We’ve looked into the details of the three lighter adventure bikes you can buy today
Mid-size adventure motorcycles
In a world of big, heavy, and expensive adventure bikes, the Yamaha Tenere offered the riders something that seems to be missing in the segment – lightweight, not a lot of electronics, and a great medium size engine that can create a lot of fun – with a very comfortable price tag, it’s no surprise that it became one of Yamaha best sellers of all times.
But the other motorcycle manufacturers weren’t planning to let Yamaha enjoy the party alone, and for 2022, the popular mid-size adventure is going to get some serious competition.
This competition doesn’t come from one of the other mainstream adventure bikes makers – KTM replaced the 790 R with the 890 R – which is far more expansive and advanced than the Tenere – there are rumors about a 500 cc from team orange but with the 690 enduro R we do not see KTM pulling a 700ish adv bike from its sleeve… also the “problem” with KTM is that you either get the regular S version (which is not a real match for the Tenere, off-road speaking) or you get the R version with WP suspension what makes the price of the bike jump high.
Honda talked about an 850 version of the Africa Twin, but rumors about this bike have gone around for more than two years now, and we didn’t really see any progress on this project (if it actually exists) and also, from the single pic that we saw that seems to be an Africa Twin 850, it still looks not as slim as the Tenere.
BMW F850GS is way too heavy, Triumph Tiger 900 is way too expensive.
And what about Kawasaki and Suzuki? They’re not even in the game.
With both Honda and KTM do not have the exact product like the Tenere, two other companies want to try and steal Yamaha’s customers – both from Italy.
We’re talking about Ducati and Aprilia of course.
Ducati showed its DesertX concept bike in 2019 and now, almost two years after, it’s going to be officially presented. Why did they wait so long? No one really knows- maybe they wanted to wait to see how things are going for the Tenere 700. Well, it’s going really well.
The DesertX shows a thin, lighter body than other big, heavy adventure bikes that we know from Ducati, like the Multistrada, and looks like the ultimate machine to help Ducati fight the success of the Tenere.
“The DesertX is Ducati’s new Adventure bike, designed to offer great off-road capabilities thanks to an all-new chassis designed around a 21″ front wheel, and it will harness the performance and reliability of the liquid-cooled 937 cc Testastretta engine”
As you can see, Ducati doesn’t give us a lot of info about the specification of the bike – especially weight which is really important in order to understand if it can be a true Tenere competitor. We should get all the answers soon enough – with the world premiere set to take place on December 9th (2021)
When Aprilia decided to bring the Tuareg back to life, they thought about the best way to do it.
Hey! Why don’t we make it look exactly like the Tenere??
And this is how we got the Italian version of the Yamaha Tenere 700.
Just look at this Tuareg 660 and tell us it doesn’t look almost exactly the same… Why work hard if you can create something that looks almost identical to the best product in the segment… right?
The name Tuareg is not a new name – it belongs to a generation of the “Elephants” – big, heavy, low-tech off-road machines like the Suzuki DR BIG, Yamaha Super Tenere 750, Cagiva Elephant ETC – way before people started calling those big off-road machines “Adventure bikes”.
Watch the new Aprilia Tuareg 660 in action
Times when “bikes were made out of steel and riders made from iron” and it made complete sense to cross deserts alone on those big off-road machines in races like Dakar and Pharaoh’s rally.
Unlike the Ducati DesertX, we actually know a lot about the 2022 Aprilia Tuareg – it has a parallel-twin engine that delivers maximum power of 80 HP, peak torque of 70 Nm – a little more power than the Tenere CP2 engine that delivers 72 hp.
Unlike the Tenere, the Tuareg comes with a bunch of electronics – there are Four Riding Modes, two of which are customizable (one dedicated to off-road riding). ABS can be deactivated at both wheels or only the rear. APRC system complete with Traction Control, Cruise Control, Engine Map, and Engine Brake. All are accessible via the high-visibility 5″ TFT screen.
More electronics means more weight – Aprilia claims for 187 kg dry which means it is close to the 204 kg wet weight of the Tenere. There are probably many riders that felt like the Tenere is great but lacking basic technology – a feeling that his Italian brother can make up for.
Another soft spot of the Tenere was the suspension – we know of a lot of riders that ride off-road and riding hard, who invested another few hundred dollars to improve it on their bikes. The Tuareg has A 43 mm fork and progressive linkage mono-shock, both with long 240 mm travel.
The ground clearance of both bikes is the same – 240 mm and with a seat height of less than 860 mm, the Tuareg is a bit more friendly to the shorter riders than the Tenere. The Italian machine has 2 liters more in its fuel tank – 18 vs 16 in the Tenere – another point of strength over its Japanese competitor.
With a price tag starting at 10,000 $, its reputation, and all the benefits that come with being a product of a brand like Yamaha, the Tenere 700 is still one of the best bikes you can buy in the mid adventure segment. The Aprilia is new and still needs to earn its respect – it’s more expensive than the Yamaha but also offers some of the electronics that some riders were missing in the Tenere – that should be the main “card” to show when going head to head with the Tenere.
