What makes a motorcycle fun isn't on the spec sheet

"Ha," my husband, Andrea, nodded. "It's about the torque."

No. It's not that, either, at least not for me.

Carl and Andrea are forgiven for thinking otherwise. I recently put my go-to motorcycle, my Ducati Scrambler Desert Sled, up for sale after bringing the Monster into the garage. It's easy to assume I had simply decided I wanted something bigger, faster, and more powerful.

I didn't.

The Desert Sled is a lovely, fun, all-around motorcycle. I just don't use it enough for what it was designed to do: make rough roads and off-road riding fun. The Monster suits most of the riding I do now. When I decided that adding the 1200S meant letting one motorcycle go, the Desert Sled seemed like the obvious candidate. It's a good bike and I suspect it will make another rider very happy.

But this isn't really about the Monster's power. Or its torque. Or even its Italian-ness, although I could write an entire article about that.

I've been riding for about 14 years, and in that time I've been fortunate enough to own and ride a lot of different motorcycles. Two in my garage aren't going anywhere: a 1974 Honda CL200 Scrambler and a 2010 Ducati Monster 696. The Monster 696 was our first Ducati, so it stays. The CL is different. The CL was my first, and I judge all the others against it.

That might sound ridiculous.

The numbers say one thing

In today's motorcycle world, where manufacturers compete over horsepower, electronics, ride modes, quickshifters, semi-active suspension systems, Bluetooth connectivity, and ever-higher performance levels, an old Honda with a 198 cc twin-cylinder engine and drum brakes loses on every spec-sheet comparison.

So does my almost-vintage Monster 696, for that matter.

The 2020 Monster 1200S is an entirely different animal. It's versatile, sophisticated, and very fast. It has personalized riding modes and a quickshifter. It is calm at low rpm, which is more than I can say for my antsy Streetfighter 848. Open the throttle and the Monster takes off. You have to remember to hold on.

Making a pass on a state highway in upstate New York is wonderfully easy. The big Monster has more than enough power for anything I am likely to ask of it on a public road.

Those same passes aren't attainable on the CL.

But here's the funny thing: I can open the throttle on the CL all the way. All the way. Until the throttle won't go any farther. That is something I will never do on a modern motorcycle.

I'll never see 150 mph on the Monster 1200S. I regularly get the CL200 to its top speed of about 60 mph and then start thinking about what I might have to do if something suddenly appeared in front of me.

I have locked the CL's brakes more than once.

Use it or lose it

The Monster has far more capability than I will ever use. The CL lets me use everything it has. And maybe that is part of what I like about it.

The CL200 is not a better motorcycle than the Monster 1200S. That would be absurd to say.

It is slow and less capable by every conventional measure, and it was equipped with technology that was already old when I bought the bike. It requires planning ahead while riding. Every hill and every headwind matters. Its suspension won't inspire confidence when the road gets rough. And when I'm on the Interstate, even briefly, I sometimes wish for another 10 horsepower.

But when I ride the CL, I don't spend much time thinking about what it can't do. I pay attention to what it can. And I like that.

Maybe that's because I'm no longer the rider I was when I started.

When I got the CL, I was learning how to ride. I was nervous about turns, braking, and traffic. I didn't need a motorcycle to challenge me. I needed one that would help me become comfortable from the moment I left the driveway until I returned home.

What makes a motorcycle fun?

Now the CL is the motorcycle that makes me grin for no particularly rational reason.

The Monster was designed to be appealing. It fits modern standards of what a motorcycle should be: powerful, sophisticated, technologically advanced, comfortable, and beautiful. I like its proportions, its exposed engine, and its single-sided swingarm. I like that I can ride it all day without feeling like I've been in a fight.

Of course I enjoy the power, and I like having all that capability available, even when I don't need it.

The CL offers almost none of that. And yet I enjoy riding it nearly as much.

That is what interests me. The Monster gives me almost everything a modern motorcycle should give a rider. The CL gives me something harder to measure.

And maybe that's the problem with the way we talk about motorcycles.

We are very good at listing features. We measure horsepower and torque. We compare wet weights and suspension components. We count riding modes and electronic aids. We talk about acceleration and top speed and how quickly one motorcycle can get from here to there. All of that matters. But none of it tells me whether I will want to ride the motorcycle. That's a different question.

Maybe the answer is pleasure.

Not the kind of pleasure that comes from knowing you have the biggest engine, the most horsepower, the latest electronics, or the highest top speed. Definitely not simply the pleasure of going fast.

Just the pleasure of riding.

I am not trying to make a case for vintage motorcycles. I like motorcycles for what they are, and these two happen to give me very different kinds of pleasure.

But if I had to explain why the CL200 has stayed with me all these years, through several motorcycles and my continuing inability to resist bringing home another Ducati, I couldn't point to a single number.

It is simply fun.

And maybe that's the specification that matters most.