing does a good job of taking just enough wind off the rider to make open road speeds more than comfortable, never giving the feeling that the rider was going to be blown off the back of the bike. As speeds rose further, a slight tuck of the upper torso balanced things out and the bike remained comfortable.
Naturally being a naked bike, don’t expect fully faired amounts of wind protection, but for those wishing to take this bike on longer extended rides I can happily report that it will do the job with all day comfort. A closed road along the way allowed the bike to be tested out above the $2 mark. It did so with ease and was begging for more.
I best mention the seat at this point. I’m a bit critical of seat comfort, and on my own road bike I have had a custom seat made to make it more comfortable for longer days in the saddle. So I had expected the Urban G/S seat to be a bit of a plank. It wasn’t.
It was comfortable all day, be it cruising along a police infested highway at Johnny Be Good speeds or belting it along the twisties. It never bit me once. While on the subject of seat comfort, as mentioned I had a pillion on board for part of the test. To set the scene, this pillion is a rider themselves and also spends time as a pillion on a late model Fireblade among other bikes.
The tiny perch of the Urban G/S did have me believing it might not be the best place for someone to sit, but it’s a bit like early Ducati Monster pillion seats, in as far as it looks like a postage stamp, yet is really quite a comfortable place to be. This pillion reported that the seat is super comfy and across a mixture of open highways and about 60km of super fun tight twisty mountain roads, never did they feel uncomfortable. Including when I wicked it up to keep a new Fireblade and GSX-R1000 at bay along the tighter section of the test route.
I would however recommend cranking up the adjustable rear spring preload and dialing in an extra turn or two of rebound damping should you be carrying a pillion. There were three or four occasions along the tight section where a combination of high corner speed/lean angle and a bump caused the rear shock to bottom out.
The only slightly negative comment from the pillion, was more a matter of being used to being perched up above the rider and being able to see where they are going. On the Urban G/S the pillion sits level with the rider and unless they are super tall, will have to have a little peek over the riders shoulder in order to see where they are going.
But again, this wasn’t an issue and although I could feel the pillion peering over on shoulder or the other, it never made a difference to either my comfort nor the pillions comfort. Just a little change in technique should the pillion wish to view something other than the side of the road.