Quick Ride

Quick Ride

YAMAHA WARRIOR Radical Road Star

IT LOOKED LIKE A showbike when it was introduced two years ago, and it still does today—may-be more so, thanks to the tidy Von Dutch-style pinstriping atop the tank and rear fender.

Yamaha's Road Star Warrior was part of 2002's power-cruiser push, joining Harley's V-Rod, Honda's VTX1800C and Kawasaki's Mean Streak as V-Twins with attitude. The Warrior was particularly stunning-alumi num frame, monoshock rear suspension, sportbike-derived fork and brakes, low-profile rubber and that Howitzer of an exhaust canister hanging off the right side, looking like something from aYZF-R3000.

At the time, its engine was an oddity, an air-cooled, pushrod, big-inch V-Twin slogger from Japan, land of high-revving, double cammed, multi-cylinder rocketships. Its two massive pistons worked through 1670cc of displacement to arrive at a satisfying 76 rearwheel horsepower, but with a pavement-wrinkling 97 footpounds of torque. So mo tored, the Warrior dispatched the quarter-mile in 12.60 seconds and ran all the way to 122 mph, both figures well above standard cruiser fare.

In fact, had it not been for Harley's V-Rod (108 bhp, 11.53 seconds atthe strip, 137mph top speed), the Yamaha would have walked away with our Power-Cruiser Shootout.

So, two years later, how's the second-place finisher doing?

Not bad at all, thanks for asking. This is basically the same platform, with some ergonomic tweaks to answer complaints. You may remember that for the comparo we had the lovely Miss Leeann Tweeden do a write-up on the power-cruisers’ backseat accommodations. Sadly, she couldn’t wait to de-ass herself from the Yamaha. “Cool bike,” said the star of cableTV sports shows and Frederick’s of Hollywood lingerie catalogs, “but I’ve had gynecological exams that were more comfortable!”

Seems she wasn’t the only one. For ’04, the Warrior corider is greeted by more seat padding and slightly lower footpegs. An improvement, yes, but stick to short hops-anything over an hour is pushing it. Up front, the rider gets a handlebar with more sweepback, footpegs that are moved down and forward a bit, and a wider saddle. Again, all to the good, but extended jaunts at high speed still feel more like an isometric exercise than good fun.

Slow down the pace and stick to meandering backroads, and the $12,099 Warrior really comes into its own-great brakes, rock solid into the corners, plenty of urge coming out. In ’02, it was the best-handling cruiser your money could buy. Same holds true today.

David Edwards