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EICMA 2006

I went to EICMA 2006 yesterday with some friends and had a great time. The automatic ticketing system worked like a charm. Just hold the printed bar code in front of one of the many kiosks and it writes the personal ticket on the spot. I forgot to mention their Pocket PC application in my previous post; it downloads the entire catalog and map of all the stands offline. The only thing missing was a Bluetooth or wifi system that could be used for finding out where you were.

= Bikes =
There were loads of beautiful bikes. Too many to mention here. My favorites were two new Aprilias.

Aprilia 750 Shiver
I really like the looks of the bike and it is comfortable even for someone as big as me. It has a new 90° V2 that is extremely compact and capable of offering levels of power (95 CVs) that are comparable to the category’s 4-cylinder bikes. 
  

Aprilia 850 Mana
It is a good looking bike but the really cool stuff is the technology in the bike. It has a totally automatic transmission and a sequential shift with 7 gears and three separate mappings.

 

Suzuki B-King
The "Baddest" looking bike was the Suzuki B-King. It may well be the King of the road with its 1300cc engine but when it is too much it is just too much:
 

 

= Moto Live =
I tried the Yamaha MT-03 and quickly realized it has been almost two decades since I drove a motorbike with a manual shift. It was raining and the “track“ was wet and extremely slippery which did  not make it any better. I did not make a total fool of myself but it was not able to drive it like I wanted through the corners. Spoiled by using a scooter too long I guess.

I had a great time with the Goes Quads though. I am large enough to force it to go where it should go and slide it trough the corners on the dirt track. Great fun to drive on a dirt track but I cannot understand why people buy them to drive them in town…