Greetings, podcast pilgrims, and welcome to Front End Chatter - just like having a fun chat down the pub with your mates about bikes, only without the drinks, or the ability for you to say anything back, or your actual real-life mates being involved. Or the fun, come to think of it. Alright, so it's nothing like having a fun chat down the pub with your mates, and much more like earwigging in on a pair of motorcycling mid-life crises unfolding in real time, mixed in with the odd history lesson pinched shamelessly from Wikipedia, half a badly photocopied GCSE maths exam paper, and a few swear words. Still, after 190-odd of these things it's somehow gathered enough momentum that neither of us knows where the handbrake is.

 

And so in episode #191 of this moss-dodging rolling stone, Simon and Mufga cover:

 

• KTM's return to building sportsbikes, in the thinly camouflaged guise of the new 990 RC R, heading to a Supersport race series near you

• MotoGP's plans to drop two dress sizes by summer, slim down those aero love handles and give their saggy rear ends a long-overdue lift

• Yamaha's XSR900GP, which proves it can delight everyone from Rose-Tinted Racers to Portuguese school kids

• Husqvarna's Svartpilen 801, which also stirs together dollops of the past, present and future like a timeline trifle

• BMW's new Automated Shift Assistant tech and, perhaps more intriguingly, which as-yet-unannounced (but possibly already-photographed) bike it'll debut on

• Whether one bike exists that could possibly replace a listener's pretty awesome-sounding three-bike garage

• What motorcycling experiences you'd want to experience if your body had just a few years of riding left in it

• Why tyres dare to demonstrate so alarmingly little respect for mathematical consistency

• Whether hip replacements and motorcycles go together like a femoral head and an acetabulum

 

If you get through all that and are thirsty for more, don't forget to like and rate and subscribe and leave a comment and tag a friend and all the rest, but most importantly do remember the great and benevolent Bennetts the next time your motorcycle insurance is due. Go on, they're Britain's best bike insurers, and if you get your insurance direct from them you'll also get free BikeSocial membership, which is statistically possible to make your motorcycling year both better and cheaper by virtue of its capacious catalogue of discounts, deals, experiences, offers, opportunities and more!

 

As always, if you're on the X-stagram socials you can find us lurking at @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

 

And if you're reading this in May 2024, it's not quite too late to join us on our incredible Viva FECspana tour - head to bit.ly/fecspain

 

Peace, love and understanding x