Initial Thoughts On Triumph’s New Motocross Bike
Story by Jimmy Lewis & Trevor Hunter, Photos by Trevor Hunter
We picked this bike up directly from Southern California Triumph in Brea, CA, who performed a PDI (pre-delivery inspection) and handed us the bike with 0.3 hours of run time on the engine. From there, we took it to Glen Helen Raceway where we racked up the hour meter to 1.0 hours before performing an oil change at the track to simulate a true break-in similar to what the consumer should do with the new bike.
Starting with the power, it’s good. Is it class leading? No. Is it the worst in class? No. The Triumph engine boasts an ample amount of torque, kind of similar to the 2023- Yamaha 250F engine. This engine is not slow, but we feel it really caters to a vet rider or even someone who spends a lot of time on 450s. The power delivery isn’t exactly linear as it does have some small dips and valleys in the delivery starting with a smooth but torquey bottom end. Building into the mid-range, it drops slightly before picking back up in the upper mid-range to lower top-end, before falling off again on top near the rev limiter.
Overall, the power delivery is very rideable and unless you’re someone who lives on the rev limiter, this engine is very good. It’s very accepting of rolling on the power and doing most of its pulling there. We really liked the Quick Shift feature as it worked spot-on most of the time without needing to adjust to it or overcome any hiccups in the power. The shifting itself is a little notchy in comparison to most bikes these days, but we often see this with new bikes and it typically improves as everything breaks in within a few hours of riding.
The KYB suspension components on this bike are great. We’ve been told to stay close to ~100mm of sag, which is slightly less preload than what we’ve come to expect from bikes these days, but it works for this bike. The balance and feel of the chassis was positive with 100mm of sag, and both ends of the bike were plush and compliant with enough bottoming resistance for the right size rider. Our 200+ lb riders were able to get the right sag numbers, though stiffer springs would go a long way with riders of that size. Still, the action of the suspension worked well, but it is sensitive to balance.
As the day went on and we didn’t bleed the air out of the forks, the bike worked better and better for our heavier riders as it helped to keep the front end up and overcome the soft spring rate for them. However, our lighter tester struggled with front end feel until he bled the forks, immediately coming around to the handling and finding the right balance – except the heavier riders were impacted by this and had to suffer for the rest of the day.
The chassis offers a lot of feedback and handling feel, but in a good way. It doesn’t jar your hands or kick and dance, but it tells you what the bike is doing underneath you and where it’s going. The ergos are very standard and neutral, allowing riders to jump on and feel right at home instantly. We liked the Pirelli tires and the traction and handling characteristics offered from the MX32 Mid-Soft tires front and rear. The Brembo brakes are some of the best and we had no issues slowing the bike down.
Triumph hasn’t tried to reinvent the wheel with this bike and we applaud them for that. They took a lot of positive traits from all of the other OEMs and were able to deliver it in this package that is effective on the track. Right away, we’re impressed by the bike’s performance, but we’ll continue to tinker with it and see what works and what doesn’t, as well as test the durability as that is the biggest question mark for us at this point. Though having decades of experience building street motorcycles, they have enough experience that we expect it’ll hold up just fine.
