Here is a question for the forumites.
Does a bike have to have off road capabilities to be considered an adventure bike? I currently have a Triumph Sprint ST1050, which is not exactly an off road machine. But I consider my rides to be of adventure type. And I believe they should not be limited to dirt roads or paddocks. After all, every time I jump on it, its an adventure. Some would consider it to be touring bike, but you can still go exploring B and paper roads on it. So technically any bike could be considered an adventure bike, which is only limited by its riders imagination. Am I correct in my assumption?
Yes you are right in your assumption, just look at the people that have made round the would trips on bikes that were never sold as adventure bikes. A few examples are Nathan Millwood who road from Australia to the UK on a postie bike, Nick Saunders who has been around the world on a Yamaha RI, Ed March who rode his Honda C90 cub 23000km from Malaysia to the UK so carry on enjoying the roads less travelled on your Triumph Sprint ST 1050 adventure bike
Actually I read a comment somewhere. Adventure riding is taking the most inappropriate / inadequate bike to some inappropriate places and make it work. Or something along those lines 🙂
Adventure bikes as a term has only existed in modern motorcycling history. The first model actually designed and marketed as an ‘Adventure’ bike is generally accepted to be the BMW R80G/S in 1980. Although other bikes were available earlier that also fitted the same brief they weren’t marketed as such.
Before that all bikes were adventure bikes, you rode what you had wherever you went, and given that a lot less roads were sealed than are now a lot of that riding would be classed as ‘Adventure’ riding under todays labelling.
Now we just need to get some knobblies on your Sprint.
Going Postal by Nathan Millwood – what a great read – which I highly recommend if you have not read it already!
This was on a honda 150 I think,
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/201813985/zenith-irfan-born-to-ride
Check out the pics I just added to the Lees Valley – Okuku River page today, A Honda Hornet doing Lees Valley.
Our first foray (that’s my mate on the Hornet, it’s the 919) didn’t end well for him in Malings Pass, when he was sliding down the other side of the hill. Road tyres (Pilot Roads) weren’t cutting it. The following year we did the likes of Nevis, and the TKC80s were available in 17s. That worked a lot better, but then he discovered west coast rain on knobblies wasn’t the same as road tyres 😀