I have been silent for a couple of months here on Examiner.com due to some personal difficulties. I decided I needed to find my happy place and, with the help of Ducati Austin, did just that. My day on the Ducati Diavel was exactly what I needed to breathe life back into my motivation.
I showed up at the Ducati Austin dealership and asked for something new that I could write about. Vito, one of the owners, introduced me to Warren, one of the sales guys, and they both told me about the Multistrada and the Diavel. They were both very excited to show me the Diavel and explain all the details and advances that made this motorcycle different. One key point was that it was designed to seduce cruiser riders by providing a less aggressive stance and better comfort for a second rider. But it was also designed to maintain the sport look and clean lines that make Ducati the style leader they are. They accomplished it all and with some unique solutions.
To start with, if you are interested in the particulars and technical data you can find all that on the Ducati Diavel website. It is a very interesting read, but I am writing about what it is like to put it through a day in the life.
One of the first things that Warren will tell you about are the three maps that the Diavel comes standard with. These maps are not of nifty places to ride, but computer programs built into the Diavel that provide traction and acceleration control that you can change on the fly. I tested all three, Sport, Touring and Urban, in different environments and under different stresses. In all honesty, when I first heard about this, and anytime I have heard about computerized presets, I have been suspicious and really wondered if they did what they say they do. With this motorcycle I was blown away. You can feel it, sense it, hear it and thoroughly enjoy it.
I rode through downtown Austin on the Urban preset which reduces the engine to 100 horse power and levels the baseline torque for smooth transitions from take-off through gear changes. It was designed for stop and go traffic, downtown red lights and situations where you don’t need the fast, head jarring take-off power. I started my Urban experience by turning off of MOPAC onto 5th Street. I hit the thumb button twice and help it down on the second press until the display said it had accepted the Urban setting, let the throttle go back to nothing and the map was locked in. I went down 5th Street to turn right on Lavaca, turned left onto 4th Street, left on Trinity, left on to 6th Street, right onto Congress, up Gaudalupe until it turned onto Lamar, then left on W. Koenig, right onto Burnett and ended with picking up a friend to test the second seat theory. Through the entire route I never felt like I was at a loss of power, needed anymore acceleration than I got nor felt anemic in movement. I wasn’t sure I was really feeling anything different, so I tried a little stint in Sport and Touring. Yeah, Urban really is all you need in an urban environment, and there really is a difference: it is exactly the right formula of timing, fuel injection and intake that you need for city motoring.
I picked up my friend, Lia, to tell me what it was like using the unique second seat features of the Diavel. They designed it so that if you want the clean sport look you can cover the back seat with a carbon fiber cover, hide the foot pegs and a grip. The grip locks and unlocks under the seat where it slides in and out. The foot pegs fold up under the seat and snap into both positions rigorously, but effortlessly as well. For Lia’s experience, I put it on Sport and took her onto MOPAC so she could experience the Sport setting. This is what she had to say about all that:
“I could feel the lighter weight of the bike and the higher center of gravity, especially leaning into curves more than I would on a cruiser. It was an exhilarating experience! It is the rush of seeing the entrance ramp to the highway and knowing that your body will be accelerating with the roaring machine beneath you – same as that thrill of climbing to the top of your favorite roller coaster then screaming down the first drop. I believe I laughed a bit the first time our speed increased rapidly.
“I recommend the ride with someone you don’t mind wrapping you arms around. The handle behind the seat might be nice in bumper-to-bumper traffic at 10 m.p.h., but it would take some getting used to. I felt vulnerable when I was not leaning forward holding onto the driver. However different from a cruiser, the ride was smooth and flowing….provided the driver wanted it to be so.”
She also noted that the foot pegs remained comfortably in place, the seat was very comfortable to ride on and she didn’t sit as high as she typically does on my Harley. She always felt comfortable and felt very stable, even when going around curves at a decent speed.
After I dropped my back seat reviewer off at her real job, I went to Lime Creek Road near Lake Travis to put the Sport mode to use. Sport mode is more aggressive and is the natural place for this bike to be. Sport delivers 162 HP to a 456 pound machine and the typical racing torque settings the engine was designed for. Actually, similar torque settings of the 1198 Superbike adapted for a non-racer. The first time I tried it, the pre-4 hour review ride, I noticed that when I went to take off from a dead stop in Sport mode there were strange noises and weirdness under me before it took off at a neck-snapping speed. All I can say is WOW on the acceleration of this thing. I came to find out that the weirdness I experienced was actually the traction control kicking in that kept me from burning out the tire, catapulting into a wheelie and launching into low orbit. It also explained the slight shift in the back-end: I was spinning out and beginning to fishtail; the combined efforts of the fuel-air mixture control and timing kept me from looking like an idiot and buying a wrecked bike. The fact that I maintained control is a testament that Sport mode really works.
I got on Lime Creek and pushed the bike, but the bike pushed me. The Diavel had no problems in cornering, accelerating, decelerating and traction control. It giggled at my attempts at trying to test it. Laughed throatily at my attempts to push it faster coming out of corners and yawned at my thrill of the ride. I had the feeling that the bike can handle everything I can throw at it, and to throw more would exceed my skill sets. But, the one place it did stand up in my defense was the two times someone tried to kill me. One was someone passing on a double yellow, the other had decided to back his trailer into the road at the top of a hill, on the other side of a blind curve.
I was going to write about how the front brake should be considered more of a “forward momentum on-off switch,” but after my near death experience, I realized that it only feels like a sudden, jarring stop at slow speeds and is much happier at higher speeds. The Diavel comes with the same Brembo Monobloc ABS front brake package as Ducati’s top race bikes. Definitely a more sudden stop than my Harley has ever effected, but I got used to the subtleties very quickly. I am very pleased to confess that the bike slowed to a stop at a very, smooth, controlled and, more importantly, short distance in both circumstances. But I hate to admit that I am not so certain my Harley would have been able to do so.
My last test was the Touring setting. It brings the 162 HP of the Sport setting and the even torque of the Urban setting for long distance or highway riding. I used Touring for my ride from Lime Creek Road to the Ducati Austin dealership via 183 south. The quick acceleration and speed was still there, but in a smooth and less shocking way. It was nice to have access to the raw power of the Diavel when preparing to pass or to get out of the way of an inattentive driver, but the smooth acceleration and tempered torque allows you to feel more in control without any loss of assertiveness.
The Diavel is a truly remarkable machine. There were little things that I had to get used to that are more related to the platform I come from than any issues with the bike, but nothing that I didn't get use to quickly. In total, I have previously remarked that I want a sport bike to park next to my cruiser; the Ducati Diavel may very well be the one.
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