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Ah, Nikolai Semenovich Leskov, the great writer of the Russian land! Nevertheless, you were not quite right when you said: that the Russian is good, the German is death. Still, there is, there is something for us to learn from the Germans. At least the speed and accuracy of the reaction. This is me to the fact that as soon as a slight decline in sales of BMW motorcycles became apparent, how did they become alarmed! But they didn’t run to their native Bundestag with supplications to crush the duties of the cursed foreign competitors, but they gave out such fireworks of new products that it was just right to open a permanent column in the magazine “And here is another BMW” … And this is not enough. In the bowels of the Bavarian concern, a special High Performance department arose - to build special motorcycles, like the legendary cars of the company with the letter "M". The best engineering minds have chosen the motto: “Only professional enthusiasts can create what professional enthusiasts crave”!
The first sign (who said “pancake”? Kill!) Was the uncompromising off-road BMW HP2 motorcycle (we predicted its appearance a few months ago - see Moto, No. 2-2005). The debutant was created for sports exploits, although he is homologated for movement on public roads. Under him, the company created a team that will take part in the German cross-country championship (here, according to Leskov, this sport is called the opposite - country-cross), as well as swings at the Baha-500 and Baha-1000 marathons (the Germans commented on the ban on the participation of "large" motorcycles in the Paris-Dakar rally with all the richness of the Bavarian dialect).
So, what's new, sorry, brand new? The power unit was taken from the R1200GS model with minor alterations: the engineers slightly raised the “top” (power increased from 100 to 105 hp), while managing not to “drop” the “middle” (maximum torque, as before - 115 N.m at 5500 rpm). But the main thing is that the chassis is modeled after those that the factory team used in the Paris-Dakar rally in 1999-2001. Spatial tubular frame, in front - a fully adjustable telescopic fork of an inverted type (the traditional Telelever is simply not able to provide a stroke of 270 mm). The rear suspension is Paralever systems, but with a 30 mm longer pendulum and a revolutionary pneumatic shock absorber. Precisely pneumatic - there are no hydraulics, no springs! The built-in compressor allows you to change the parameters of the suspension depending on road conditions.
