The other night, I get a call from my dad. Its a lovley sunny evening. "What you doing? Fancy a ride on Nelli?" Hellll yeah. So I jump on the Bandit and head down to dads. Sure enough I get there and theres two Benelli Tornados sitting outside, gleaming in the sun, ready to be fired up.
We go for a nice ride down to the coast (Rye) and I love the hour of getting used to the Tornado. The speed, power delivery, weight, brakes, everything about it is superb, especially compared to other bikes i've ridden. Its a rare site to see 1 Tornado, but to see 2 of them, one being an LE model, is quite rare and we soon had a few people looking at the bikes as we got some chips in Rye
On the way home I get offered to ride the LE "nahhh im ok on this one" I say with a huge grin still planted from ear to ear. We head off down more sweeping roads. "Damnn I love this bike" Im thinking. That 900cc triple has bags of power low down, plenty to keep you entertained. Revs higher than the twins, but fades off top end the same way. The brakes are lightning sharpe, and im loving every minute.
We come to a small roundabout, dad goes in fast, out fast. I come in slow, with the intention to come out fast. As I wind open the throttle, the back end stes RIGHT out to the left, I instantly come off throttle
and it highsides back to the right, me clinging on.......
It holds, im back on the straight and narrow, no time for adrenaline, dads gone... I give chase, but something never fealt right, every corner the back end fealt skittish, something wasn't right.
Eventually came to a village and I caught him up, telling him whats happened. We pull over, and im overtaken by a cloud of steam. ARGHH what have I done.... The bikes rear wheel was covered in coolent and its slowly dropping out the bottom, but then stops? Strange.
So, what to do, dad rides the tornado, I have to take the LE home, what a shame. "I don't mind you dropping the standard one, but drop that LE and your dead"
I had these thoughts running in my mind all the way home. Jumping from one bike to the other though, what a difference. The bike fealt so much sharper and more flickable. I enjoy the last 20 minutes home even more
We get home to find its a material issue. When out of the castings, the early engines had poor quality materials and eventually the coolent leaked through. ?20 later, a new engine bung, with better quality material, fitted, sorted, shes back ready to go.
Im invited out for another run soon, I can't wait.
