Drive Impression: Honda CB1000R ABS
August 10th, 2009 
Russell Drive Impression: Honda CB1000R
Yes, and bikes too.
Sure looks mean.
The Honda CB1000R is an aggressive looking motorcycle reminiscent of a Bulldog, leaving you with the feeling that it might attack you at any time. Once you get on the bike though, in common with a pet bulldog, it is a docile friend.
Honda say that the CB1000R was designed in Europe for European riders and it does have the purposeful streetfighter looks with design cues borrowed from machines like the Ducati Monster. It uses the 2007 Fireblade motor tuned for a more road-orientated ride. The Honda tuners managed to let 40 raging horses escape during the process. The bike is very easy to ride and novice riders won’t scare themselves.
Our test bike, which was equipped with ABS, arrived on a rainy Thursday but the temptation was too great – after waiting several hours for the rain to clear, I could wait no longer. I jumped on the bike and took it for a ride on the wet roads.
It’s in these conditions that you appreciate the bikes re-tuned engine, riding without fear of a huge power induced highside.
The bike handled superbly on the wet and cold roads and the brakes were impressive. There is so much feel that I had to look again to make sure they hadn’t accidently fitted radial units to the test bike. For those of you that don’t know, selecting the ABS version of the bike means sacrificing the radial brakes fitted to the non-ABS model.
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