Greetings and Salutations All,
Yesterday,four friends and myself went on a 300 mile ride to the coast. On the way down we took the twisted out of Cholame to Creston direct to Morro Bay. One of the guys was on his Triumph Expedtion type bike and he took the lead in the tight twists. I could not keep up with him. He motored through like a slot car. On short straights I could bully the bike and close gaps but all and all he was just faster. After we ate in Morro Bay we came back via route 166. The turns were there alright, but much faster stuff. The two of us jumped out there again and pretended like there were no consequences or CHP and let the machines have all the lead needed. If I was not at 7K rpm I was in to high of a gear. This was the first time in 5000 miles I have unleashed the fury in my bike on a prolonged basis. Let me tell you what an awesome piece of equipment. The power at high speed is staggering. Many times I found myself sucking up to the tank just to keep the front tire on the ground. After about 15 minutes of intensity the darn machine even got better! It seemed to reach way down inside and come up with gobs more power. Just a terrific Adrenaline packed ride and I felt the need to share. This activity is not recommended and serious side effects may result if this scenario is duplicated.....apogee

* Last updated by: apogee on 9/28/2015 @ 6:25 AM *

Glad you had fun!

I agree with everything you said. I have had mine on the dragon in TN and the Cherolhala Skyway and it was fun on both.

Howerver I had a much more challenging time on the VERY tight rapid succession turns of the dragon vs the large sweepers on the skyway.

Sounds like a blast. I had a similar experience earlier this year when I happened across a guy on a dual sport bike of some kind. Ducati, I think. It was all I could do to keep up with him in the tight corners and I was pushing the bike outside of my limits. Once we goto out to the main road, I coulda passed him easy but thought better of it. I had had enough risk for one day already.

Fastest bike I ever saw was a guy on a goldwing with a teddy bear bungied to the back. I was on my Daytona 675 in the twisties with my dad and a friend and he passed all three of us like we were sitting still. Tried to keep up but 3 curves later he was gone. I'm not that fast, but that guy could ride.

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt

..and saw the dude with the wing.... insane.... lol

More and more, I'm preferring the thrill of slicing and dicing the twisties. Straight line acceleration is still fun every now and then, but being able set up for a turn, ride the line, and power out of it faster than I went in is much more satisfying. The ZX14R is perfectly capable of keeping up with anything, except maybe litersport race replicas. The rider is much more the limitation. Highly recommend taking a track day if you have not done so already. I learned more in my first TD than all the years of road riding up to that point.

* Last updated by: Volfy on 10/23/2015 @ 9:42 AM *

Yeah, depending on the road, nothing will keep up with a well ridden supermoto or adventure bike. But let the road open a bit and the ZX just flies. I had a high speed dual with a GSXR750 and a Busa recently. The guy on the Busa kept looking in his mirrors trying to figure out why he wasn't dropping me. Big fun, just glad the cops decided to be somewhere else that day.

Mad

As someone who used to roadrace in WERA and CMRA, I can tell you that the ZX14R will NOT keep up with most smaller bikes in the hard twisties with equal riders. That said, it is a very capable bike and is more than most can handle.

For street riding it's more about what a rider wants. The biggest disadvantage is being heavier and harder on the rider in the twisties for prolonged periods. As far as physically going around a corner? Yeah you can get a little more lean and shorter turning radius of the lighter and smaller bikes but it's not going to be much but on the street it's mostly just going to be about the physical limits of tire grip compared to anything else. There's stories about LEOs on full Harley dressers chasing down squids on 600s for a reason.