And it looks heaps better, too. Kawasaki have re-designed the rear seat cowl so it looks swoopy and interesting instead of plain old dull, there's now a GSX-R-stylee swingarm with heaps of tough-looking bracing, and a smart new paintjob. The ZX-9R has always been a big bike and still is, but therein lies part of its appeal. Despite being continually out-gunned on the supersport front by the ever-developing FireBlade and white-hot R1 and GSX-R1000, the ZX-9 has always appealed to riders who wanted something less mental and more useable on the road.
Not to say it ain't fast. The Nine has always topped-out north of 170, and the latest model will be knocking on the door of 180mph in the right conditions. We only got to ride the bike on the track, and after spending most of the day on the new ZX-6R I have to admit to being a bit apprehensive about how the big ol' ZX-9R would handle Pau's nadgery corners. True enough, on stock settings the 9R was a wobbler. Low and soft at the back end to make it more comfortable on the road, the Kawasaki lumbered confusedly around after the nimble 6R - not what we were expecting at all. Some major tweaking was needed.
So we tweaked like buggery, and lo and behold if we didn't get the Big Blue Bus handling pretty damn well. The real key behind getting a 9R to handle is to jack the rear ride-height up - always was - to give almost another inch of altitude between the tail unit and swingarm. The difference in seat height is marked and (coupled with dropping the forks through the yokes 10mm to really slam the bike onto its nose) so is the effect on the handling. Where before the Nine didn't want to turn into corners and wallowed on the way out, now you could use the excellent new brakes to full effect, demolish speed on the way into a turn, roll the 9R onto its side with a positive shove on the bars, lean til the pegs kissed-out and feed back in the 135bhp motor as quick as possible. Much more like it, and allied to the new stiffer suspension units you could really hustle the new ZX-9R round Pau.
And it looks heaps better, too. Kawasaki have re-designed the rear seat cowl so it looks swoopy and interesting instead of plain old dull, there's now a GSX-R-stylee swingarm with heaps of tough-looking bracing, and a smart new paintjob. The ZX-9R has always been a big bike and still is, but therein lies part of its appeal. Despite being continually out-gunned on the supersport front by the ever-developing FireBlade and white-hot R1 and GSX-R1000, the ZX-9 has always appealed to riders who wanted something less mental and more useable on the road.
Not to say it ain't fast. The Nine has always topped-out north of 170, and the latest model will be knocking on the door of 180mph in the right conditions. We only got to ride the bike on the track, and after spending most of the day on the new ZX-6R I have to admit to being a bit apprehensive about how the big ol' ZX-9R would handle Pau's nadgery corners. True enough, on stock settings the 9R was a wobbler. Low and soft at the back end to make it more comfortable on the road, the Kawasaki lumbered confusedly around after the nimble 6R - not what we were expecting at all. Some major tweaking was needed.
So we tweaked like buggery, and lo and behold if we didn't get the Big Blue Bus handling pretty damn well. The real key behind getting a 9R to handle is to jack the rear ride-height up - always was - to give almost another inch of altitude between the tail unit and swingarm. The difference in seat height is marked and (coupled with dropping the forks through the yokes 10mm to really slam the bike onto its nose) so is the effect on the handling. Where before the Nine didn't want to turn into corners and wallowed on the way out, now you could use the excellent new brakes to full effect, demolish speed on the way into a turn, roll the 9R onto its side with a positive shove on the bars, lean til the pegs kissed-out and feed back in the 135bhp motor as quick as possible. Much more like it, and allied to the new stiffer suspension units you could really hustle the new ZX-9R round Pau.
