KTM's 990 Super Duke is a hard, fast bike with speed and power galore - a machine you can grow to love for its very meanness, writes Tom Roberts
EVERYTHING ABOUT this motorbike is hard, sharp, fast and mean. If it was a person, it would be the Fonz's evil brother: the one who shaves with a knife, dumps women the moment they fall in love with him, and wears an expensive but scuffed leather jacket whose permanently turned-up collar meets his scowl on the way down.
Mind you, what do the designers at KTM expect? These are men who have spurned the curve to such an extent that they wouldn't recognise one if it walked up to them in the street and introduced itself politely.
The good news is that they've got the angular look just right, as opposed to BMW, who tried it in cars with the Z4 and in bikes with the 1200ST and got it not quite right, which in the immortal words of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, means that they may as well not have bothered in the first place.
If you don't believe me, take a look at not only the Super Duke, but KTM's astonishing 1190 RC8.
Like it, the Duke looks like a two-wheeled Stealth fighter, especially in the lustrous black of the test bike.
The effect is industrial and muscular, spoiled only slightly by a horn which sounds like the truncated mewlings of a mangy tomcat, and the occasional scream as someone accidentally places their hand on the exhaust to find that it's reached the core temperature of a nuclear reactor.
But that's later. For now, start it up, and the big twin settles into a purposeful snarl. Climb aboard, and the position is firm but comfortable. Ride off, and the great news is that while the bike may look sharp and hard, the clutch is silk-smooth.
Believe me, it needs to be, with a throttle so quick that it reminds me of the Triumph Spitfire I had in the early 1980s on which the go-faster pedal was more of an on-off switch.
However, that's where the resemblance ends, for I fear that no amount of fiddling with the Spitfire's twin carbs would have got it from zero to illegal in first gear the way the Duke does, with a phenomenal combination of power and smoothness that will have you grinning all the way to the first corner.
This is where the fun really begins, with the combination of those almost vertical forks and firm damping creating steering as direct as a children's tricycle.
What does that mean? It means if you go into a corner a little quicker than you'd planned, you'd better be a black belt in the dark art of counter-steering.
The good news is that if you take your time getting to know the Duke, you can use that miraculous combination of power, lightness and accurate steering to brake hard using the excellent four-pot Brembos, fling it into corners, reach the apex, then just point and shoot at the next corner.
And this is a bike you need to get to know, especially because it's got an engine that just hates pottering about below 4,000 revs. Even cruising steadily below that, it complained so much that I actually thought there was a fuel delivery problem.
But no; as Philip McCallen, the former race ace who's just got the KTM franchise in Northern Ireland, says, this is a bike that loves to be in a particular power band, and hates to be outside it. And he was right: at 7,000 or 8,000 on the tachometer, it sings like a choir of freshly washed angels.
So turn up your scuffed collar until it meets your scowl, pocket your shaving knife and treat this bike hard and fast and mean. It will love you for it, and you'll grow to love it right back.
Factfile KTM 990 Super Duke
Engine and performance:twin cylinder, liquid- cooled four-stroke, V 75, 999cc, bore x stroke 101 x 62.4mm; 118bhp; 88kW @ 9000 rpm, top speed: 137mph; 100 Nm @ 7000 rpm; compression ratio: 11.5:1; six gears, dog-clutch engagement
Fuel:generation electronic fuel injection
Drive:primary: 67:35; final: 16:38
Clutch:Wet multi-disc, operated hydraulically
Motor management:Keihin EFI
Colours:black, silver and orange
Price:€14,500. Dublin dealer is Killeen Motorcycles; www.killeenmotorcycles.com.
Test bike from Philip McCallen, www.philipmccallen.com