VIDEO: It turns out you CAN hustle a Yamaha Niken on a hillclimb... so there!
The Yamaha Niken may defy a lot of conventions for what many consider to be a motorcycle... but that doesn't mean you can't wring the neck of it
Ahh, the Yamaha Niken.
Is it a motorcycle? Is it an entirely different breed of transport? Is it the answer to question nobody asked?
Frankly, it doesn’t matter because the Yamaha Niken is a thing, it does exist, get over it.
We don’t need to read the (many) comments on our social media threads to recognise the Niken divides opinions with a cheese wire. Even for a ‘trike’ it’s controversial, pops both wheels with independent forks at the front, with the single wheel at the rear.
However, if you disengage that conventional part of your brain and gauge the Niken for what it is and why it was created, it does start to make some sense.
For one, it is a GT and that means covering Touring mileage over a Grand distance, which it does with aplomb since the extra wheels improves refinement, dissipates the bumps more easily and - because not all of us want to put a knee down - feels reassuringly stable.
Then again, there are those that ‘do’ like getting a knee down and while the 45-degree lean angle maximum on the Niken means if you’re getting your knee right down then the motorcycle is probably about to come with you, who says you can’t ride it with interest.
That’s the premise for this video posted to Yamaha’s social media channels as Mark Forsythe attempts to complete a speedy hillclimb at Kirkby to prove you can hustle a Niken with interest, even if doing so somewhat defeats the purpose.
If you’re prepared to watch a Niken do things it wouldn’t normally do, watch on...
