#1997YamahaYZF600R

Twenty-five years ago was three years before Al Gore conceded a too-close US presidential race to George W. Bush, as we collectively decided to kick the global warming can down the road a bit further. Honda’s first bike with a catalytic converter was also three years in the future – the VFR800FI. Just before all that hit the fan, 600cc Japanese inline four-cylinders were all the rage: carbureted, basic, cheap, and expendable. Ninety horsepower in a 420-pound package was all you really needed. And in 1997, the top 600s were still even pretty good streetbikes. The MO crew was positively giddy over all of them.

And in those days each Japanese manufacturer built an inline 600cc Four-cylinder sportybike, and so it made it natural to compare them, an eye for an eye, a nose for a nose. And if any bike should smite the eye of the other three, or the eye of his maid, that it perish; then that bike shall go free and prosper in the marketplace. Or that was MO’s story, anyway.