Cw 25 Years Ago

CW 25 YEARS AGO

DECEMBER 1989

This issue closed the decade with a look ahead at several new 1990 models. The feature section dedicated several pages to upcoming bikes from Honda, Kawasaki, and Yamaha with Honda’s new ST1000 sport-tourer leading a Big Red lineup that also included a new VFR750 equipped with a single-side swingarm.

Then as now, Kawasaki raised the performance bar in a big way with the introduction of its ZX-11

Ninja. Will Team Green’s all-new Ninja H2 offerthe same impact? A personal favorite was the announcement of the coming of the Yamaha OW01. For $16,000 and a racing license, it can be all yours, we wrote.

-> Better still were road tests of the BMW R100GS Paris-Dakar, a precursorto today’s GS, and the 1990 Ducati 750 Sport, “a Duck of different color” as we called it.

-> In the Ups and Downs of our Roundup section, we gave a welldeserved Up to Eddie Lawson, the dominant American roadracerof the 1980s, for wrapping up the 1989 500cc GP world championship. The title marked Steady Eddie’s fourth in roadracing’s premier class, the most by an American rider and a feat that remains unmatched to this day. And we sadly don't see that changing anytime soon. -Don Canet