From my 50+ years of riding, at least 2 motorcycles are required: an adventure bike for fast pavement rides to easy off-road trails., and a lightweight enduro bike for technical and difficult trails. My 2017 KTM 1090R is awesome for fast pavement rides to easy trails, and my 2023 KTM 350 EXC-F is incredible for difficult trails. Great video, thanks for sharing!
N+1 rule. N is the # of bikes you currently own. Best bike for the job at hand. For me, none of those are a big, hefty ADV bike. Whether its a Pan America, or a GS... its no offroad bike. Touring bike cosplaying as an offroad machine. I'll stick with a sportbike (or super-naked) for twisty roads, a light dual sport, and a proper dirtbike. There is no "do-it-all" machine. Its always a compromise. Nice choices. The xc-w is a handfull. I found it easiest to lug 3rd gear in single track, and lug 2nd in the tight bits. I have a wr250r/x for dual sport and supermoto duty. Weighed it with two bathroom scales the other day. 304lbs full of fuel... ugh... time for a proper woods bike.
Very well said!! I used to have a KTM 690 SMC for a super moto and that bike was amazing. It was a much more capable bike than I was a rider for it though.
I've got a 300L and a ktm 500exc. The 300L is dangerous on trails unless you respring it. Fine for gravel roads, great even. Lackluster on the highway, and maybe dangerous as a result of no ability to accelerate quickly at highway speeds. It also feels unnecessarily heavy. But easy to own. The 500 is scarily light on the highway but has plenty of umph to pass fast traffic. In the dirt its a dream, but the engine prefers more open trail at 50 mph and above. Still, I can crawl, lug or whatever in single track and it still feels super nimble. It's a dream, but it's biggest drawback to me is more a limit of physics not the engineers, if you want to ride a featherweight on the highway, you better expect to get blown around and the 500 is only 237lbs dry.
Honda 291 # is full wet weight FYI, but yeah, they are only ok at the tech stuff. Just have to maintain over 2k rpm min throttle and they do lug well, but it's not an easy thing to do. I would love to ride that 300 XCW 2 smoke
New subscriber here. Just discovered your channel yesterday. We must have similar taste in bikes. My off road bikes are a Beta XTrainer and a CRF450L. I ride my CRF450L on single track quite a bit, but not on highly technical single track. As long as the single track is flowy, I think the CRF450L beats the XTrainer. On the slow speed technical stuff is the only place I've found the CRF450L lacking; that's why I have the XTrainer! I could get my XTrainer plated, but if I will be connecting trail, I think I'll just use the CRF450L. That's what I have it for. Connecting trail and short commuting on occasion. I gave up riding pavement because compared to off-road, it's too easy. I'd have to be riding like a total tool to get the same sort of stimulation as I get off road. Also, I live too close to a major city and the traffic can get insane at times. Often not a place to be on a motorcycle.
I also have the 450L and for desert and mountain, it's perfect! I don't do anything real technical, if I can't gas it to get through/over something, I avoid it. 😄 I have the 20L Nomad tank as I mostly do long-range exploration and BDR type rides, and the occasional desert race.
Great suspension, lightweight and 300cc are not words I would use to describe the Rally. Plasticky, overweight and underpowered at 286cc or how I would describe it personally after riding one.
That’s comparing it to bikes more suited for the road. Also not a dig on you but underpowered is likely based on your skill level. Daniel is an A class rider and is always in front of the much more powerful ADV and Dual Sport bikes.
@@throttleblipmetric I am for sure on the lower end of the skill level, in line with who the Rally is marketed/hyped towards. On an incline with camping gear in the hills I had ZERO roll on power while constantly feeling I was going to get run over by traffic. For trail riding and around town most would be better off with a 300L or KLX. My buddy has spend some $$ on plastic parts for the Rally and added even more weight with crash bars. May as well have a DR650 or XR650.
Agreed. Stock suspension is garbage if you're not a 115lb woman. Power is lacking, but you just have to pin it everywhere. Agree with you on the 300L being a better choice. The 250L was even worse. anemic, and heavy.
I'll never buy KTM again. Sence they have added a pay window to get all the options locked up electronically. Yeah, a 10k bike, then you have to pay more money for it to do what they advertise. Pay windows may work on a 60 buck video game. But is BS on a pricey dirtbike.
