The Rookie Rides: Kawasaki KLX300SM

Motarded mo' fun?

Kawasaki’s “supermoto” bike is the same motorcycle as their KLX300 without knobby tires and with an inch less suspension travel - a lowly 9” up front and 8” in the rear. With that lessened travel there is also a lower seat at 34”, however, the bike sags enough on stock preload settings that it presents no issue to this rider’s portly 175lb heft. Adding to the soft suspension is the light weight, for a street bike, of 300lb. This thing is easy to move around and it never feels like it’s getting away from you in normal conditions.

There’s no ABS which means once you work through the front stroke you can learn to stoppie to your heart’s content. Outside of that the brakes felt strong and immediate, combined with the paucity of weight, street tires, and lack of outrageous speed I don’t see how one could cook the brakes even on a go-kart track. I did not lock the rear up, but I do know from experience that it’s fun to do on light bikes that you feel like you can throw around.

The motor is a small displacement thumper which does a fine job keeping up in traffic but does not have an abundance of low end torque. If you’re used to anything as madly torquey as Kawi’s 400cc parallel twin, which I have accidentally started off in 2nd more than once, you may find yourself killing the motor off the line because you didn’t gas it nearly enough. The gearing is tall up in the top gears which means surface streets will be ridden in 2-3, and I assume one could take it on highways without fuss here (65MPH, traffic going 70-75MPH) but not the freeway where vehicles regularly clock 85-90MPH on open stretches. It won’t wow you, but it’s not meant to.

You won’t spend time looking at the dash except to verify speed

Seating position and seat are both comfortable enough. There’s no chassis you’re pressing on with your legs, and as it’s dirtbike thin sit where you want when you want. The pegs are placed, per usual, to provide an abundantly open knee when sitting in the middle of the seat. Overall a very comfortable and roomy place to be with no pressures to contort any part of your body.

Steering is best described as darty or twitchy at times. This was never unsettling, and may be due to the tire profile, but didn’t feel consistent across lean angles.

For my own purposes, and in anticipation of having kids riding trails, I would much rather pick up the plain jane KLX300 which, while higher, has appropriate wheel sizes for trail riding and putting on better knobbies. Either one would make a fun around town runabout for beer runs, and not much else. I’m not sure even the KLR inspired milk-crate topcase would work well here. There’s only a few hundred dollars spread between them so it’s really just a matter of taste if all you’re doing is using it on road.