Used test: 2014 YAMAHA MT-09 MORE THAN JUST A COMMUTER
Back at the end of 2010, things were looking decidedly ropey for Yamaha. Its bikes just weren’t cutting it, and buyers were spending their hard-earned on other brands. The Japanese giant had misread the market, and by its own admission was producing ‘the wrong bikes, of the wrong spec, at too high a cost’. Everyone connected with the firm was suffering, and if you were a UK dealer your future seemed particularly bleak. Something had to change, quickly and radically.
Its own research revealed customers wanted Yamaha to produce something with a distinct identity. Back then, Yamahas were being viewed as too similar to the other Japanese brands. Plenty of meetings and discussions took place worldwide, and the idea of producing a new range of bikes using a three-cylinder engine was born. Then, at the end of 2012, a new triple motor was shown at the Cologne bike show.
Displaying the engine alone was an unusual tactic, and though it was aimed to boost the flagging spirits of all connected with the brand, it also gave rivals a heads up of what the future may bring. Yet as far as confidence within Yamaha was concerned, the presentation worked well, with importers, dealers and the Press all reacting positively.
Yamaha hadn’t revealed any details of which bikes the triple would be fitted to though, and it took another year before the first of the new generation MT range, the MT-09, was launched late in 2013.
Journalists rated the bike highly,
