TEAM PEAKS

For many of us, our introduction to Triumph’s Speed Twin was when it lobbed into dealerships at the start of 2019. But if you like flat caps adorned with Triumph badges you may well associate the Speed Twin moniker with the late 1930s when Londoner Edward Turner developed the first parallel twins. That bike and engine platform were in many ways the start of Triumph’s success.

Now, nine decades later, Triumph is again pushing the performance of the Speed Twin. Okay, not as dramatically as Turner’s ground-breaking work – and it’s fair to say the factory’s hand was forced to make sure the Speed Twin conformed to Euro 5 regulations – yet still, the firm’s objective was to increase the performance of the both engine and the chassis.

Power is up a handful of kilowatts, the torque is delivered slightly lower in the rev range, new M50 Brembo calipers are added along with grippy, track-ready Metzeler Racetec RR rubber. There is also a new Marzocchi fork and a revised chassis, meaning this isn’t just a superficial tweak. There is even a completely new twin exhaust that neatly