History tells us that the first machine that we now know as a Superbike was the CB750 and if you look no further in the annals of time than that then all is well. Honda only got there by the skin of their teeth however, as lurking in the wings during the same period was Kawasaki’s much higher specification, 750cc four cylinder machine that unfortunately was being so rigorously developed and tested it missed the limelight by the merest of whiskers.
Personally, I have always harboured a soft spot for those high bar monster muscle bikes that the yanks seem to have so much fun racing on throughout the 70’s and 80’s. Unlike the UK on the other side of the pond “proper” fully faired race machines regularly did battle with high bar naked monsters.
Revealed to a stunned European motorcycle audience at the 1972 IFMA motorcycle show in Cologne, the impact and significance of the Kawasaki Z1 cannot be underestimated. Marking the emergence of Kawasaki into the large capacity four-stroke multi-cylinder market, the Z1,…
Biking specials cover a multitude of ideas, with a mixed bag of end results, but Brian Foord’s creation is among the very best. Looking every bit like something that rolled off the end of a Kawasaki production line, this Z1000…
Z and the art of motorcycle maintenance The Z1R was suppose to be the pinnacle of late 70’s Superbike design, but wasn’t the raving success Kawasaki had hoped for. Nowadays stumbling across one is an unlikely event but occasionally one…
