Reader's Choice Best Value Bike of 2015: Yamaha FZ-09
The readers have spoken, and their Value BOTY is the Yamaha FZ-09, which is only two digits from also being the staff’s pick for 2014 – the FZ-07, which is a year younger, one cylinder shorter and $1200 lower in price. The critics all loved the -09 when it first appeared in late 2013, including MO.
Yamaha housed its first street-going Triple in many moons in a light, sporty Controlled Fill aluminum frame, left off a fairing, kept the price down to $8,190 and created an instant hit – finding the seam between Triumph’s Street and Speed Triples and throwing in a bit of its own latest-tech engineering to come up with a 100-plus horsepower do-it-all bike for less than 8 thousand bucks.
For 2015, Yamaha tells us it’s remapped the bike’s injection system for smoother power delivery, and if it’s as good as the recent comparo winner FJ-09, which shares that excellent 847cc Triple, it’ll be fine with us. Yamaha also says the new map can be downloaded to retrofit earlier FZs as well. We can’t wait to see where this Triple turns up next.
Reader’s Choice Best of 2015 winners:
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Put a half-fairing on it. I want a semi-sport triple.
To quote Motorcycle Consumer News, in their positive review of the FJ, "The only sad note is that the vastly improved suspension and engine tune wasn't given to the 2015 FZ-09... maybe next year." 'Wonder what's going on?