It’s hard to believe it was six years ago that the MT-10 came bounding into our lives, kicking down our senses, and making our licences feel as vulnerable as a worm on a fishhook in a pool of piranhas. While its looks might have split opinions more so than Marmite, its unapologetic head-banging formula won over our hearts, souls, and mesmerised minds, delivering to the masses an affordable, outrageous and performance-fuelled wheelie machine, complete with wide ‘bars, a comfy seat and mirrors that showed more than just your hairy armpits. You could say the MT-10 was a pioneering performance for the Japanese brand, arriving on the scene just a year after the 2015 launch of Yamaha’s coveted MotoGP-inspired R1, which became the donor of much of the MT-10’s parts, DNA and excitement. The truth is that the iconic hypernaked we’ve since come to know and love was picking up the pieces from where the MT-01 and FZ1 had tried and failed a decade earlier. Unlike its predecessors and their long lists of limitations, the MT-10 nailed the magic formula, taking the fight to like-minded rivals, such as KTM’s Superduke and BMW’s S1000R. A legend was born… but time takes no prisoners and in recent years the shine has been shed from the brand’s flagship naked, overwhelmed by nextgeneration competition with more tech, more power and, quite honestly, more appeal.
When the word got out that Yamaha was set to release a new MT-10 towards the
