first ride yamahas 2000 sxr series

Now it's time for a bit of impressions
Yamaha's test center had three courses for us to run. The main course was about 2 miles long, the second was a little over a quarter mile in length. These two were supposed to be setup with a number of rough trail simulated moguls. What we got was 2.5 to 3 feet tall speed bumps. It seemed a little more like a snocross than a rough day on the trails, but it provided a perfect venue to test Yamaha's claimed Big Bump Ability.

As the first jump approached, something wonderful happened. The sled took it in stride, flying flat and true. The same thing happened on the rest of the jumps. We were very impressed with the SX-R's ability to absorb the blow from a launch pad and convert it into stable flight. Both front and rear suspensions worked well together, never bottoming out.

The other course Yamaha had on the property was a full-size snow oval. A great way to test acceleration and cornering. We took each of the three sizes out to the oval for some Fantasy Eagle River action. All performed as expected on the straights. Good weight transfer (something new for Yamahas) and crisp throttle response (something not so new for Yamahas). But the cornering was what we were interested in. As the turns came up, we were surprised with the flatness of the cornering. We had surmised in the past that the SXs cornered well partially due to the rigid ProAction chassis, but also because of the shorter suspension travel. Despite the longer travel, the SX-Rs managed to keep a tight inside line around the ends of the oval. It was very impressive.

At the end of the day, we walked away from the new blue scooters feeling good. As we get to the spring test session, we look forward to pitting these machines against the ZR, XC and MX Z to see where they fall in head to head comparison. Our suspicion is that the SX-R series will give its competition a real run for their sales this coming season.