The case for a middleweight twin as the best track-day motorcycle

I was lucky enough recently to have that mental exercise as reality, not theory. Aprilia invited me to hang around a day after I covered the final round of MotoAmerica racing at New Jersey Motorsports Park for one of their Aprilia Racers Days events. Within reason (I wasn't going to be a rude guest and hog the lone Tuono V4 Factory all day) I could ride what I wanted from their demo lineup. So what did I choose?

I think some of you might be surprised. And I know others who have been through the process of choosing what they want out of a track-day bike won't be surprised at all.

The case for a middleweight twin as a track bike

I knew well before I got to the track that morning what I wanted to ride, and fortunately Aprilia had multiple RS 660s in the demo lineup, as well as a Tuono 660 Factory. I didn't even cast a longing glance at the 200-horsepower RSV4 as I grabbed one of the twin-cylinder RS 660s for my first session on track.

I know some people will say, "Wait, you had the chance to ride one of those legendary V-four sport bikes on the track, as fast as you were capable of going, and you passed up the opportunity?" I can understand someone saying that such an experience should not be squandered. But I was invited to join the track day by the kind folks at Aprilia with no agenda except to have a good time after working all weekend, and I've found that for me and my skill level, at least, the recipe for having a good time involves a sporty but not hard-core race replica bike with around 100ish crank horsepower. Go to track days and you'll see plenty of veteran riders who have come to the same conclusion.

Sure, you'll also find people who figure that if you're going to the land of no speed limits, why not pack as much horsepower as possible? You'll see them on liter sport bikes, often blasting past you on the straight and then parking it in the corners. And honestly, I'm fine with that. As long as everyone's following the rules and having fun, I'm all for each rider choosing the experience he or she wants to have.

As an intermediate track-day guy who was never that fast and is definitely slowing down with age, I find the sweet spot to be something just like the RS 660 I rode for several sessions.

Why? The RS 660 has enough power for me to go as fast as I need to be going, especially on a track like Thunderbolt at NJMP, which only has one straight. Unlike the 600 cc inline-four-cylinder race replicas that used to be track-day staples, it has enough midrange power that I won't bog down and get rear-ended by a line of held-up traffic if I come out of the last corner onto that straight in the wrong gear. Its light weight, good suspension, and quality brakes are up to handling all the curves the rest of the way around the track. At the same time, if your technique is terrible in the corners, you can't cover it up by blasting down the straight with liter-bike power to catch up to everyone. The RS 660 encourages you to improve your lap times with better cornering technique, where a liter bike might convince you that your shortcomings can be solved with more throttle.

In short, it's capable enough to be entertaining, forgiving enough that it's fun rather than frustrating to ride, and not so uber-capable that I feel bad because I'm only exploiting a fraction of its abilities, as I would be on today's most advanced superbikes. And that's true not just of the Aprilia but also of the Yamaha YZF-R7, the new Suzuki GSX-8R, and other current twins.

I used to do most of my track days on a 2006 Triumph Daytona 675 I owned. I appreciated the Daytona because its inline-triple engine provided stronger mid-range power than the 600 cc inline-fours it competed against at the time. The Daytona made more power than today's twins in the same displacement class, but that power was still mostly up top, in five-digit rpms. While the Daytona felt a little more accessible than the screaming fours, the RS 660 feels at least as light in the handling, just as strong in the mid-range, and a step easier to ride than the Daytona.

Time marches on, twins get better

There's nothing really new under the sun. Lots of track-day rats probably remember how one of the popular choices for a track-only machine used to be a Suzuki SV650 with upgraded brakes and suspension, maybe a GSX-R600 fork bolted on. But I can go further back. I remember talking to a guy who spent a lot of time modifying his old Honda Hawk GT for track use, and when the SV650 first came out he said, "We used to spend a lot of money to get as much power out of the Hawk as the SV makes out of the box."

Now, people are saying the same thing about the capability of today's twins, in comparison to those old massaged SV650s. We see it not just at amateur track days, but also in pro racing. When the MotoAmerica Twins Cup first began several years ago, the field was more than half SV650s with Yamaha FZ-07s filling most of the other spots on the entry list. Today, the field is more than half Aprilia RS 660s and most of the rest are YZF-R7s. And nobody wants to go back.

The bonus: Not only are today's twins a good choice on the track, but they're also a better choice for street riding than the race replica inline-four screamers that have faded away.

If you're too good for a twin, maybe you need less bike

Some people have the idea that if you improve as a track-day rider you'll naturally move up to a liter bike. That's the common progression on the street — as your skills grow, so does the size of the engine beneath you — but it doesn't always work that way at the track.

I had a good conversation with one of the control riders with the local track-day organization and he told me all about the Aprilia RS 457 he bought and prepped for track use, both by him and his wife. Here's a guy who is a better rider than I'll ever be, but he wasn't excited about a 200-horsepower liter bike. He was keeping his skills sharp and having fun by getting the maximum out of a bike with less than 50 horsepower. Success consisted of riding the RS 457 in the intermediate group and not getting passed by anyone, even those guys on the liter bikes.

I did ride the RS 457 one session, just to see if my impressions matched Dustin's opinions of the smallest Aprilia as a track-day mount. Maybe if I were a better rider, it would be the choice for me. But where I stand, a middleweight twin like the RS 660 is, to me, the best track-day motorcycle.