Front End Chatter

Hello and welcome to Episode 184 of Front End Chatter, Britain's Bestest Biking Bodcast with him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, Simon Hargreaves – with thanks as ever to our patient and perfect partners Bennetts, the bike insurance specialisms, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the most informative and entertaining motorcycling website on the, er web. Is it still called the web?  Anyway, check out the offers, discounts and competitions available should you choose to become a BikeSocial Member (free to Bennetts customers, £60 a year if not) – seriously, if you're planning on spending a few quid this year on tyres, kit and accessories, chances are the shop you'll buy them from has a discount offer with Bennetts – so sign up, ya fool! Right, on with the show and today it's a bit of a FEC-sack Special because we're getting a bit behind with your emailed questions and queries – so it's all you today: • whose leathers are on the wall of a hotel near the Nürburgring? • great biking reassessments, such as Harley are technically advanced and Honda do think they can change gear better than you after all: with mandatory DCT and, now, Honda's Eclutch – another auto transmission. Honda really don't like manual gearboxes, do they?  • plus, Martin recalls having to reassess adventure bikes after it became clear they were taking over the world • how to regain a biking mojo • how will BMW's front collision warning cope with 'progressive' riding in traffic?  • best bike for long range commuting?  • is the SWC300 any good?  • do we grow out of modifying bikes? And much much more... Thanks for listening, please spread the word, please ring-fence a couple of dates in your diary – we have a FEC tour of Spain coming up in early June 2024, and a FEC tour of the Borders in late July 2024! YOU HAVE TO BE THERE! It's such a good time. Also – keep your emails coming in to: [email protected] @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's most foresighted motorcycling podcast and, as regular listeners, you don't need to be Nostradamus to know what we're going to say next. So no surprise it's a massive thank you to Bennetts, Britain's best motorcycle insurers, who continue to amaze and astound with a litany, nay, cornucopia of offers, competitions and nice things – one of which is bikesocial.co.uk with all the biking news, new bikes, consumer features and BSB info fit to eat. And check out Bennetts' YouTube channel coz it's amazing. And become a Bennetts BikeSocial Member and get access to all the above, for a paltry £60 a year – and it's free if you're insured with Bennetts.  Right, after all that, onto the pod. And it's a Knobbly News kinda week, what with BMW's R1300 GS getting the full nerd-out in-depth detail – what's the motor/frame/suspension/styling, and how's it different, why's it different and will we like it? Plus Honda have nibbled at the Africa Twin and ruined the Adventure Sport by not importing a manual gearbox version (we love Honda, we really do, but blimey they make it hard sometimes). Meanwhile Suzuki unveil the V-Strom 800RE, possibly the most useful motorbike of 2024, and Triumph announce some prices. And in the green corner, literally, there's Kawasaki letting slip a small trump of details about the "Strong Hybrid Ninja 7" - a half battery, half petrol-powered 451cc parallel twin with what Kawasaki say is the fuel economy of a 250 combined with the performance of a 750 and the 0-60 of a ZX-10R, yeah right chinny chin chin (that bit wasn't in the press release). And after all that, we FECsack about CX500s, commuting 100 miles a day and cramming a lifetime of motorcycle choices into a few years as you work out what kind of biker you are.  Right, that's all for now. We should start a newsletter. Hey, that's a good idea.  Email your thoughts and queries and desires and offers of, well, anything goes tbh but money's good, to: [email protected] Thanks for listening, you mad FECers you x @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 182, live in front of a bunch o' FECers from the Elephant & Castle in Newtown, Wales! Thanks as ever to Bennetts, the finest motorcycle insurers in the country, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the place to go for all your bike-related news, new bikes, tests and stories. Become a BikeSocial Member and take advantage of a plethora of offers, discounts and competitions. It just makes sense, ya heathens. Anyway, on this episode of Front End Chatter, Simon and Martin natter about:  • Suzuki's forthcoming GSX-8R, GSX-S1000X and V-Strom 800 • BMW's fifthcoming R1300 GS and F900 GS  • Kawasakis sixthcoming EV-1s • ...and much more, plus chat with the FECers on tour – where's the bar?  Thank you for listening to Front End Chatter, and please send your questions, queries, thoughts and musings to: [email protected] I'm @SimonHbikes and he's @Mufga  

Hello and welcome to Episode 181 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s most electric, eclectic and eccentric motorcycling podcast, presented by hoary old motorcycle journalists Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons. We are as ever indebted and in cahoots with Bennetts, Britain’s leading bike insurance experts, and BikeSocial.co.uk. No flipping, don’t change that channel – check out the offers, competitions and discounts Bennetts offer and become a BikeSocial member to access them all even if, for some reason beyond the wit of man, you aren’t insured with Bennetts. Don’t take our word for it – see for yourself. However, speaking as someone who always fails to take advantage of money-saving offers because I’m hamstrung by a belief that paying less than full value is somehow morally wrong (I don’t like using loyalty cards because why should a supermarket item be cheaper for someone who has a ‘loyalty card’ than for someone who hasn’t? An item should cost what an item costs for every human in that shop, regardless of where they habitually grant their custom). Mind you I’m perfectly happy to stream football matches off an eastern European website, so figure that one out.

On this episode of Front End Chatter we have topics as widely varied as: • Triumph’s new 660 Daytona and how middleweight sportsbikes now often less sporty than middleweight naked bikes

• Triumph’s addition of user-lowered rear preload on Tiger 1200s to make them more usable for more people of inversely advantaged verticality

• why KTM’s 890 Adventure R could be a forever bike, even if it doesn’t last forever

• proving a Zero electric bike can manage a day’s adventure (including off-road)

• and why every single commentator on YouTube, in print or on podcasts need their riding advice filtered through an ‘it doesn’t apply to me’ filter – this stuff ain’t Gospel, okay?

Anyway, that’s enough for now because I’m on holiday and the wifi in the holiday cottage uploads at a prehistoric pace which, given I’m on the Jurassic Coast, is appropriate if not completely infuriating. Please grace our inbox – [email protected] – with your thoughts, queries, jokes, funny stories and any random stuff that passes across your grey matter. Catch me and him here: @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome back to Front End Chatter, Britain's most durable motorcycling podcast, with Simone Hargreaves and Marion Fitz-Gibbons – a pair of ye olde worlde motorcycle journalists like wot they had off them magazines they used to have, talking about bikes, talking about riding them, talking about remembering what it was like to ride them, talking about dreaming of riding them, and talking about other things as well. Or even better. There's more to life than bikes – you might think that's what you came here for, but bikes are just the start.  Anyway, thank you to Bennetts, the marvellous bike insurers, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best place on the web to locate all your motorcycling news, views and reviews. And check out their YouTube channel, whydontcher?  On this mighty organ of FEC we have:  • a chat about the BikeSocial group test of the Suzuki GSX-8S, Honda Hornet, KTM 790 Duke and Yamaha MT-07  • Yamaha's Tracer 9 GT+ with added radar soup • a bit of natter about manufacturers using throttle mapping to define the power delivery of their bikes • KTM's upcoming 1390 motor, and what size it might actually be • ...and do we really need more capacity, and is that what really sells new bikes?  • plus some of your FECsack emails, including what bike best sums up the 1990s?  Thanks again to everyone for your ears, and please write with your questions, thoughts, queries, jokes, funny experiences, and that time you met and he tried to get off with your girlfriend, to:  [email protected] @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 179 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s Chattiest Motorcycling podcast with him Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, Simon Hargreaves – underpinned, as ever, by Bennetts, Britain’s best bike insurer and BikeSocial.co.uk, the place to go for your biking info. 

And on this week’s FEC we have:  • EXCLUSIVE details of a special ADDITIONAL FEC tour THIS YEAR!

Yes, we’ve teamed up again with our friends at MCI Tours to bring you a FECin Welsh Weekend. When’s that, I hear you ask?

I’m glad you did – the FECin Welsh Weekend is taking place from the afternoon/evening of Friday 22nd September, riding on Saturday and Sunday, departing Monday 25th September. JOIN US – on the best roads in Wales, officially selected by the Cannes Jury Of Mint Roads in Wales, Bach. 

Visit bit.ly/fecwales and get involved.

Also in this honestly massive episode of FEC (because bigger is better, right?) • Ivan Cervantes, multiple enduro world champ and Triumph test rider speaks about his world record endurance ride on a Tiger 1200, doing 2493 miles in 24 hours – and also updates on the progress of Triumph’s forthcoming range of enduro and motocross bikes

Plus!  • all the info on two new technologies coming up on BMW’s R1300 GS – radar-powered front collision warning system and a new suspension system with variable spring rate (haven’t we heard this before? – Ed) • details of Triumph’s new 400 Scrambler X and Speed 400 • how to ride in the wet

...and if that’s not enough, there’s more of the same. Blimey. Please keep your emails coming in – queries, thoughts, musings, amusings, funny stories, nothing too heavy if you don’t mind, keep it light – to: [email protected] Aye. Youse brilliant, youse are. @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello everybody and welcome to a Front End Chatter FECsack special. Special you say? Yes, very special indeed, thanks for asking.

Why so special? Special because in a change from FEC's (un)usual format, we've devoted a full hour to answering one single, solitary, lonely, individual question sent in by a listener. Well, you know, after 170-odd of these things, we figured it's about time we did one properly...

And as such it is the unbelievably enormously magnificently humongous pleasure of Britain's best bum-lickingiest biking podcast to welcome the one and only Adrian Morton - Britain's best bike designer - to the deepest deep dive (too soon?) you'll ever hear on:

• what it was like to work with (and then take over from) Massimo Tamburini - how the Cagiva, sorry, MV Agusta F4 750 came to life, and whether it can ever be repeated - how many designs does it take to get a footpeg right - who really designed the F3, despite what Wikipedia says - and much, much more, including the future of motorcycle design...

We hope you love this detour from our usual FEC waffling as much as we do. And if you'd like to contribute to our bulging FECsack of listener questions, please fire your ponderings through to [email protected]

Hello and welcome one and all to Front End Chatter, Britain's cakiest motorcycle podcast with she/him, Martina Fitz-Gibbons and it/blimey, Simone Hargreaves. As the country's leading formerly employed but subsequently jettisoned motorcycle journalistas, now freelancing for anyone with a gold sovereign and a glint in their eye, we're proud to be supported and stimulated by Bennetts, Brian's leading bike insurers, and BikeSocial.co.uk, more motorcycling news, reviews and blues clues on the web than the web really deserves.  And on this mightily magnificent episode we have:  • the NC500 and why it's not a Honda parallel twin, but a blummin' ace ride around the top of Scotland • BMW's new M1000XR • Kawasaki's new ZX-6R • the price is announced for Kawasaki's ZX-4RR • Michael Dunlop and Peter Hickman dominate the 2023 TT • how Triumph's Tiger 1200 is the fastest bike ever over the longest distance in 24 hours • details of Bennetts High Performance Awards for bike clothing, taking the complexity out of bike kit protection ratings and why you should look out for it • FECsack musings including why isn't cruise control fitted to smaller bikes, the best small-bore track bike, why bike modern bike seats don't always fit and much more... Thanks for your ears, please keep your musings and queries and general thoughts coming to: [email protected] @simonhbikes @mufga

Hello everybody, and welcome to a quick but exciting FEC cordially inviting you, dear FEC listener, to the Bennetts Snetterton Track Day on Thursday 13th July.

We’re going, and we’d love you to be there with us for a chin-wag and a cup of coffee.

Bennetts BikeSocial trackdays aren’t like other trackdays – they’re WAY better.

As well as 7 x 20-minute track sessions, with novice, intermediate and advanced group options, you’ll also get FREE action shots taken by a professional British Superbikes photographer, and be able to meet and ride on track with Mr John McGuinness.

An onsite BSB mechanic will offer set-up advice, a team of instructors will offer riding tips, and Yamaha track hire bikes are available to book. If you’re a novice, this is the perfect introduction – there’s an extended safety briefing if it’s your first time, plus two free classroom sessions offering advice on body position and circuit riding.

And all of this costs just £139 – an absolute bargain.

Normally Bennetts trackdays are only available to BikeSocial members, but we’ve swung a deal to allow FEC listeners to come along too, even if you’re not a BikeSocialist.

We'll be there, and we’ll have a garage put aside exclusively for the use of FECers.

Obviously you will need all the usual trackday safety kit (ACU approved full-face helmet, full one-piece or complete zip-together two-piece leathers, proper boots and leather gloves and all the rest) plus a full length back protector, and a front brake lever guard or hand-guards, and your bike will need to meet the noise limit (102DB static / 92DB driveby).

To book, you’ll need to head to the link below:

https://rewards.bennetts.co.uk/rewards/snetterton-trackday-13072023-discount-voucher-code

You’ll find all the info you need, the terms & conditions, plus a link to take you through to book your place, at Snetterton, on Thursday 13th July. See you there!

Hello, good morning and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's best general-purpose biking podcast (apart from racing podcasts, of which there are many and excellent). This is Episode 177 of nonsense, the first since the FEC Grin Up North tour. And it's been a while because Simon and Martin have been busy eking a living from the dry, dusty soil of freelance motorcycle journalism.  Thanks as always to Bennetts, with whom you ought to be insured for so many reasons – they're actually motorcyclists, for a start. And they support www.bikesocial.co.uk and its associated YouTube channel, where you can find road tests, launches, news, proper consumer advice and loads more genuinely useful, and entertaining, stuff. Check out becoming a BikeSocial Member, because the money-off offers alone are more than worthwhile – not to mention the competition offers.  Anyway, on this episode of FEC Simon and Martin natter about:  • The FEC800 Grin Up North Tour • Martin's impressions of Suzuki's GSX-S1000 GT+ • Simon's impressions of Honda's Gold Wing • Honda's DCT system and why it's taken 13 years for Simon to get over himself  • why Ireland is SO NICE! • speculation about BMW's M1000XR • some truths about the hydrogen as an alternative fuel, and why the Japanese manufacturers have got together to find out it's probably not the answer • your FEC Sack questions and queries including why changing your tyres is a Good Thing, why there's good riding in the south of England if you go looking for it, is Ducati's Monster defined by a trellis frame, and riding bikes before you were born. *From* before you were born, not actually pre-womb.  Thanks for listening, send your questions, thoughts and lunatic ravings to [email protected] Get me and Martin on the socials @simohbikes @Mufga  This episode is dedicated to the memory of Boz. 

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E176... LIVE FROM THE 2023 GRIN OOP NORTH TOUR!

Yes folks, after a lengthy absence due to life, the universe and everything, Front End Chatter is back – and not only back, but back LIVE. Recorded in front of a hand-picked audience of FEC friends from a hotel in Lancashire, your hosts Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons talk a load of nonsense including:

• guff about the new Suzuki GSX-S 8S and why it might be better than Honda’s Hornet

• guff about the new Yamaha Tracer 9 GT+ and how it helps you brake

• Mufga goes trials riding with Inch Perfect Trials

• plus questions from the audience, including: • how to set-up, or not, a GSX-S1000S

• why pillion seats are so small • how to save motorcycling

• who will build the last petrol engine ever

And a bit more.

Thanks as always to Bennetts and BikeSocial.co.uk for their enduring and endearing support.

Thanks also to Paul at MCI Tours (www.mcitours.com) for organising and managing the FEC Grin Oop North Tour.

Thanks to the staff of Crooklands Hotel, Kendal, for their hospitality.

And, more than anything, thanks to our friends on the FEC Grin Oop North Tour 2023: Matt, DJ, Peter, Jamie, Owain, Dale, Paul, Jono, George, John, Iestyn, Fazer John & Pamela, Andy & Carol, Stuart & Leonie, Stuart & Jenny, PJ, Connor, Matt, Avi and Jake.

@SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Episode 175 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s funkiest motorcycling podcast, presented by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, supported as ever by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best place to get your motorcycling news and other two-wheeled resources.

And on FEC175 we have:

• Simon becomes one of a handful of humans to ride both Suzuki’s V-Strom 800DE and Honda’s Transalp at their respective launches – find out what he thinks and which one might suit you

• KTM and MV Agusta re-organise their dealers (which only matters to the half of the podcast who owns an MV Agusta)

• Irish road racing is back on after securing £90,000 from crowdfunding and a renegotiation of their insurance premium, which is good news – although is this now going to be an annual issue?

• the first two races from World Superbike at Phillip Island and Mandalika

• plus more of our emails, including:

            - the when and where of throttle snatch

            - why can’t I go round right handers?

            - how come Sikhs don’t have to wear helmets?

            - recalibrating quickshifters – urban myth or actual thing?

            - why does my bum ache?

...and much more...

Thank you very much for listening, and please send your thoughts, queries and random comedy motorcycling moments to

[email protected] @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Dearest FECers, welcome to episode 174 of the long-running – well, it's our ninth birthday, apparently, Happy Birthday to us etc – motorcycling podcast brought to you by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and ably, nimbly and elastically supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists (and if you haven't yet, you really should) and bikesocial.co.uk, the world of wokecycling on the web.  And on this episode of FEC we have:  • Martin making his spring comeback on his MV • top tips for getting back into it after a winter lay-off • the current state of play on the roads in Ireland • Simon rides BMW's R1250 RS and gets confused by Triumph's DRLs • plus a bunch of FECmails including naming your bike, which Guzzi, does your confidence dip, and what a compression and why is it ratioed?  Thanks for listening once more, please spread the word, and please keep sending your thoughts, ponderings, musings, anecdotes, jokes, questions and offers of, well, anything, to: [email protected] @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello & welcome to Front End Chatter with him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and me, Simon Harararargreaves. This is episode #173 of a long-running saga, in which we are as ever indebted to Bennetts, the only bike insurers who actually invest a shed-load back into British motorcycling culture to promote the British Superbike series, create an ocean of free content at www.BikeSocial.co.uk, planted the seeds for a rich and fertile YouTube channel, and allow FEC to come in your ears once a fortnight. That's gotta be worth the entry fee.  And on this fortnight's FEC we have a new bike blitz with the return of the sports 400 in the unlikely shape of Kawasaki's ZX-4RR, the return of the sports touring supermoto with KTM's 890 SMT, and the debut of Suzuki's V-Strom with a 21in front wheel. We also dive into the FEC sack – and, in a break with tradition, we harvest it from the top down, responding to the most current emails first (mostly commenting on FEC172's rather depressing message about the end of life as we know it).  Anyway, we're still here, you're still here, and bikes are still awesome. So we're good.  Please keep the questions (bike choice or existential), plus any other queries, comments and funny stories, coming to us at: [email protected] Catch us on the socials at:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga Aye. 

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 172, hosted by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons and supported in their noble endeavours by Bennetts, the bike insurance gurus, and bikesocial.co.uk, the world wide web of wokorcycling. 

Bit of a special episode of FEC – c'mon, keep it light – as we visit the Motorcycle Industry Association annual conference and speak to the head of the MCIA, Tony Campbell, to find out what the great and the good of the British motorcycle industry are doing to prepare for the UK government's proposal to ban the sale of new petrol-engined bikes in just over a decade from now. It's not all bad news, but some of it might be.  Thanks for listening, and please email your thoughts, reactions, questions and opinions to:  [email protected] Get us on the socials:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E171 and I’m a bit short on time this week so here’s a condensed version of the usual word salad: FEC is a motorcycling podcast created by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, a pair of motorcycle content creators (I wrote a load of other stuff here about crumbling ivory towers but thought the better of it and pressed delete). Meanwhile, FEC is truly, deeply, madly proud to be supported and fertilised by the good people of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and bikesocial.co.uk, the best motorcycling website in the world. Pay them a visit, check out what's going on, and get involved with Bennetts Membership with all its offers and discounts. And there are many.  Bit of a slow news week for this episode, so in the absence of actual news worth repeating we have a deep dive into the FECsack instead, covering so many topics you might as well listen than have me type them out here, if that's ok? Ta.  Please keep your thoughts, queries, musings and mumblings coming in to: [email protected] And thank you for your continued aural appreciation.  @SimonHBikes @Mufga 

Hello and welcome to episode 170 of Front End Chatter, the UK's finest motorcycling podcast with Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons (other finest motorcycling podcasts without Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons are available). FEC is, as ever thus far, supported and ported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the greatest motorcycling website on the, er, web.  And on this episode, we natter about:  • birthdays, and why BMW are celebrating theirs like a death in the family • prices for Suzuki's GSX-8S and P-Strom, and why maths isn't their strong point • KTM's spy-shotted RC990, and possible the origins of its motor • last chance for an exclusive place to the FEC tour 2023 (It's Grin (and indeed, Gin) Up North) before we spread the love on the internet • our memories of ex-motorcycle journo John Cantlie • plus loads of next bike recommendations, too late as usual but no-one ever does what we suggest anyway Thank you for your listening ears throughout 2022, and 'ears to a similarly audible 2023.  Please keep your thoughts, ponderings, musings and questions coming to [email protected] @SimonHBikes @Mufga  

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's best biking podcast even if we – 'we' being Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, a pair of motorcycling ne'er-do-wells who once had an opinion and now just have onions – do say so ourselves, which is just as well because no-one else does.  Front End Chatter is as ever supported like a great surgical truss of benevolence by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and their media empire of bikesocial.co.uk, upon which one can find all the news, reviews, new bike and consumer tests one could wish for. And check out their YouTube channel too.  On this esipode of Fnet Rund Chasser we have, for your aural delectation:  • a bit of goss from that Motorcycle Live they had recently • a thoroughly in-depth chat about Honda's new CB750 Hornet • why World Superbike will be worth watching in 2023 • the return of KTM's 790 Duke and Adventure, only made in China and as we predicted ages ago • details of the FEC Tour 2023 – It's Grin Up North!  • plus a stack of your emails from the FECsack Thank you for listening, and please keep your thoughts, queries and ponderings coming to:  [email protected] @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Episode 168 in the long-running series of Great Motorcycling Podcasts – yes, we're back after a late summer break in which one of us got married and one of us didn't.  Thanks as ever to Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk – supplying quality motorcycle news, reviews, videos, launches and consumer product tests longer than anyone can remember. No, not the consumer tests themselves; how long BikeSocial has been aro... oh never mind.  Right, 168 is easy to describe: • a big chatter about the finale of the MotoGP races of the season, who won, are the Japanese factories on the way out, and why it will be our last for a while • tons of new bike news, including Honda's Transalp & Hornet 750 slugging it out with Suzuki's P-Strom 800DE and impossible-to-pronounce GSX-8S, plus a bit of green news from Kawasaki (geddit?), the most advanced radar system ever on the new Yamaha Tracer 9 GT+, revamped Triumph Street Triples and loads of stuff we forgot to mention.  Thanks again for listening with your ears, and please send thoughts, questions and offers of pretty much anything to: [email protected] @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello everyone, and welcome to episode 167 of Front End Chatter, Britain's poddiest motorcycling cast, supported as ever by nos amis at Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and bikesocial.co.uk, not only the web's most informative and enlightening motorcycling website, but also refreshingly free of the nasty, irritating ads and pop-ups you get on other websites. So let that be a lesson. 

And on this FEC we rabbit about: • the new Ducati Multistrada V4S Rally • BMW's uprated S1000RR • Honda's new CB750 Hairnet • ...and which of those is the most important for the future of motorcycling • the action from MotoGP in Thailand, including how Ducati are actually managing to beat themselves • 42 MotoGP races at 21 MotoGP rounds next year, including one in Kazakhstan (why?) and India  • Plus more ruminations from the FECsack  • details of FEC at the NEC – yes, on the Black Horse stand talking with Jamie Whitham on Thursday 24th Nov Thanks for your ears, and please send your thoughts, ideas, disputes and questions to: [email protected] Get us on the socials: @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s chattiest motorcycling podcast with him, Simon Hargreaves and him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and supported as ever by the wonderful folk at Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best biking website, er, on the internet.

And on E166 we have for your aural delectation:

• the fallout and the fall-offs from Aragon, son of Arathorn, including Marc ‘Mayhem’ Marquez
• a farewell to Dovi, the new Dani Pedrosa
• speculation around the new Honda Hornet 750 parallel twin and Transalp
• more speculation around Suzuki’s forthcoming parallel twin adventure bike and roadster, including why it could be an 800, not a 700
• a whole thing about the future of motorcycling
• if there’s anyone left, a bit of FECsack including Suzuki power modes, Groms, and how crash recovery isn’t the same thing as breakdown recovery. Thanks for listening, please send thoughts, questions, contributions and other scribbled notes to [email protected]

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's best biking podcast, and episode 165 featuring him, Simon Hargreaves, and him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons. Front End Chatter is, forever and day, sponsored and supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and www.bikesocial.co.uk – the best website on the planet to get your fix of news, views and reviews.  Hot news – FEC will be *briefly* be on stage at the NEC at 11am Thursday 24th November at Motorcycle Live! Be there, and come prepared to FECkle!  And also on this week's FEC we have:  • MotoGP's plans for an additional Sprint Race in 2023 • Marc Marquez's Honda ultimatum • the long-term future of Yamaha and Honda in MotoGP • oh, and there was a race in Austria • meanwhile, we take a guess at Ducati's seven new 'products' in 2023 • plus the usual deep dive in the FEC sack - your questions, queries, comments and thoughts - please send them to [email protected]

Thanks for listening!  @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Episode 164 of Front End Chatter (or 'FEC' as it's also known around these parts) – a motorcycling podcast, ish, supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and bikesocial.co.uk, the world of biking on the web.  And on this episode of FEC we have:  • a round-up of Silverstone MotoGP, for the benefit of the 26,000 people who went last year but didn't go this time.   • Energica Experia – in a genuine ooo, Mufga test rides the best electric bike, by a mile, so far. • Royal Enfield make the UK's best-selling big bike.  • Triumph's Enfield Meteor rival, built by Baja . All this and more, including ruminations from the FEC sack of listeners' emails.  Thanks for listening, keep the emailed questions coming to:  [email protected]

@SimonHBikes @Mufga 

Hello and welcome to Episode 163 of Front End Chatter, Britain's most flavoursome motorcyclistic podcast with Simon Fitz-Gibbons and Martin Hargreaves if you're listening in black & white.  Front End Chatter is supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best place on the web to keep up to speed with all things two wheels (and don't forget the Bennetts' YouTube channel wot has tons of good stuff on it).  And on this week's FEC we have: 

• testing jackets for RiDE magazine on the hottest day EVER  • the splendour of a Bennetts' track day at Cadwell on an SV650 • World Supers from Donington • running over cats and dead piglets • does MotoGP visit democratic countries?  • why boots squeak and how to fix it • how much better is a Tracer 9 GT than a Tracer 900 GT? • should we experiment with cornering ABS? All this and much more, or less, depends on your point of view and the orientation of your ears.  Thanks to everyone for listening, please keep your emails coming in to anything@frontendchatter and see you soon! @simonhbikes @mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Episode 162 of the long-running family of motorcycling podcasts featuring wayward sons Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons (combined motorcycle journalism age: 50+, combined mental age: -50), supported like a pair of workshy fops by the patriarchal benevolence of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and bikesocial.co.uk, the place on t'internet to get all your bike info.  And on this week's FEC we have:  • when does riding off-road stop being fun? • Peco Bagnaia done for drink-driving and sticking his car in a ditch • Suzuki cease World Endurance support as well as MotoGP – is it the beginning of the end?  • detail on Ducati's V21L MotoE race bike (which exists and be ridden) and Triumph's TE-1 prototype (which exists but won't) • bolt-ons that make you ride like an idiot All this an much more...  Thanks everyone for listening, please send your thoughts, feelings, emotive pleas and questions to: [email protected] Get us on Twitter and Insta: @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s favourite biking and egg-throwing podcast, presented by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and bikesocial.co.uk, the best and most complete motorcycling website on the, er, web.

On episode 161 of FEC:

• When is a MotoGP crash a mistake and when is it reckless riding, and what’s the difference?
• what is a Maeving RM1 and are friends electric? • Mufga puts his best foot forward at the Royal Enfield Slide School
• RIP Steve Harris, one third of Harris Performance
• How much power is too much, and what does too much feel like?
• How do we ride with people who are slower than us, and is it ok to get a bit frustrated sometimes?
• Is a slow, safe rider a ‘better’ rider than a quicker but riskier rider?

All this and much more, including pillow-fighting.

Thanks for your ears, please spread the good word (and the bad ones), and get us on the socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's Podcastiest Motorcycle, brought to you by Simone Hargreaves, Martina Fitz-Gibbons, Ben Nets (the bike insurance specialists) and bikesocial.co.uk (the best biking website on the er, web).  And on this, the 160th episode, we have for your aural delectation, gossip about:  • Marc Marquez – will he or won't he?  • Suzuki – will they or won't they?  • MotoGP – is it better than WSB or not?  • The FEC800 – was it amazing, or was it amazing?  • Simon's injury – is it broken leg or ankle?  • Yamaha's Ténéré 700 World Raid – is it better than a Ténéré 700 or not?  ...and much, much more! Thank you very much for listening, and please follow Simon and Martin on the socials:  @Mufga @SimonHbikes And get your insurance from Bennetts, visit www.bikesocial.co.uk, subscribe to RiDE magazine and buy your kit from www.sportsbikeshop.co.uk

Hello and welcome everyone to Episode 159 of Front End Chatter, Britain's Lengthiest Motorcycling Podcast – supported and extended by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and Bikesocial.co.uk, the best biking website on, er the web. And on FEC159 we have:  • MotoGP gossip from Portimao and Jerez • the FEC800 is nearly upon us! • Suzuki Bennetts BikeSocial Busa Bonanza • the planned trials of 'noise speed cameras' • more on motorcycling training in the US • disappearing testicles and inopportune arousals •... and plenty more where that came from Thanks again for listening and please keep your thoughts, questions and poetry coming to [email protected] And catch us on the socials: @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Episode 158 of Front End Chatter, Britain's most sideways motorcycle podcast, supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best place on the web for all your biking news, views and reviews.  And on E158 we have:  • the implications of Marc Marquez' remarkable ride at COTA • what is going on with Alvaro Bautista's hair? • The return of the Honda Hornet, but not as we remember it • Kevin Schwantz and Wayne Rainey ride together again at Goodwood Festival of Speed • Mufga's new bike revealed! • why are some modern bikes too cramped to even fit an alarm? • the merits of revamping your existing track bike instead of buying a new one ...plus much more!  Thanks for listening, keep your questions, thoughts and admonishments coming to [email protected] Follow me and him on the socials:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome everyone to Front End Chatter, Britain’s talkiest motorcycle podcast, and episode 157 presented by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves – supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the web.

And on today’s episode we cover the following ground:

• MotoGP gossip post Argentina but pre-Circuit of the Americas (well, the North Americas)
• will head-butting a herring gull write off your helmet?
• bar muffs – sensible and comfortable, or unforgiveable fashion faux pas?
• should you take your helmet as hand-luggage or checked-in hold luggage on a flight?
• does a wide helmet aperture reduce riding stress?
• suggestions for extending life of a high-compression two-stroke (no, really)
• best all-season daily textile jacket for under £200
• group riding as a confidence-builder
• and much much more

Thank you so much for continuing to grace us with your ears, and please keep your thoughts and questions coming to [email protected]

Catch us on the socials:

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello everyone and welcome to Front End Chatter, a motorcycling podcast of sorts in which Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons conspire, despite something like a combined half century in motorcycle journalism, to demonstrate the absence of having learned anything worthwhile. They are ably supported in their endeavours by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the best motorcycling website in the world. If you’re insuring you bike, you’d be well advised to have a look at  Bennetts BikeSocial Membership scheme, which gives you access to a vast array of discounts, competitions, tracks days and events – including the upcoming Busa Bonanza: the chance for Hayabusa owners to come to Elvington near York and take their bike up the runway as often as they like. Details below.

Onto FEC Episode 156, among the contents of which you may find:

• guff from the second MotoGP race from Indonesia, including Marc Marquez – he gets knocked down, he gets up again... but how long can this go on?
• MotoGP Unlimited: hit or a miss?
• ex-500GP-and-lots-more old-age-race-ace Jeremy McWilliams wins a race in the US on an American V-twin for the first time since 2010, when he last won a race in the US on an America V-twin
• Busa Bonanza details, and why going fast in a straight line is a Good Thing
• KTM 790 Duke makes a comeback after a colossal one year’s absence
• Honda Hawk, a modern café racer based on the, take a guess, yes, the Africa Twin platform
• Triumph’s Tiger 1200 ridden, rated, and is it as good as a GS? There isn’t lots more, because that’s it for this week! Lots of FEC-sack emails thoughts, questions and ponderings in FEC158, promise!

Thanks for listening and supporting FEC, and please continue to spread the word! Follow Simon and Martin on the socials at:

@SimonHBikes @Mufga Busa Bonanza details! Calling all Hayabusa (and B-King) owners, road legal or otherwise… how would you like to attend our event in conjunction with Suzuki GB for as many high-speed runs as you want?

What?We’re calling the event, The BikeSocial Busa Bonanza!

BikeSocial and Suzuki GB are inviting all Suzuki Hayabusa (and B-King) owners, road legal or otherwise, to a disused two-mile long airfield for a chance to run their bike flat-out.

Straightliners, the drag racing events experts, will use their immense experience to operate the event with support from BikeSocial and Suzuki GB. Bikes that have run at over 200mph will also be running, and a team of experts will be on hand to help with launches and body positions.

Free professional photos, as well as a commemorative printout of the registered speed at ½ mile and one-mile intervals, and a beautiful sticker(!) will form part of the record of your day.

Suzuki GB will bring several of the latest generation Hayabusa models which can be booked for a trial on the day.

The 2022 Buildbase Suzuki team who’ll be competing in the Bennetts British Superbike championship will be in attendance along with riders Christian Iddon and Danny Kent, fresh from the season’s opening round at Silverstone.

Come on, how many opportunities will you get to feel what 170mph+ is like?!

Where? Elvington Airfield, Yorkshire, YO41 4AU. A former RAF base.

When? Tuesday, 26th April 2022, 10.30am – 5pm. Gates open from 8:30am. First runs at 10:30 following the safety briefing. No need to pre-register, just turn up. Spectators are welcome too but it'll only be Hayabusa's and B-King's permitted on the runway!

How much? After a £5 entry fee per person (rider, pillion or spectator), the opportunity to run-what-you-brung along the runway will be free of charge for BikeSocial Members, but there’ll be a one-off £10 charge for non-members.

There is no restriction on the number of runs between 10.30am – 5pm.

Small print: Riders will be required to sign an indemnity and have their riding gear checked (one-piece leathers preferred though 2-piece leathers must zip-together all the way around) then they’ll receive a sticker for their bike and a wristband for themselves.

Only once a safety briefing is completed can the rider join a queue to be escorted to the beginning of the runway.

Only one bike at a time will be permitted on the runway.

The noise restriction is 105dB static.

For those wishing to book one of the latest Suzuki Hayabusa road bikes to test on the runway, you need to provide your licence and DVLA check code. You will be entitled to two runs.

Spectators: £5 (under 16s free but must be accompanied by a fee-paying adult).

BikeSocial members must bring their policy or membership number.

We look forward to welcoming you to Elvington, and don’t forget to tell all your Hayabusa owning friends!

For further information or any questions, please email us on [email protected] or join the discussion at the Busa Bonanza Facebook Events page

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E155, the Ben Bostrom episode, presented by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons from Chatter Manors, ably supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance experts, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the place for all your motorcycle news, launches, reviews, road tests, product tests and racing.

And on this edition of FEC we have:

• the first round of MotoGP 2022 from Qatar and matters pertaining...
• as Triumph announces the restarting of bike manufacture in the UK, would you pay more for a bike assembled in the UK instead of elsewhere in the world?
• should tech development in MotoGP, like carbon discs and shapeshifters, be limited to relevance on road bikes?
• Honda’s V4 history filtered through the FEC mangle

...and much more – nearly two hours’ worth of chatter and bobbins. Thank you very much for your ears, please keep your emails, thoughts, opinions and musings to anything@frontendchatter, and catch Martin and Simon the socials... @SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E154, and – please put your lips together and pipe us a tune – it’s our 8th birthday! That means Simon has been making Front End Chatter for 14% of his life – and 20% of Mufga’s.

Front End Chatter is proud, nay, positively tumescent to be sponsored and supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and their multimedia wing, BikeSocial.co.uk. We implore, nay we beseech you to get your bike insurance with Bennetts – bike insurance run by motorcyclists, FOR motorcyclists, and putting more back into the industry than any other bike insurer, FACT. From BSB sponsorship to their YouTube channel with bike reviews and features and kit and gear tests, to the BikeSocial website with news, stories and tests – right through to BikeSocial Membership which gives you access to tons and tons of cool stuff such as: discounts at Sportsbikeshop, money off Yoshimura and Akrapovic exhausts, R&G stuff, Evotec stuff, a VIP weekend at the Nick Sanders Expedition Centre, and bargain track days exclusively for Bike Social members.

Anyway, before all that, a bumper episode of FEC including MotoGP testing from the disintegrating Mandalika circuit, rants about MotoGP Unlimited, surprising indifference to the news Wayne Rainey is riding at Goodwood Festival of Greed Speed, the new Yamaha Ténéré Wordle Raid, and a slew of lovely listener emails.

Keep ’em coming to [email protected]

And catch Simon and Martin on the socials at

@SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front Endy Prongs number 153 in the long-running cerealised podcast of motorcycle-related things, sponsored forever and a day by Bennetts, the prince among Thebes of bike insurance specialists – and bikesocial.co.uk, the number one place to go for bike-related news, reviews and product and kit tests. And check out Bennetts' YouTube channel, with all the lovely lovely lovely moving images contained therein.  Now, to business. This week Simon and Martin natter about:  • MotoGP testing from Sepang • sending long termers back to importers in a crate • taking the bodywork off test bikes on location • Norton ex-boss Stuart Garner pleads guilty • Triumph's TE-1 electric Speed Triple ready for testing • BMW's 2022 K1600 reviewed • and a tone of other stuff, including a smattering of your lovely lovely lovely emails Thanks for continuing to indulge our witterings, and please continue to send emails with thoughts, queries and questions to  anything@frontend chatter.com Catch us on the socials at:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome everyone to Front End Chatter, Britain’s Best Predominantly Road-Based Biking Podcast, with Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons supported for the 100th time by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and bikesocial.co.uk for all your motorcycle news, launches, reviews, road tests, product tests and racing.

And on episode 152 this week we have:

• quiz time: who had 152 MotoGP podiums in their career?
• Marc Marquez is making his comeback, but in his 10th season he’s basically the old timer of the class now
• 2021 has given BMW and Ducati their best-ever sales results – but where in world do they sell the most?
• RIP to the man inspired a generation to ride bikes (okay, maybe just me), Mr Meatloaf

Plus FECsack specials including:

• got any good tips for sportsbike touring?
• what used litre sportsbikes will get me into the fast group?
• how a Grand Prix could be coming to Lincolnshire

Plus loads more – about 2 hours’ worth. Blimey. Thanks for lending us your ears, and please send your questions, queries and thoughts to: [email protected] And catch Simon and Martin on the socials:

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, possibly Britain’s longest-running motorcycling podcast, don’t sue us, we haven’t done the maths, and welcome to episode 151, supported and enhanced as ever by the presence and patronage of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and bikesocial.co.uk – the place get all your news and views and reviews of new bikes, used bikes, kit tests and everything happening in motorcycling.

And on Front End Chatter E151 we have a FECsack special, partly because there’s no news to speak of (apart from Petrucci being a star), and partly special because Simon read the wrong emails. We hope you enjoy!  Thanks again to Bennetts and bikesocial.co.uk, and please keep your thoughts, questions and ideas coming to:  [email protected]

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 150, presented as ever by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialist, and bikesocial.co.uk, your one-stop on the interwebs for everything bike-related – and don’t forget to check out Bennetts’ YouTube channel with a stack of new bike launch videos, consumer advice and how-tos.

And on this Christmassy episode we have:

• Some bad bike jokes
• FEC at the NEC; our chat on stage with Mr Jamie James Whitham live at Motorcycle Live
• Triumph's new Tiger 1200 gets more from less
• BSA's Goldstar gets something from nothing
• Ducati's Desert X gets it white first time
• John McGuiness returns to Honda for the NW and TT Plus
• why Sargent seats are good
• how having kids changes motorcycling
• synthetic fuel alternatives to electric as the future
• ...and loads of chit-chat in between

Thanks to all of you for downloading and giving FEC a listen, please continue to spread the word, and please keep your thoughts, queries, questions and musings coming in to  [email protected] ...Ands catch us both on the various socials: @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and is it that time already? This, in all its error-strewn glory, is episode 149 of the biking podcast presented by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves in which they attempt to steer a smooth path between pot-holes on the A87 of modern motorcycling, and avoid denting their rims.  Front End Chatter is, as ever, proud to be supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and Bikesocial.co.uk, the best website in the world for getting all your motorcycling news, reviews, product tests, racing info and first rides of the latest bikes.  And on FEC this week Simon fails to understand much about anything, leaving Martin to soldier on nattering about:  • EICMA No-Show – the big Italian bike show normally flush with new bikes... but minus some big names this year... • new Bimotas, Hondas – including the resurrection of the Hornet, by name at least – Kawasakis, Moto Guzzi and MV Agusta • Toprak Razgatlioglu finishes the WSB season in dominant style by losing the final two races but winning the title Plus samples from the FEC-sack, including: • what would a bi-directional track day be like as a way of teaching on-road rider training? • what bike would we love to ride but never want to own?  • what bike would we love own despite there being more exciting rivals? • what bikes were ahead of their time, failed, but would be a success now? • what are our best, or closest, near misses? • plus lots, lots more Thanks for listening, please keep your mails coming to [email protected] Come and see us at Motorcycle Live at the NEC on Thursday 9th at 11am, catch us on the socials: @SimonHBikes @Mufga And thank you for your ears. 

Hello and welcome to episode 148 of the long-running motorcycling podcast otherwise known as Front End Chatter, presented before your brain by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons and supported like a bridge over troubled water by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and bikesocial.co.uk, the place to get all your bike news, reviews, product tests and racing.

And on this week’s episode Simon and Martin blather about:

• goodbye and farewell to you-know-who, managing to make the very last lap of his career one of his most impressive • what’s his legacy, what was his finest moment, and what was his worst?
• more MotoGP farewells from Petrucci and Mr Steve Day
• Marc Marquez’ eye injury – what does it mean long term for Marquez, Honda and Repsol?
• Jack Miller racing a Panigale V4 R in the Australian Superbike Championship
• the passing of Paul Smart, Ducati legend and all-round great bloke

Plus a bunch of new bike reviews:

• Ducati’s Multistrada V4 Pike Peak
• Honda’s NT1100 tourer
• Ducati’s ‘new’ Multistrada V2 S
• Aprilia’s Tuareg 660

And finally, news of the FEC800 Tour 2022 – and go see FEC at the NEC on Thursday 9th December on stage with James Whitham, where Simon and Martin will be talking bobbins about the best bikes of 2021 and what we’re looking forward to 2022…

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and episode 147 of the world’s most motorcycling podcast performed by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the number one place on the web to carbon capture all the info fit to eat on anything to do with news, new bikes reviews, gear guides and kit tests, used bike info and all manner of racing stuff. 

So on this episode of Front End Chatter we have a trundle on about:

• a new MotoGP champion, a retiring MotoGP champion and a MotoGP champion returning to form
• why are there no mean, moody bastards in racing any more, and do we miss them?
• WSB's knobbled Kawasakis and does it undermine the legitimacy of Yamaha's success? 
• Ducati's shock entry into the MotoE world cup
• new bike news including Honda's NT1100, Suzuki's GSX-S1000 GT, Ducati's Multistrada V2 and Triumph's Tiger 600 Sport
• good lids for oblong heads
• what are the best and worst adventure bikes to take on a track? 

All this and more in E147 of Front End Chatter. Thanks for listening, and please keep your emails, thoughts, queries and questions coming to:  [email protected] And also – if you fancy being part of a crowdfunded road test, check out Twitter:  @SimonHbikes @Mufga And don't forget, only a couple of rooms left on the FEC800 Tour! Email for info!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E146, the UK’s most iambically pentametered motorcycling podcast, poetically performed and produced by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and perennially supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the happeningiest place to go for offers, deals and square meals – if you can buy it for your bike or your riding life, you can get discounts and cool points with Bennetts BikeSocial. Fact.

And on this episode of FEC we have:

• Bagnaia and Bastianini go big in Misano, plus a bit of wow from Aragon the week before
• A look at the career of Chaz Davies, who’s called WSB a day, so... see you at Darley Moor
• Suzuki’s new GSX-S1000 GT – is it good value or not, and should we be excited or not?
• Ducati’s Desert-X – a Multistrada in an off-road frock? Or an entirely new ‘middleweight’ adventure bike (we don’t invent these categories... oh, hang on, we do)
• Triumph’s new Tiger 1200, with a T-plane crank, and how it’ll fare against BMW’s R1250 GS – featuring the return of the Mufgulator and some educated guesses on the Tiger's actual capacity, bore x stroke, and a prediction on its power output
• Plus more of your thoughts, musings and questions from the FEC-sack Thanks for listening, and keep an eye out for details of the FEC800, a tour around Scotland's Greatest Hits in May 2022 and to which you are all cordially invited to ride with Simon and Martin, and drink beer in the evening. Full details on the socials:  @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and go away to Front End Chatter, the UK’s most motorcycling podcast featuring aural nonsense from Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves. This is episode 145, supported and nourished by Bennetts Bike Social; so much more than just bike – and now car – insurance: check out their website to discover the multifarious munificent benefits of membership. And, if you’re at all interested in Yamaha’s Tracer 9 GT v Triumph’s Tiger 900 GT Pro v BMW’s F900XR v Kawasaki’s Versys 1000 SE GT, check out the road test video at https://youtu.be/C5SJO6trgz8

Anyway, on this week’s moany, miserable-ass FEC we have:

• on-the-scenes goss from the British MotoGP at Silverstone, including why Mufga loved being there on Saturday and Simon hated it
• Dorna’s race feed going down just before the race
• Marquez crashing out *again* and why he’s the crashingiest rider this season
• Aprilia’s... we can’t call it a resurrection so let’s just call it an erection...
• WSB gets a mention with some fab racing from Magny Cours – and some scandalous losing
• more new bikes from Triumph with a teaser for the all-new Tiger 1200 and leaked shots of the new Speed Triple RR
• ...and the new Moto Guzzi V100 – all-new water-cooled engine, with fins, with fairly *interesting* looks...

Plus the FEC sack, including:

• changing pads to change braking character
• re-setting the quickshifter on an S1000XR
• a touching story about becoming emotionally attached to items of bike clothing
• when is a tubeless tyre not a tubeless tyre? Answers please, because we don’t know...

And much, much more – including more info on the first, and perhaps only, FEC Tour coming in May 2022...

Thank you for listening, please keep your questions and thoughts coming in to:

[email protected]

And get us on the socials:

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 144, Britain’s – nay, the world’s – most irreverent motorcycling podcast, with Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves. Thanks as ever to Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the web, for their unwavering support (especially while the new wing of Chatter Manors is built).

And on this week’s episode we have:

• what year would Kenny Roberts Snr have retired if he’d had Rossi’s career longevity?
• excerpts from the Secret Diary Of Maverick Vinales, Age 14 and a half, and does he need sympathy or a stiff talking-to, or possibly both?
• ...but if you think Vinales’ behaviour is odd, wait until you hear what Miguel Oliveira’s been up to
• ...and we finally get an explanation as to why Rossi’s not come first for ages
• plus, the will-they/won’t-they Isle Of Wight road race saga continues
• ex-Norton boss Stuart Garner is in the dock
• Triumph’s new half-faired sporty-ish Speed Triple 1200RR...
• ...and Triumph’s also new Tiger 660, based on the Trident
• speculation about Yamaha’s sporty MT-09, the R9
• can we put E10 fuel in our tanks? Mufga has the answer (for SV650s)
• plus your FEC sack queries and thoughts...

PLUS! A vague hint about a potentially forthcoming FECing tour of Scotland sometime next year – gauging interest, what do you think? Fancy going for a big ride with Simon and Martin, involving bikes, beer and banter? Let us know at [email protected] Thanks super so much for ears and support, please keep the FEC mails with your thoughts, queries and mad ideas coming in to [email protected]

Get us on the socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Welcome, friends, to Front End Chatter E143 – the one hundred and forty third time Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, some-time motorcycle journalists past and present, have sat, stood and otherwise presented themselves before a pair of microphones and spoken unto them, sometimes with funny accents.  And special thanks to our sponsors and friends at Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk where you can find new bike news, racing, buying guides, used reviews, and gear guides – and don't forget their Youtube channel!

And on this episode of Front End Chatter:

• The GOATI (Greatest Of All Time Ish) announces his retirement: not a moment too soon, or wailing and gnashing of teeth?
• all the spills and thrills... yes, count them... from the Styrian MotoGP, let’s call it Austria #1 between friends
• Aprilia’s new Tuareg 660, the third model in the popular parallel twin series, picked apart on paper
• if you could buy your first bike back now, would you restore it to its original condition or put it back to how you last rode it?
• What's the best sportsbike to buy now as an investment? 
• weren't the 1990s great? All this and more on FEC143. Thanks for lending us your ears, please tell your fwends about us, please keep sending us your thoughts, musings and questions to [email protected] and download us from www.bikesocial.co.uk  @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E142, and right up front please accept sincere apologies for the lousy sound quality – the usual recording room at Chatter Manors has been flooded by an unfortunate incident involving a blockage in the sceptic tank and Ron, the missing handyman, who, it transpires, is in fact the blockage. Thus Simon and Martin have been forced to squeeze into the only room in Chatter Manors that isn't knee-deep in effluent – which is, ironically, the downstairs toilet complete with its unfavourable podcasting acoustics. It might have an echo but at least it's not swimming in raw sewerage. Although some might suggest the two have a lot in common.  

None of this is the fault of Britain's best bike insurance specialists, Bennetts, nor indeed BikeSocial, who both are blissfully unaware of the infernal plumbing irregularities plaguing Chatter Manors. Anyway, assuming you can tolerate the infuriating slapback delay, here's what's in store on FEC this week: • Isle Of Wight Races are back on – or are they?  • Triumph's plans to race enduro and motocross  • Cal Crutchlow subs for Morbidelli at Silverstone and Austria x 2 • who's done more for motorcycling: Keanu Reeves or Tom Cruise? • when are you too old to ride an MV Agusta?  • when are brakes too good, and how do you make them worse? • why isn't more love given to Kawasaki's 2004 ZX-10R? 

All this and lots more on this week's Front End Chatter, brought to you from the echo chamber. Please keep your thought, ideas, mad plans and questions coming to: [email protected] Get Simon and Martin on the socials @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to E141 of that Front End Chatter they have nowadays, spoken with words by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves and supported, enabled and legitimised by our fwends at Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists (and yes, they will insure a Tuono!), and Bike Social, the bike club that gives you access to discounts, track days, events and competitions – as well as running the most up-to-date and informative biking website and YouTube channel, at www.bikesocial.co.uk

And on this episode we have:  • how Suzuki's Hayabusa is still the go-to bike for old-school performance • how Suzuki's revamped 2021 GSX-S1000 is much, much better than the previous version • why WSB might be worth watching • how Norton are still getting it wrong • does Harley-Davidson's history of 'breakout' models bode ill for the Pan America? • are UK bikers more conformist these days? • do riders from different countries ride differently? All this and much much more! Thanks for listening, and please keep your thoughts, queries, arguments and ideas coming to [email protected] Get Mufga and Simon on the socials @Mufga @SimonHbikes 

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 140 – in which Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves (supported and nurtured by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world of biking on the web) natter at length about:

• the Dutch TT at Assen and very much about the future of one Maverick Vinales – and where *is* his head at?
• BMW’s new R1300GS and why it might not be what everyone thinks it might be
• news of Mufga’s SV650 renovation
• which sporty middleweight twin for the larger gent and costing around £8000
• which regular commuter middleweight
• what’s the best way to park a bike upright that isn’t a paddock stand?
• when do you tell a mechanically incompetent friend not to touch his bike?
• ...and much, much more...

Thanks for listening, please tell your friends and spread the FEC word, thanks again to Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk – and: Send your thoughts, musings, arguments and questions to: [email protected] And get Simon and Mufga here on the socials:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to episode 139 of Front End Chatter, the marvellous motorcycling podcast supported and, indeed, buoyed by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the web.

And on FEC this week we have: • young Fabio’s habit of getting his boobs out, and the propriety of doing it on the last laps of a MotoGP race

• plans to livestream the 2022 TT, plus more racing in 2023
• where we stand on Ana Carrasco’s balls
• Simon’s latest headphone revelations

Plus!

• more on where to your feet when you’re riding
• if you haven’t got a bike, are you still a biker?
• what would you do and where would you ride if you knew you had limited time left?
• are electric bikes *really* green or is it just a great big hypocrisy?

And much, much more!

Thanks for listening, please support Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk with your patronage, email your thoughts, questions and musings to:

[email protected]

And catch us on Twitter and Insta

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and benvenuto to Front End Chatter, Britain’s most tardy motorcycling podcast with Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves. And why not. And, lest we forget, grazie to our wonderfully benevolent benefactors Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, from who you can secure not only, some say, the most competitive insurance premiums in the business, but who also are the only bike insurers who plough so much back into motorcycling – where do you want your cash to go? Into the pockets of fat cat shareholders using retired racers as a PR stunt for an existing bike insurance broker? Or actually back into motorcycling and, full disclosure, into our pockets?

Right, on Episode 138 of FEC we natter about:

• MotoGP from Mugello, in which the racing was overshadowed by the death of Moto3 talent Jason Dupasquier in qualifying. But the racing went ahead anyway: should it? Plus why can't Marc Marquez and Alex Rins stay upright? 
• we also natter about Yamaha’s R7 (we wuz rite)
• why southern Italy is a cool place to ride a bike
• why a 2021 Tracer 9 GT is a good bike to ride it on
• why a 2021 BMW S1000 XR maybe isn't
• and Simon's completely unbiased opinion of Bridgestone's new Battlax T32 sport touring tyres (cheque to the usual please Mr Stone)

Plus!

• do we still have to deduct a Covid year of not riding from a helmet's life? 
• should we give Harley's Pan Am a chance?
• if adventure bikes are the bikes for all occasions, and we don't like scooters, what doe we think of Honda's X-ADV? 
• should a first-time A2-licence bike owner go for a project bike or a new/used bike - and what's the best pillion A2 bike? 

All this and much more! Is this the longest FEC ever?  Many thanks again to Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk, please remember to like and subscribe and leave a review on iTunes, please send your questions, queries and thoughts to [email protected] And please follow/get in touch on Twitter and Insta @Mufga @SimonHBikes

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 137 in the long-running series of 137 so far, in which Simon H and Mufga, a pair of motorcycling outfluencers, talk about motorbikes and motorcycling – and are supported in their endeavour by the mighty Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the wonderful world of widing on the web.

In this episode we have:

• MotoGP from Portugal, wherein did Marc Marquez return to the fray and managed to score more points in one race than Valentino Rossi has in the first three. And although his body may be weak, it took but a few minutes to discover the Marquez spirit is still strong.
• a brief summation of a first ride on KTM’s new 1290 Super Adventure S
• a few impressions from the first big trips on Suzuki’s 2021 Hayabusa
• and Mufga’s final road test (maybe for a while, maybe not) on Aprilia’s Tuono 660
• how hot is too hot to ride a bike?
• best tourer for a six-footer with a sportsbike background?
• why a Kawasaki KLX230 might the answer to reliving your biking youth (if you could buy it in the UK)
• best sporty all-round tyres for a custom-built Suzuki SV650…
• …should used scrubs from racing be used on the road?

…all this and much, of so much, more! Thanking you muchly for listening; please keep your thoughts, observations and questions coming in to: [email protected] And you get us on the socials, here: @SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Aye! Till the next time, whenever it is.

Hello and welcome to Episode 136 of Front End Chatter, the UK's most chocolatey motorcycling podcast. 

Thank you to Bennetts, the suspenders to our stockings, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the internet's repository of all that is wise and current about motorcycling. A

And in this episode Simon and Martin rattle on about:  • MotoGP is back! Two races from Qatar, a veritable oasis of human rights, and a few lefts, in the desert – where, true to current MotoGP form, there is literally and metaphorically no form book.  • Suzuki's Hayabusa gets ragged up a runway fo some speed figures, and reveals the result of its engine changes • Triumph unveil the TE-1 – their electric Speed Triple [it's not a triple - Ed] and even cynics are taking an interest [will the first test be written by Sir Alan Cathode? Hahhaahha – Ed] • and a deep dive into the FEC sack, with wide ranging questions such as: • which Scrambler is the best? • are there any bike models in which the bike with the smaller engine is better than its bigger brother? • are illegally ridden electric mountain bikes putting kids off 'proper' motorbikes?  • advice on new bikes and rubbish tyres ...and much, much more.  Thanks again to the patron saints of FEC – Bennetts and BikeSocial – and please keep you thoughts, questions, queries and musings coming to:  [email protected] And get Simon:  @SimonHBikes And Martin: @Mufga Laters!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, the world’s most self-deprecating motorcycling podcast in which, for the 135th time, Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons talk two wheels into a microphone. FEC is supported by Bennetts, Britain’s best bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the web’s central repository of all the news, new bike reviews, product tests and touring info worth a read.

And on this week’s FEC we have:

• the season hasn’t even begun yet, but MotoGP testing from Qatar has already produced a long list of winners and losers, and raised more questions than it answered:
• will Dovi race an Aprilia this season?
• when will Marc Marquez return?
• who will be Yamaha’s top rider?
• will this be Rossi’s last season?

Plus we have gossip about:

• a potential return for the R7 name, but not as we know it
• when buying a crash helmet, do you get better protection the more you spend?
• is a KTM SUperDuke GT a better sports tourer than a Kawasaki Z1000SX or a new Yamaha Tracer 9 GT?
• where should we put our feet, part II
• what’s Moto Guzzi’s next step?
• is a 2021 FireBlade really a better road bike than a 2011 model?
• what’s the best bike for a motorcycling Rip Van Winkle?

All this and more! Get it while it’s hot!

Thanks for listening and please continue to fire in your emails with thoughts, musings, meanderings and mutterings to:

[email protected]

And catch Simon and Mufga on the socials:

@Mufga @SimonHBikes

Hello and welcome to Episode 134 of Front End Chatter, the UK's most scatterbrained motorcycling podcast featuring the musical talents of Martin 'Maverick Not Vinales' Fitz-Gibbons and Simon 'Iceberg Lettuce' Hargreaves. Apparently it's the seventh anniversary of Front End Chatter. Happy birthday to us.  

We are enabled and besotted with Bennetts, the Bike Insurance specialists – yes, ask them nicely and they'll do their best to help, as proven by Mufga – and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the web.  And on this week's episode we chatter about: 

• which bikes from the 1990s Performance Bikes archives did *exactly* 134.0mph? • Harley-Davidson's Pan Am adventure bike and what we can glean from the – let's not be coy – frankly amazing spec. Is it too good to be true? And is it ugly or good-looking?  • the return of Buell, which probably isn't actually • Keanu Reeves' virtual sex • Suzuki's Hayabusa, with an explanation by Suzuki as to why it makes less power – and does it matter?  • will the battery-swapping tie-up between Honda, Yamaha, KTM and Piaggio make any difference to the acceptance of electric bikes? • what's the best road to the West Coast of Scotland? • what bike from the last ten years will go to be collectable in the next ten?  All this and much, much more. Thanks for listening and continuing to support the podcast with your magnificent ears, we really do appreciate it. Please keep your thoughts, queries, questions and musings coming to: [email protected] ...and please download from www.bikesocial.co.uk if you can.  Find Simon and Martin on the socials:  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s most pancake-powered biking podcast, with Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, Britain’s most pancaked motorcycle journalists. And Front End Chatter is, as ever, made from the plain flour and two eggs of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world’s most comprehensive motorcycling website.

And on this episode of Front End Chatter we have:

• how do you like your pancakes?
• full details of Suzuki’s 2021 Hayabusa, including some thinking behind that headline power deficit over the old bike…
• Martin’s new bike – what’s he got and why’s he got it?
• how cool would an adventure bike rally-cross race at the Isle of Man be?
• how will a proposed naked superbike class effect the prospects of up-and-coming young riders on an international stage?
• wouldn’t it be cool if Triumph lay on a Speed Triple one-make series to promote the new bike?
• the pros and cons of the Rekluse auto clutch system
• fuelling and throttle snatch – why, oh why does it exist?
• why is fuel injection less efficient than carbs?

… all this and much more chattering! Thanks for listening and supporting the pod, and please keep your emails and questions coming to: [email protected]

And catch us on the socials:

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and episode 132 of the long funning ramily drama in which ranty old seadog Simon Hargreaves (played by Oliver Reed, in his final screen role), rattling around alone in the east wing of Chatter Manors, is faced with moral bankruptcy and can only be saved by the intervention of the saintly Martin Fitz-Gibbons (played by Peter O’Toole in his final screen role). Together they form an unlikely alliance with Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists (played by Alan Bennett, in his final screen role) and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world of biking on the web (played by Meryl Strepsil, in her final screen role).

And there are some motorbikes in all this, in case you’re new round here.

And in this episode, Simon and Martin chatter about:

• a new Suzuki Hayabusa they know nothing about, but which you, by now, do – was we right or was we right?
• Triumph’s new and rather impressively spec’d Speed Trip
• KTM’s updated but also impressive 1290 Super Adventure with rude tyres
• Are BMW really not going to bike shows any more?

And in the FEC sack, we have topics as varied as:

• how to secure your helmet to your bike when going walkabout
• how to ride over potholes and bumps (at speed)
• what do electric bikes have to achieve to find widespread acceptance?
• what makes a bike exceed expectations?
• what’s the Five Nations Tour?
• when is a Vyrus not a virus?

...and much, much more...

Thank you for downloading and listening, and sending your thoughts, ideas and questions to:

[email protected]

And thanks to Bennetts and BikeSocial for continued support!

Get Simon and Martin on the socials at:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E131, Britain’s favourite and longest serving motorcycling podcast, possibly either or, who’s counting? What’s for sure is we’re indebted and abetted by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the marvellous motorcycling website.

And on FEC this week, Simon and Martin chatter about:

• Triumph’s new Speed Triple 1200 RS – how big will it be really, is it bored and/or stroked, and will Triumph go after hyper-naked revs and power, or keep the Speed Trip a raunchy but slightly more useful super-naked?
• when is a spy shot not a spy shot?
• guesswork around Aprilia’s new RSV4 and Tuono, for whom the passenger has always been a "barely tolerated guest" according to Aprilia – and wouldn’t it be nice if they made a CapoNord V4?

We also dive in the FEC sack and ponder delights such as:

• when is it too cold to get your pegs down and why motorcycling shouldn't be a faith-based activity
• where should we put our feet when we're riding?
• how racing isn't necessarily a mandatory next step on from track days
• what's the adventure bike equivalent of a ZZR1400 for £6-£7k? 
• and much, much more! A bit.

Thank you very much for listening, thanks to Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk for putting up with us, and please keep your thoughts, musings, queries and fact correcting coming to:

[email protected]

Catch us on the Instas and Twitters:

@SimonHbikes 

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E130, and the first FEC of 2021; a brand new year, and hopefully things will get better – but some things stay the same and there’s not much chance of FEC improving any time soon.

Thanks as always to Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, home of all that’s good and virtuous in motorcycling.

And on FEC this week, Simon and Martin chatter about:

• Davide Brivio’s shock exit from Suzuki MotoGP team boss to F1... and who we’d choose to replace him
• John McPint MBE has won an MBE from the Queenie, but who else has and who hasn’t?
• when motorcycle manufacturers get market research wrong
• hello to Aprilia’s new Tuono 660...
• ...and goodbye; we mourn the passing of true racing and engineering pioneer, Peter Williams

We also dive in the FEC sack and answer some timeless wonderings:

• what was that about preload and ride height again?
• winter hacks – it’s a love/hate thing
• magazines are for old riders; YouTube is for young ’uns: discuss
• are the Isle Of Wight Diamond Races going to happen in 2021?
• all this and much more!

Thank you very much for listening, thanks to Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk for putting up with us, and please keep your thoughts, musings, queries and fact correcting coming to:

[email protected]

Catch us on the Instas and Twitters:

@SimonHbikes (but to be honest it’s more paracord hobbies and current affairs than bikes; I like to think it’s context)

@Mufga (he’s funnier than me)

Hello and welcome to a very special mini-episode of Front End Chatter, sponsored by Bennetts and www.bikesocial.co.uk – and it’s the one where Simon and Martin, literally a quartet of spods in underpants, get to have a 10-minute chat with none other than the 2020 MotoGP World Champion, Suzuki’s Joan Mir. It’s short and sweet, a bit like Mr Mir himself.

Hello and welcome a fully festive, technically flawed, partially visual (which makes no sense to listeners in black and white) but otherwise entirely oral episode 129 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s favourite motorcycling podcast helmed by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons and kept afloat by the oceanic Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, all your two-wheeled needs digitally delivered via fibre optics (get well soon John!)

And this week on FEC we have:

• good news for Norton donors
• good news for scooter and moped manufacturers
• how the Covid pandemic has affected bike sales and how far and often we ride, and how it’s given us renewed motivation to do the things in 2021 we’ve always put off doing
• our favourite bikes of the year, and biggest disappointments
• what we’re looking forward to riding in 2021
• plus! Do you want an MV Agusta Turismo Veloce, or would a Tracer GT do the same thing? Or even a Z1000SX?
• would a Guzzi V85TT suit a novice off-road rider?
• is the NC500 really worth it?
• what’s Britain’s most picturesque motorway?
• is the 1998 Kawasaki ZX-9R C1 the most underrated sports tourer ever?

...and much much more.

Thanks again to Bennetts and BikeSocial, thanks to you for listening to us, supporting us and sending in your thoughts, queries, ponderings and questions to:

[email protected]

...and we hope you manage to have a great Christmas. See you in the New Year!

Ladies and gentlemens, pray welcome to Front End Chatter E128. Inside you’ll discover presentation by the ineffable Mr Simon Hargreaves and the inestimable Mr Martin Fitz-Gibbons, plus their delightfully delictatious Mr Ben Nets, the bike insurance specialist, and wwwbikesocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the webbage.

And in this episode of FEC we have:

• Mufga’s riding impressions of the new Aprilia RS660 (closes eyes, makes brum brum noises)
• and SiH’s riding impressions of the new Ducati Multistrada V4 (closes eyes, makes brum brum noises), in case anyone hadn’t been watching Bennetts YouTube channel, reading the website or picking up just about every UK bike magazine and newspaper in the last few weeks
• Marc Marquez going for third time lucky for arm operations, while FEC will henceforth be acting as medical advisor for DORNA on the grounds we have a better handle on what constitutes fitness to ride than they do
• why we shouldn’t dismiss Long Way Up with such offhand flippancy
• why do we measure bike tank size in litres and fuel consumption in mpg?
• how to – but really, why – pull a wheelie
• what should a rider do with their helmet when dismounting and walking about?
• what’s the best electric bike out there, and why?
• why oe tyres might not be perfectly not great, but it’s not the tyre manufacturer’s fault, it’s the bike manufacturer we should blame

Thanks to Bennetts and BikeSocial for their indulgence and please download FEC from www.bikesocial.co.uk if you can.

Thank YOU massively for indulging our nonsense, and please continue to populate the FEC sack with your thoughts, ideas, questions and nonsense of your own – write to [email protected] You can catch us on the socials here: @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

One more before Xmas! Yay! A Yuletide FEC.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 127, the slightly behind the curve episode, with Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves waffling along as usual – supported and enhanced by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the home of all things two-wheeled and powered by an engine, internally combustible or electric or, indeed, propelled by little more than an inappropriate fragrant emission.

And on the show this week we have:

• a new MotoGP World Champeen, and a slightly subdued Portimao ending to the craziest, least predictable and – let’s be honest – luckiest MotoGP season in modern history • the best Joan Mir stat you will ever hear
• new bikes for 2021, including:

– BMW’s S1000R, the bike with the wrong half of the fairing removed

 – Ducati’s Multistrada V4 which Simon hadn’t ridden, much, when the podcast came out, but which it subsequently turns out he had. It’s very confusing

– Ducati’s underrated SuperSport, now called a 950 – ...and the Panigale V4 SP, whatever that is

– Triumph 850 Sport, and how it replaces the world’s shortest-lived model, the Triumph Tiger 900 – Yamaha MT-09 Tracer and GT

– Yamaha’s track-only R6, and the death of the supersports 600

• PLUS! A brief dip into the FECsack and topics such as do track days matter when you’re over 50, is a Z900 RS Café better than a Z H2, tyre scrubbers, how come more people don’t commute on bikes, and much – a bit – more...

Many thanks to Bennetts and Bike Social for their continued patronage, and many thanks to you, dear listener, for lending us your ears... and please keep sending your thoughts, musings and life stories to us here:

[email protected]

You can get us on the Socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Cheers ma dears.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's most paracorded motorcycling podcast Fronted by Simon Hargreaves, Ended by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Chattered by www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. And in E126 we have: • Yamaha's overhauled, uprated and enlarged (but not in the way you might have read) MT-09 • Martin's unnatural desire to buy a Piaggio MP3, as winter-hack path to an almost equally irrational Aprilia RS660 • the usual ramblings on MotoGP including where in the world is Marc Marquez, has he been moonlighting as his own brother, and what does this all mean for the 2020 title?  • plus emails on topics as wide-ranging as more small acts of human kindness, the IOW Diamond Races (or not), ugly features on otherwise not ugly bikes, the difference between buying the first bike you look at and the bike you look at first, why under- (or over-) inflating a tyre for an extended stint on a motorway might not be a good idea, and the real reason you want to adjust your suspension. Thanks for letting us into your ears, hope the new lockdown and winter aren't too savage for you, and please email us your further thoughts, comments and/or questions to: [email protected] @SimonHbikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome for Front End Chatter, Britain’s best biking podcast, and Episode 125 of the aforementioned, presented by him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, Simon Hargreaves. And we are, as ever, enabled and legitimised by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and www.bikesocial.co.uk, the wonderful world of woking on the web.

And in this fun-sized Mars Bar of an episode we chatter about:

• how IAM observers are like twitchers
• what’s the best 125 ever, why isn’t it the Varadero, and are modern 125s better than classic 125s?
• how to topple off an Africa Twin and an F800GS in style
• how far can you go on a Zero SRF, and still get back in a day?
• wet MotoGP from Le Mans including an uncannily prescient Martin suggesting Covid could play a part in sideling riders THE DAY BEFORE a viral Rossi misses a couple of rounds
• loads of chat about Ducati’s new V4 Granturismo motor powering the new Multistrada – how it’s bigger, but smaller, lasts longer, makes more power but less torque, and where has the whole Desmo business gone? And why?
• a natter about details of Aprilia’s RS660, as Martin from the past pays a visit to remind us his half of FEC worked all that stuff out a year ago. Apart from the price.
• all before we dive into the FEC sack with its usual barrage of good points, corrections and fab stories.

Please email us all your thoughts and questions to:

[email protected]

Thank you very much for listening, please spread the word, leave us a review on iTunes, and if it’s not too late and you’re in the US – VOTE!

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hurrah for wet roads, diminishing daylight and dropping temperatures. We’re so excited about the onset of winter. Excited, excited, excited. Apparently, a study of the moods of the Nordic peoples shows a successful strategy for coping with long periods of little sunshine – and Seasonal Affective Disorder – may be to simply develop a positive attitude toward it. Literally, repeating “I am excited about ” has been shown to reduce anxiety.

So we’re excited, excited and excited to invite you into Fronty End Prongs, episode 124, brought to you by Bennetts, the people who offer amazing discount deals and offers with bike insurance thrown in, and the world of motorcycling at www.bikesocial.co.uk. Please remember to wipe your feet on the way in and your bum on the way out.

And this week Simon and Mufga natter about:

• autumn – why?
• why Dumfries and Galloway is a good place to ride a bike
• why we don’t review bikes any more
• BMW’s new M1000RR and why it’s failing to light Mufga’s fire
• future Mufga pays us a visit down the time tunnel
• Triumph’s Trident – what it is and how much it should cost
• high speed MotoGP review
• where, or not, to get up-to-date info on MotoGP engine use
• advice for your second track day
• is the current lack of spectators at race events sustainable, and if the racing has to change, how will it change?
• is buying a bike while under the influence a good idea?

...and much, much more.

Thanks for listening, and let’s do this again in a fortnight.

Please send thoughts, questions and musings to:

[email protected]

Keep up with Simon and Mufga on the socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s nicest motorcycling podcast, with Simon H & Mufga, punctuated and perforated by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and BikeSocial.co.uk, home of news, views, road tests and Jammie Dodgers.

And on this month’s – hang on, it’s been a month? – we chatter about:

• the closest, craziest MotoGP season since records began with exploding brakes, exploding forearms, exploding engines, first-time winning teams, bikes and riders, unlikely crashes and testing pit-to-bike radios
• why World Superbike is worth watching this year
• the merits or otherwise of Ewan and Charley’s Long Way Up, on Harley Livewires
• does Regina’s new M-Endurance chain signal the end of lubing and adjusting?
• is the FIM’s criteria for five push-ups really sufficient to determine a human’s fitness to ride a MotoGP bike?
• do bike journos adjust test bike suspension to suit their preference?
• do men really ask their partners for ‘permission’ to buy a new bike?
• the wisdom of repairing a puncture with a proper kit v a self-tapping screw
• how to start racing and which is the best bike or series to choose?
• which is the best hypersportsbike for a bit of pillion action?
• has the rise of social media bike content and the decline of print media brought younger riders into motorcycling?

Plus much more (well, a bit).

Thank you for listening and supporting Front End Chatter; please email your questions, thoughts and queries to:

[email protected]

And catch FEC on the socials at

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello und velcome, friends, to Front End Chatter Episode 122 in which Simone and Marion chatter endlessly, augmented into three dimensions under the auspices of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists and BikeSocial.co.uk, the finest accumulation of news, sport, views, product tests and road tests ever to grace the ether.

And this week – well, what do you reckon? Let’s talk about the myWorld Motorrad Grand Prix Von Österreich. Topics include:

• who’s to blame for that crash?
• is the circuit safe?
• why did Ducati apparently provoke Dovi into sacking himself?
• if riders could be somehow 100% protected from all harm and injury in crashes, would we still find racing such a compelling spectacle?
• is ‘safer’ inherently a) less exciting than dangerous, and b) is it inversely proportional to speed?

Plus

• is Honda BSB rider Andy Irwin a liability ?
• what’s not the correct method for transporting a guitar on a bike?
• more ‘heaviest things you’ve carried on a bike’, and why it might include 14 bottles of Jerez brandy, 24 bottles of Kronenburg and 45 multipacks of Orbit chewing gum
• don’t buy the first bike you see, unless it’s not the first bike you’ve seen
• more rear brake cornering advice
• is it worth chopping in a 2005 R1200 GS for the new R1250 GS?
• is a Sur Ron Light Bee (a sort of electric mountain bike) the future of biking?
• which bike has the best-sounding standard exhaust note?
• which is better: Triumph’s old Tiger 800, new Tiger 900, old Tiger 1200 or even older Tiger 1050? And what will Triumph’s almost certain new Tiger 1200 have a grumbly T-plane crank, and will it come with a 30-litre tank Adventure option?

And muchly much more gossip and slander. Don’t sue us. We’re skint anyway.

Thanks again to Bennetts and BikeSocial – but especially to you, for listening and putting up with us – and please keep your emails of thoughts, observations, jokes and questions coming to:

[email protected]

And get us on the socials at:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Ta-raa.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E121, Britain’s most aromatic motorcycling podcast, presented by the fragrant Simon Hargreaves and the perfumed Martin Fitz-Gibbons – and supported as ever by the mellifluous niff emanating from the guys and gals of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and the aromatic scent wafting from www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world of motorcycling on the interweb.

And on this edition of FEC we natter about:

• details of the proposed Isle of Wight Diamond Races – Britain’s first new road race in modern times – and ask how likely it is to happen, who's paying for it, and what do the islanders have to say – plus, a detailed look at the layout and quality of the circuit itself
• action from MotoGP from Jerez #2, including the wisdom of racing with broken bones
• action from WSB at, er, Jerez again
• more electrical issues and who can solve them
• is there such a thing as a good, cheap, sporty V-twin?
• does comfort matter on a naked bike? 
• have sportsbikes got too radical and would a Superleggera outsell a GS if it was the same price?
• what does 'best bike of 2020' actually mean?

...and loads more!

Please send your emails of thoughts, musings, questions and offers of free Fazer 1000s to [email protected]

Thank you very much for continuing to grace our chattering with your ears, please continue to support Bennetts with your dollars, BikeSocial with your eyes and MCN and RiDE and Practical Sportsbikes with your dollars and your eyes.

You can get us on the socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to FEC120, the 120th episode of not the UK’s most popular automotive podcast but one of them. As ever, we are indebted to Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists – and check out www.bikesocial.co.uk for the kind of comprehensive investigative consumer journalism you can’t find anywhere else. However, if it isn’t comprehensive investigative consumer journalism you want but a pair of gas-bags waffling instead, here’s what’s in store for you in episode 120:

• does a necktube count as a face mask?
• a scatter-gun and largely incoherent round-up of MotoGP from Jerez #1 – including: - should riders be allowed to race with broken bones, and is the ‘medical’ tough enough? - will the championship result be any less significant if the favourite is injured? - should Repsol team manager Alberto Puig be allowed to troll other riders? Plus!
• goodbye to the Honda Ron Haslam Race School
• does just the thought of selling a bike mean eventually selling becomes inevitable?
• which is the best Multistrada: original 1200S, Skyhook version, Pikes Peak, Enduro or 950?
• if a bike is SORN, is it worth MOTing it?
• should you try your first track day without tuition?
• what’s the future of bike magazines?
• what happens to press demo bikes?
• do phone cameras fail when they’re used on bikes as sat navs?
• is it safe to plug a tyre puncture with a plug kit?

...plus loads more... Thanks for listening, please get your insurance from Bennetts – it helps the world keep turning – and take advantage of the Rewards scheme! Get your bking info from www,bikesocial.co.uk, plus RiDE, MCN and Practical Sportsbikes magazine! Keep your questions, thoughts, musings and jokes coming to:

[email protected]

And get us the Twitters and Instas:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

x

Hello and welcome to possibly the final lock-down episode of Front End Chatter, the motorcycling podcast that reaches the parts upon which other podcasts fear to tread. Thanks as always and eternally to that repository of all that is knowledgeable and wise, BikeSocial.co.uk, and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in episode 119, Martin and Simon chatter about:

• revving up for the return of MotoGP at Jerez with more speculation about who goes where in 2021, and guessing who’s going to win
• the great biennial KTM giveaway
• is Arai’s Pro Shade: inelegant solution or just naff?
• is taking weight off your bike’s flywheel a good idea, and can it improve handling?
• track days are back in action, but how safe are they post-lockdown?
• after six years and 119 episodes, what are our FEC highlights?
• how would riders who ride in POLITE vests react if they were asked to do actual police work?
• what’s the biggest thing you’ve carried on the back of your bike?
• what’s the best post-Direct Access bike for a new rider, for around £4000, apart from Honda’s CBR650F?
• what to look for when buying your first bike, and how to try not to buy one with a shagged gearbox without getting a test ride
• the pros and cons of commuting on so-called ‘exotic’ bikes, and is Husqvarna’s Nuda 900 the ideal exotic commuter?
• how high can you drop a helmet from before it’s knackered?

Thanks for listening, downloading and being all-round good eggs. Please visit www.bikesocial.co.uk,get your insurance from Bennetts, and subscribe online through the Bikes Unlimited app to MCN, RiDE, Bike, Practical Performance Sportsbikes and Billet, the magazine about temporary civilian lodgings for soldiers. @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, the occasionally number one motorcycling podcast in Iceland and, now, Singapore. This is episode 118 in a series we can confidently state contains at least 118 episodes recorded from the orals of Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, a pair of motorcycle journalists who’ve both forgotten more than they ever knew anyway.

Eternal thanks to that font (sans serif) www.bikesocial.co.uk – all your two-wheeled infotainment emanating from one convenient portal (and YouTube) – and Bennetts, the bike insurance experts who not only insure your motorcycle but also add all kinds of benefits and bonuses; discounts, offers and competitions. Quite the array of offers should you so be inclined, as indeed you should.

Anyway, to matters in hand: in this episode of FEC we have: • more speculation on the MotoGP merry-go-round of who’s signed for who and who’s not signed for anyone and who might be getting the Herr Flick • disgraced Norton ex-boss Stuart Onions is required to pay back £14m of other people's money he no longer has • Yamaha release details of the Ténéré 700 Rally, which may or may not be the best-looking bike of 2020 • Ducati launch the Superleggera in an exclusive ride at Mugello, and it's really fast and really expensive and sounds nice, aye Plus! • our favourite rides of all time • the perils of using a phone as a sat nav • keep the GSX-R750 or get an SV650X or a Tiger?  • why tracing fuelling faults is the worst job in the world • why aren't photo-reactive visors more common?  • the problem with carbon fibre wheels ...and much more including Simon's sandwich recipe and Martin's biking spirit guide revealed.  Thanks for watching with your ears, and you'll hear from us again soon! @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Halló og velkomin to Front End Chatter E117, briefly the most popular automotive podcast in the whole of Iceland (a country renowned for its exquisite and most excellent taste) and also, briefly, the second-most popular automotive podcast in the UK (er, yes, them too).

Great bundles of thanks to the hominids at Bennetts BikeSocial – improve everyone’s lives and get your bike insurance from Bennetts and your biking infotainment from www.bikesocial.co.uk (and their YouTube channel). Right, on this week's episode we have chatter about:  • The return of racing, with condensed schedules proposed for MotoGP and BSB – and which riders will benefit? • Rider line-ups for 2021 taking shape, with him there and him going there, does that mean he won't go there?  • no Motorcycle Live in 2020 – so what new bikes will we see in 2021, and where can we see them? • why do manufacturers make bikes with small fuel tanks?  • the four-wheel Honda powered by an Africa Twin engine • how to fit earplugs properly, and are foam plugs better than custom-made plugs? • with touchscreens and electronics, are bikes getting too complicated for their own good?  • will voice-activation be a thing for bikes in the future?  • ...and much, much more, no, really.  Thanks again for supporting us, please leave a review on iTunes, visit bikesocial.co.uk and get your insurance from Bennetts, follow us on Twitters at @SimonHBikes and @Mufga and email your thoughts, musings, questions and insults to: [email protected]

Hello you lucky people you, and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 116 with Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons,  brought to you via Durham with a detour to Castle Barnard.  Front End Chatter is supported through thick and thicker by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, internet's home of motorcycling.  And in this episode, a still socially distant Martin and Simon rabbit on about: • the return of MotoGP, and whose Alpinestars Jack Miller will be filling at Ducati in 2021... and if they turn out to be Petrucci's, will the Italian then go and do the Dakar instead? • getting back on a bike after post lockdown, and is 'riding rust' actually a thing or is it just riders getting overexcited after a period of inactivity?  • what bikes do we think are the best of all time in a FEC's Factor? • should we celebrate 125 episodes of FEC by doing 125 laps of a flat-track oval, or a roundabout? • will Kawasaki's supercharging technology eventually trickle down to smaller bikes in their range, or will it always be flagship technology?  • is an R1250GS *really* the ultimate aspirational bike, or is it over-hyped? • will wearing an air-bag suit one day be as normal as putting on a helmet? • is it ever okay to cheer a rider crashing on a race track?  ... and much more natter and chatter.  Thank you for your continued appreciation, and please keep your emails with questions, answers, thoughts and ideas to: [email protected] Catch us on the Twitters: @SimonHBikes @Mufga ...and see you next time!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s most teeth-sucking motorcycling podcast... but no! That was the previous episode! For FEC115, Simon and Martin have installed a 5G mast at Chatter Manors to deliver you, dear FECers, broadcast quality audio at what I think you’ll agree is the minor cost of second-degree skin burns among the local peasant population.

Thanks as ever to our comrades at bikesocial.co.uk – the worldwide web of motorcycling (check out their YouTube channel, it’s awesome despite Simon’s launch videos) and of course Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in this week’s worldwide web of waffle we discuss:

• when is lockdown not a lockdown, and why it’s important to make our first ride back special
• how MotoGP and WSB plan to keep calm and carry on – and if a race falls down in a season and there’s no-one there to see it, does it actually happen?

Plus!

• taking an MT-07 off road, and is it better to have a single all-rounder, or two specialist bikes but each at half the value?
• Fazer 1000 or FZ1 Fazer? And what are the best mods?
• is there any way to keep cool on roasting hot days, and which bikes should be avoided? And do bikes run hotter today then they used to?
• what’s our favourite engine configuration and is it the sole reason for falling in love with a bike?
• drop visors – yes or no?
• what modern gadgets are hardest to live without?

...and much more nattering and chattering, as usual.

Thanks for listening, hope it’s still helping in this crazy time and hope we all can ease back into riding without causing ourselves or other people any problems. Please keep your emails (and sound files!) coming to us at

[email protected]

with thoughts, advice, queries, questions and observations. Catch us both on the socials at:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

And please visit bikesocial.co.uk for all your biking infotainment (and their YouTube channel!), get your insurance from Bennetts, and get your kicks on the A66 – but easy does it.

Peace and biscuits.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s – nay, the world’s – most socially isolated motorcycle podcast, with Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons... and welcome to Episode 114 – the third in a series in which Martin literally phones it in.

Thanks as ever to our brothers and sisters at bikesocial.co.uk – the worldwide web of motorcycling (check out their YouTube channel!) and of course Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in this meandering soufflé of waffle we touch lightly on subjects as varied as:

• what constitutes an ‘essential’ journey, and is a bike an appropriate vehicle?
• Norton has been bought by TVS of India for £16... sorry, £16 million... so will any of that go to refund deposits, reimburse pensions and repay creditors? And what does it mean for future Norton motorcycles?
• the MotoGP 2020 season guessing game continues with news of cancellations and possible fan-free races financed by an energy drink
• plus! What have the MotoGP stars been getting up to in lockdown, and why they should maybe keep it to themselves

Plus!

• why owning a Firestorm isn’t as fun as dreaming of owning one
• should manufacturers be forced to reveal where a bike is assembled on the VIN plate?
• how much influence does the bike press have, and if they covered smaller brands, would it sell more bikes?
• do bikes have a soul?
• is downsizing an admission of defeat?
• more rear brake advice, this time from a MotoGP rider and WSB champ
• the most embarrassing things we’ve ever done on a bike
• can you go further riding on your own?

...and much more nattering and chattering.

Thanks for listening, hope it’s helping in this really crazy time. Please keep your emails (and sound files!) coming in with thoughts, advice, queries, questions and observations. Catch us both on the socials at:

@SimonHbikes @Mufga And please visit bikesocial.co.uk for all your biking infotainment (and their YouTube channel!), get your insurance from Bennetts, and get your kicks on the A66 – just not right now. Even for decking screws. Peace and health.

Hello and welcome to E113 and the second lock-down episode of Front End Chatter, the biking podcast that’s been around for over 160 hours of guffage – none of yer opportunist ‘Johnny-come-lately’ podcasts, jumping on the Corona bandwagon because someone’s bored, here. Oh no, Front End Chatter has been boring people for a lot longer than that.

Thanks as always to our amazing benefactors and supporters at the world’s most comprehensive motorcycling website, bikesocial.co.uk, and Bennetts, the bike insurance experts.

On this week’s episode we discuss:

• coping with life not riding motorbikes
• will there be any racing at all in 2020?
• does virtual racing offer any kind of substitute for the real thing?
• actual Andrea Iannone drugs ban news
• the joys of watching 1980s racing on YouTube

Plus the mighty FEC sack gets a battering, with topics such as:

• the pleasures of working your way up the biking ladder, then starting again from scratch...
• ... and is it therefore worth ‘saving’ getting your ultimate bike
• candidity (© Mufga) in the bike press
• is an airbag jacket really worth it, and can they save lives? Or better off spending the money on rider training?
• if bike theft trackers are fitted as standard by dealers, will that mean thieves will just get wise and work out how to disable them?
• the merits of Honda’s VFR800 v Honda’s 954 FireBlade, and why Honda’s current VFR isn’t as good as its predecessors
• what’s a good modern sports tourer?
• ... and much much more...

Thanks for listening and we hope lockdown life is made slightly less intolerable by our ramblings. Please continue to populate the FEC sack with your musings, questions, stories and your Corona coping strategies. Email us at:

[email protected]

And catch us on the socials:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to very special, hopefully one-off, episode of Front End Chatter in which, as a result of current events, has been assembled from snippets of previous FECs and turned into a completely new podcast!  No, truth is in keeping with government advice, FEC has self-isolated itself with Mufga calling in via Skype from the East Wing of Chatter Manors – yes, he's literally phoning it in.  But even with the seriousness in the world, motorcycling carries on – well, not racing, but we can even talk about not racing.  And apart from the obvious, we take a deep dive through the FEC sack and discuss your many and varied thoughts, questions, points of order and musings.  Please keep them coming; the world might be changing but you can rely on FEC to keep chugging along. Email: [email protected] Thanks as ever to our long-time sponsors and friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.  Catch us on the socials @Mufga and @SimonHBikes 

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E111, the Aaron Slight Episode of Britain's flavoured biking podcast, sponsored and supported as always by nos amis at www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance peeps.  And aptly enough we have a WSB feel to the front end of Front End Chatter, as the racing season kicks off with a triplet of cracking races from Phillip's Island in Australialia. Sadly, that's about as far as racing is likely to go for a good few months yet, as global events demonstrate racing is not, in fact, life.  Luckily we still have a few new bikes to chunter about, as well as a bulging FEC-sac with topics as diverse as... the best bike to replace a 1400GTR, is riding morally wrong, leathers buying advice and the correct underwear, and riding in France on a bike that smells.  Hope you enjoy the show, please email your thoughts, musings, questions and ideas to  [email protected] And get Simon or Martin on the Twit/Insta socials:  @SimonHBikes  @Mufga  Thanks again, and buy your insurance from Bennetts – and check out their Bennetts Rewards offers!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s best and most motorcycling podcast, supported through slim and thin by the veritable font (or indeed fount; both are legitimate) of tests and news and reviews, bikesocial.co.uk. And of course Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists – check out their customer rewards and make the most of being insured!

Right. Nothing going on here. Nothing to see, move along.

No, of course we have ill-informed gossip about:

• Norton – the story you’ve probably already heard, where you can read a bit more, and – while it’s a mere spec of insignificance compared to the very real issue and pain of people losing their life savings – we discuss the role of the motorcycle media in the sorry saga
• Triumph’s new Tiger 900 – what’s the crank like?
• Kawasaki’s new Z1000S... sorry! Ninja 1000SX – what’s the steering like?
• Suzuki’s V-Strom 1050 XT – what’s the paint job like?*

*It’s gorgeous!

• MotoGP is nearly back, with the closest testing times from Sepang in the history of ever meaning it’s even more pointless to try and derive any relevance from it – and why the top-placed factory rider has a V-Strom 1000...
• news on Iannone’s hair and sausage drug defence
• and of course the mighty FEC-sack, including:
• how to wave at other riders
• VFR800Fi or late 90s Blade?
• do mods make a used bike more or less valuable?
• how to overcome a fear of leaning a bike through corners

...and much more.

Thanks again for lending us your ears – we really appreciate it – and thanks for all your emails which are truly thought provoking, funny, interesting and just plain daft. Please keep them coming – addressed to:

[email protected]

Thanks to our friends and benefactors at Bennetts and bikesocial.co.uk – the place for your all biking information, and bike and travel insurance.

Get us both on the socials

@Mufga

@SimonHbikes and simonhbikes (Instagram)

Hello and welcome to E109 of Front End Chatter, a biking podcast without barriers or boundaries – we know not the meaning of constraints other than the fairly obvious extent of our knowledge and articulacy, the limits of both of which will become obvious as soon as you press ‘Play’.

However. Enormous and sincere thanks to our patrons at bikesocial.co.uk, which is where you should go for new bike news, reviews, consumer info and racing gubbins – and Bennetts, the bike insurance bods who are often the cheapest and even when they’re not, at least put something back into biking. Like this podcast. It’s not all about you, you know.

Aaaaand on this edition of FEC we have:

• no news to speak of because the last FEC was plenty newsy enough thanks
• a patchy film review of 1917 – Kermode & Mayo we are not
• what we’ve both been up to, including riding around the Peaks on a 2020 Africa Twin, and a visit to Triumph’s splendid museum at Hinckley...
• a look at the state of UK biking in 2019: what’s selling and what isn’t
• gossip about Ducati’s V4 Superleggera
• a rant about the irrelevance of quoting dry weight figures instead of wet weight figures... in fact, taking any manufacturers’ quoted figures as gospel and repeating them, parrot-fashion, without question. And does it even matter?
• FEC sack emails on a wonderful variety of topics such as:
• protective clothing standards and the merits of textiles v leather
• the return of two-stroke to MotoGP
• snowflakes
• how to deal with mansplaining
• motorcycling dead ends and missed opportunities
• long legs and webbed toes

...and much, much more. Thanks for listening, apologies for rambling on so much (never mind editing your letters, we should try editing the replies), and please keep your mails and thoughts and queries coming to:

[email protected]

Big up ’spec again to bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts...

And get us both on the Twitters (again)

@Mufga

@SimonHbikes

Aye.

Hello, welcome and feel free, literally, to feast your aurals on Front End Chatter, A Most Biking Podcast, with this being Episode 108 delivered in a stream of barely comprehensible noughts and ones directly into your earballs courtesy of the UK's most celebratory biking website, www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the number one and ONLY place to get your bike insurance because they actually put something back into biking, including this podcast, unlike certain other so-called 'motorcycle' insurance companies who are all just take, take, take. Yeah. You know it, brother.. 🤘 Simon and Martin's scrambled thinking this week includes: 

• the fall-out from Andrea Weeannone's B sample*  *warning, may contain drug references and mild ridicule • the fall-out from Guy Martin's court case – oh, hang on, there is none... • the fall-out from a certain Donington Castle-based motorcycle manufacturer facing a winding-up order if their tax bill isn't paid pronto... • more of your emails, thoughts, comment, queries and questions drawn from all four corners of the globe and placed in the mighty FEC sack... ...hang on, a globe hasn't got corners. Enjoy the show, and please email us on [email protected]  Or harass Martin on Twitter: @Mufga But not Simon because he's a snowflake Laters, taters.

Hello and welcome to E107 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s most biodegradable biking podcast, oralised by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and supported and recycled by the green bins at bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in this fab, decidedly retrospective episode we have:

• under-achieving factory Aprilia rider Andrea Iannone is in trouble with the FIM after a urine sample is found to contain performance-enhancing drugs. Mr Iannone is understood to be seeking a refund from his dealer under the Consumer Rights Act
• as the year crawls to its conclusion like a slug looking for the exit sign, FEC goes back 12 months to watch ourselves gazing into our crystal balls and compares what we thought we’d be saying then to, er, now...
• ...and as the decade grinds to a crushing defeat we also look back at the trends and changes we’ve seen in motorcycling over the last ten years, the look forward to what’s to come in the next ten...
• plus more of your FEC-sack emails, including subjects as varied as helmets turning to cork, possibly thanks to corrosive perspiration, and/or adding a Best Before date to the lining, sat navs v smart phones part deux, semi-active Fireblade Öhlins v upgrading suspension, why some endurance race bikes have yellow headlights and much much more....

Thanks for listening, you’ve still been wonderful. Props to my man at bikesocial.co.uk – a tumescent repository of motorcycling wisdom – and Bennetts, whose insurance superstardom continues to include 10% off at Halfords on top of goodness knows what else.

Please email your thoughts, queries, questions, musings and mitherings to:

[email protected]

Fank youse.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E106, Britain’s fave biking podcast, supported and enabled by the good people at bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in this fab, decidedly non-Xmassy, episode we have:

• relatively informed but mostly speculative chatter about Triumph’s new Tiger 900, including probably far too much thinking about its innovative T-bone crank – explained in an aural medium with the help of a drum machine
• Guy Martin off that telly they have now recreates a half century-old movie stunt by jumping a Triumph over a fence in Austria. Or Bavaria. They all look the same with your eyes shut. Which he probably did when he landed
• the pros and cons of riding a pair of premium litre sportsbikes on the road in December
• more of your FEC-sack emails, including subjects as varied as magazines making up letters, does size matter when it comes to riding style, and being gear-shamed in public

Thanks for listening, you’ve been wonderful. Big up my man at Bikesocial.co.uk – an outstanding repository of motorcycling wisdom – and Bennetts, whose insurance wizardry includes 10% off at Halfords.

Please email your thoughts, queries, questions, musings and mitherings to:

[email protected]

Fank youse.

Hello hello hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s rambliest biking podcast with him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons and me, Simon Hargreaves – enabled, legitimised and somewhat vindicated by Bikesocial.co.uk – the world’s largest repository, depository and not the one beginning with ‘s’-itory of all modern new and used motorcycle info – and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And on E105 we have:

• Motorcycle Live round-up – what we thought of Honda’s Blade, Kawasaki’s Z H2, Ducati’s Streetfighter, Triumph’s Rocket and Suzuki’s V-Big Strom, and what we didn’t think of Aprilia’s RS660, Husqvarna’s Denis and BMW’s R1800 concept because they weren’t there...
• goodbye to Jorge Lorenzo, a ‘complicated’ champion
• goodbye to Karel Abraham, with a ‘complicated’ exit
• hello to Alex, brother of Marc. Can’t see that ending well

Plus a super-massive FEC-sack including...

• what is it with Ducati and cam belts?
• is Aprilia’s CapoNord an alternative to Ducati’s Multistrada 1200?
• leathers v textiles for commuting, and the best options for wearing over office clothes
• is your bike a shrinker or a grower?
• what happened to normal-sized tail units?

...and much, much, too much more.

Thank you for listening, and thank you for joining in with the conversation by emailing your thoughts, questions, considerations and jokes to:

[email protected] Please visit bikesocial.co.uk for your two-wheeled info, check out Bennetts’ YouTube channel for some cool bike vids (still Africa Twin, ahem), and get your bike and travel insurance from the mighty Bennetts themselves. And don’t forget to check out their offers!

@SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter episode 104, eventually, brought to you by via the web’s best motorcycling website, bikesocial.co.uk, and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, via the mouths of Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons.

But before we kick off – come and chat to Martin and Simon for real at Motorcycle Live at the NEC on the Bennetts stand (Hall 4 Stand 4B 25) on Thursday 21st November between 11am to 12pm, then again 2pm to 3pm.

So it’s a really simple FEC this week: bit of racing, then a metric tonne of new bike news, conjecture, comment and opinion – including:

• Aprilia’s RS660, Tuono and Tuareg
• BMW’s F900XR
• Ducati’s Streetfighter V4
• Harley’s Pan Am
• Honda’s Blade and Africa Twin
• Husqvarna’s Denis concept
• Kawasaki’s Z H2 and Z1000SX
• KTM’s 390 Adventure, 890 Duke R and 890 Adventure. Um...
• Suzuki’s lovely, lovely, lovely DR Big 1050
• Triumph’s... er... hello? Hello?
• Yamaha’s Tracy 7

We ramble on for so long we run out of time for the FEC sack so apologies if it’s not a vintage episode, but at least it makes FEC150 a bit of a no-brainer. Thank you for listening, and thank you for joining in with the conversation by emailing your thoughts, questions, considerations and jokes to:

[email protected] Please visit bikesocial.co.uk for your two-wheeled info, check out Bennetts’ YouTube channel for some cool bike vids (Africa Twin, ahem), and get your bike and travel insurance from the mighty Bennetts themselves. And don’t forget to check out their offers! AND – see you at Motorcycle Live at the NEC on the Bennetts stand (Hall 4 Stand 4B 25) on Thursday 21st November between 11am to 12pm, then again 2pm to 3pm. And probably a few points in between.

@SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter episode 103, suspended like a great chattering hammock from the stout tree trunks at bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. And what a rambling podcast we have this week, only tangentially about motorbikes but also talking in topics such as:

• MotoGP from Aragon, with how the winning bike was second slowest, how Bradley Smith beat a factory Honda and what happens to all the “New World Champion” T-shirts that are made for riders who don’t end up winning them
• Jonathan Rea’s fifth WSB title proves a knife can win in a gunfight if the guy with the gun shoots himself in the foot – or unless he’s actually shot in the foot by a CEO with a Photoshopped head, then takes the money and runs onto a Fireblade
• news of Honda’s 2020 Africa Twin, including how it’s different from last year’s bike up to and down to lower seat height, more power, fancier gadgets and electric springs – and how much it’ll all cost
• plus gossip about the 2020 Triumph Street Triple, Kawasaki’s supercharged naked, BMW’s new S1000XR, F850GT and 850R, remote-controlled KTMs
• whether Ewan and Charlie’s ride across South America on Harley-Davidson Livewires is the most fascinating thing ever or a total irrelevance and, really, who cares? Answers on the back of a TV script please
• plus loads more nonsense about how to do 200mph on the cheap more motorcycling Room 101 topics (and a few disagreements!) what can replace a KTM 990 SuperDuke? what’s the best litre sportsbike replacement for a 2010 S1000RR? how to chainsaw braches on a fallen tree and why a Husqvarna won’t run on mineral two-stroke...

 ...and much, much more of the same. Thank you for listening, thank you for joining in with the conversation by emailing your thoughts, questions, considerations and jokes to [email protected] Please visit bikesocial.co.uk for your two-wheeled info, check out the Bennetts YouTube channel for some cool bike vids, and get your bike and travel insurance from the mighty Bennetts themselves. That is both amazing and great.

@SimonHBikes @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode... oh, look, who's counting? It's not like we're keeping score. Anyway – here are Simon and Martin, Making Britain's Biking Podcasts Great Again, with special thanks and appreciation to bikesocial.co.uk, the one-stop shop (except, er, it's free) for all your bang-up-to-date biking news, views and reviews (not sure that works). And of course thanks also the Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, for their continued loveliness and support. Hugs.  And on FEC102 (stop it!) we have:  • how motorcyclists get in the way • slightly tardy but nonetheless entertaining flashback to the Misano MotoGP in which Marquez and Rossi renew an old on-track friendship and Jorge Lorenzo falls out of friendship with Honda (recorded literally milliseconds before General Zarco got dumped by KTM)  • a new Harley ridden by Martin in that America they have now • have you ever lost the passion for bikes or riding?  • what's the worst bike of the last 10 years?  • should we record another FEC LIVE at the NEC bike show?  • is there any other racing besides road racing, and why speedway is a good night out • is poor marketing to blame for the drop in numbers of young riders?  • are seats less comfy than they used to be?  • which matters more: smiles-per-gallon or engine size?  • what's the best bit of Scotland to ride? ...all this and more! Thanks for listening, and longtime love to everyone who helps us make FEC the FECnomena it is. 

Hello and welcome to the podcast they said would never happen – 'they' being 'us' – yes, it's Front End Chatter E101 – the one hundred and one-est motorcycling podgasm in the world.  And thanks as ever to the munificent and mellifluous melodians of motorcycling, Bikesocial.co.uk, and the brains behind the beauty, Bennetts the bike insurance specialists.  In E101 we have:  • our biking Room 101s (as suggested by Mian Cowell but whom I suspect we forgot to credit!) including:    – Steppenwolf    – Polite vests     – riding certificates     – the good old days      – PR    – track tyre pressure obsession    – moaning about other riders' kit • plus! all the fact -free opinions from Silverstone MotoGP (which, yes, seems like a long time ago but was only last weekend ffs) • opinion about new bikes, including Triumph's Daytona 765, Honda's 1100 Africa Twin, and Triumph's Tiger 900... and a radical guess at Suzuki's 2020 range...  • plus #2 – emails on topics as diverse as: • helmet HUDs • heated visors • how a KTM 1290 and 1050 have the same gearing apart from top gear • best sub-500cc second bike for a short all-year commute • why learning to ride in your 30s might save biking • what are wire crash barriers all about?  • best underwear for hot weather and long distances All this and much more, so give FEC a go! Thanks again to Bennetts and Bikesocial.co.uk, thanks to you for listening (please continue to spread the words!), thanks to all race commentators everywhere for giving us free plugs, and get FEC on Twitter @SimonHbikes and @Mufga. 

Hello and welcome to....

THE FECTACULAR! 

Yes, this is the century, the big one-zero-zero, the 100-not-out, the five-score... and widely rumoured to be the last ever Front End Chatter podcast with him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, Simon Hargreaves, loins girded by the veritable cod-piece of motorcycling on the web, bikesocial.co.uk, and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And in this very special live-in-front-of-an-audience-in-the-canteen-at-Cadwell-Parkingtons (although we sound like we're actually in the toilet; do we look like sound engineers?) we have:

• MotoGP from Red Bull Ring Pull in Austria in which Mark Marquez and Andrea Dovizioso swapped paint atoms until on of them won, and Johann Zarco agreed to a split at the end of the season with KTM – because obviously it won’t go any further south before then, will it?
• Yamaha’s Ténéré 700 and KTM 70 Adventure R on the MCN250 test route (but at a track day, we’re kinda preaching to the unconvertible)
• the best upgrade from a GSR750 for a bit more comfort and more miles
• what categories of bike are missing from the modern range, and what’s biking’s next big ‘thing’?
• are brake lever protectors or bark busters best for clipping car mirrors during filtering?
• what’s a Moto Morini Milano, and is it like a Triumph Hinckley or KTM Mattighofen?
• what’s our biggest biking disappointment?
• is the future of the TT safe? And was it safe in 1998?
• ...and much, much, a bit, more!

Thanks to everyone who came along to Cadwell to make the FECtacular truly special, and contributed to a small moment of something.

And if you’ve downloaded Front End Chatter in the last five years, thank you.

Thanks also to bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts for their enduring good humour and tolerance of a pair of chattering idiots, and please download Front End Chatter via

bennetts.co.uk/bikesocial/news-and-views/features/podcasts

We’re on Twitter at @Mufga and @SimonHbikes, and occasionally elsewhere...

See your ears for FEC101 soon... or will we? Yeah, go on then.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 99, the Nearly-But-Not-Quite episode brought to your ears in cahoots with the best biking website on the, er, web – bikesocial.co.uk – and the best biking insurers in the, er, universe, Bennetts.

And for your delectation:

• remarkable Mark Marquez marks his all-time record-equalling 58th pole position at Brno by qualifying with the biggest margin in the modern MotoGP era...
• ...although technically and mathematically, there’s still a chance Hafizh Syahrin could still take the title...
• ...but anyway, MotoGP is boring now because the same guy keeps winning all the time so we’re all going to watch WSB instead...
• ...or maybe we should watch BSB, with Scotch Redding still leading the championship after Thruxton, but by less, from Josh Brookes, not that it matters because, basically, Showdown...
• ...although we only needed to watch the last lap at the Suzuka 8hr because for 7hrs 57mins some bikes went round the track until Jonny Rea fell off and then won in the restaurant.

PLUS!

• an audio review of Moto Guzzi’s V85 TT ridden for 1000 miles in 35°C

AND! Your emails, including...

• Triumphs are still reliable
• with a few new bikes now coming with an SP (or R) version with uprated suspension, would it be worth buying the standard-suspended model instead and spending the difference getting it uprated by an aftermarket suspension specialist?
• how far does Mufga need to shove the drugs up his... oh, you had to be there, really...
• which used naked bike to upgrade from an Aprilia Shiver 750: Ducati Streetfighter 848, Monster 1200, Aprilia Tuono V4 or Triumph Street Triple RS? Or Speed Triple, even?
• would you rather have a perfect bike from a shitty dealer, or a bike with a few teething troubles from a really good dealer?
• is a late-1990s GSX-R SRAD750 or 600 still a good sportsbike today? Or is there something better from the same era?
• DO NOT MOCK THE MIGHTY DEAUVILLE... please
• ...and much, much more. No, really, even more.

Thanks for listening!

• Please come to FEC#100, live at Cadwell Park near Louth, Lincs, on Tuesday Aug 13th
• email your thoughts, questions and comments to [email protected]
• or why not record us a FEC#100 message? Just a simple “Please stop, again!” would suffice...
• visit www.bikesocial.co.uk for your motorcycling news, stories, fun and frolicking about
• go get your insurance from Bennetts
• book yourself on the FECtacular/FECstival on 13th August at Cadwell Park
• follow @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on the Twitters, Instas etc
• and hello to Mr and Mrs Preston

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 98, the One Less Than Jorge episode, verbalised and spuffed into noughts and ones with the roadside assistance of bikesocial.co.uk and their insuring overlords Bennetts, the bike insurance guys and gals.

And it’s a short and sweet episode this week, as we clear the FECsack in preparation for FEC100 (live at Cadwell Park near Louth, Lincs, on Tuesday Aug 13th), including:

• Mufga gets tugged by the Fuzz
• Why milking snail mucin for facials is a real thing
• WSB from the corkscrewy Laguna Se-ca, and the revelation pit lanes the world over are, entirely not in fact, named after Brad Pitt
• BSB from Snettingham Parks and the revelation Scotch Reading-not-from-Reading can’t half pedal a bike round a circuit he’s not seen before, but when is a jump start not a jump start
• would you beat Marquez on a road bike, first time out, down your favourite road?
• would WSB be livened-up by forcing winning riders to change teams?
• when is an oil flag not an oil flag?
• airbags – are they pointless out in the random environment on the road, away from predictable race track crashes? Or are they genuinely useful in certain road crashes?
• why is MotoGP’s video pass 30% more expensive in the UK than, say, France?
• should corporate greed be regulated?
• what’s a good, all-weather, non-dissolving London commuter bike for £3k?
• more from happy, hassle-free Triumph owners (but not Mufga)
• ...and a bit more.

Thanks for listening!

• email your thoughts, questions and comments to [email protected] • or why not record us a FEC100 message? Just a simple “Please stop!” would suffice...
• visit www.bikesocial.co.uk for your motorcycling news, stories, fun and frolicking about
• go get your insurance from Bennetts
• book yourself on the FECtacular/FECstival on 13th August at Cadwell Park
• follow @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on the Twitters, Instas etc

Apologies for the late arrival of FEC#97 – delayed by unexpected items in the bagging area – but now it’s here, let’s tuck in! Brought to you as always by the furiously febrile funkateers at bikesocial.co.uk and the bike-insuring bike insurers Bennetts, this week’s regurgitation of previously held opinions includes:

• MotoGP (remember that?) round-up from Assen and Sachsenring, including neck braces, tankslappers, youngsters v old ’uns, should JL99 and/or VR46 retire, who’ll take ZR5’s place at KTM, and who’ll replace MCN race reporter now he’s taken the gig as PR blerk for Petronas Yamaha?
• with Rea overturning Dave Bautista’s lead in WSB, does he still think his ZX-10R is “like taking a knife to a gunfight”?
• MotoE’s first race – pointless comedy, the future, or both?

 PLUS! Listeners’ emails, including:

• do leathers and other items of bike kit have a safety lifespan, and what’s best to clean them?
• living proof back protectors are worth wearing all the time...
• why are the roads in the Fens so bad?
• has Scott Redding done enough to justify a ride in WSB next year... but will it actually pay more than he’s already getting in BSB?
• has BTSport’s coverage of MotoGP been successful?
• Chinese 125 retros: stylish or not? And why don’t the big manufacturers build such stripped-back bikes?
• ...and should we make an ethical choice not to buy bikes from China, given their human rights record?

...and introducing our new bike-buying advice section, VFECR800 Corner, including:

• what’s the best big £3k sporty bike for a big sporty bloke, upgrading from a ZX-6R?
• what’s the best £4k second bike alongside a Daytona 675 for two-up weekend touring?
• what’s the best bike to replace a Husqvarna 701 Supermoto and a Triumph Tiger 800?
• what’s the best bike to deliver top-endy, rev-happy thrashable thrills instead of single-gear flexibility?
• What’s the best cheap track-day bike to suit a 6-footer for a £2k?

Thanks for listening!

• email your thoughts, questions and comments to [email protected]
• visit www.bikesocial.co.uk for your biking fix
• get your insurance from Bennetts
• AND! book yourself on the FECtacular/FECstival on 13th August at Cadwell Park – places still available!

 ...and follow @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on the Twitters, Instas etc

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E96, the world’s most favouritist biking podcast, supported as ever by bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

Rambling gossip this month includes:

• MotoGP from Catalunya and why Lorenzo wasn’t the bad guy
• conquering the Rudland Rigg on a Triumph Scrambler 1200
• new bike news featuring...

1) Ducati’s Streetfighter V4, with added wings

2) KTM’s 790 Adventure R Rally with added springs

3) Triumph Rocket III TFC with added torques

• ...which is an awful lot of extreme/exclusivity/exotica all in one go, but should anyone really care, do they actually make any money for the manufacturers or are they just exercises in PR and brand awareness?
• are bikers getting more gammony?
• does size matter (we’re talking engines here)?
• why don’t more bikes have an overdrive top gear, and is it more fuel efficient to use big throttle in top gear of part throttle in lower gears?
• are Triumphs more unreliable than other manufacturers, and why doesn’t the press talk about it?
• you want a desirable, fun, impractical road bike – should you buy a Ducati 1098S or an MV Agusta F3 800... or something else altogether?
• BMW R18 concept bike – thumbs up or thumbs up bums?
• why focussing on less-tall bikers is size-ist; a lot of tall riders have problems too...
• more on the merits or otherwise of air-bag vests – do they work, and does risk compensation actually make you more likely to have an accident when wearing one?

Thanks for listening, please:

a) tell your friends, relatives, work-mates and even people you don’t really like about Front End Chatter

b) visit www.bikesocial.co.uk for your FEC fix and biking info

c) try Bennetts for your biking and travel insurance

d) email your thoughts, ideas, questions and rants to [email protected]

e) come to the FECtacular FEC100 episode live from Cadwell Park on August 13th (alongside a Bennetts track day)

f) find Simon and Martin on the social mediums here:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter and the 95th outing for Britain’s most stubbornly random motorcycling podcast, suspended as ever between the 48mm upsidedowners of bikesocial.co.uk – the world of motorcycling in a webby nutshell – and the fully adjustable monoshock of Bennetts, the bike insurance experts. And what a weird podcast we have this week, as two – well, one – of Britain’s funniest, smartest, sassiest and damn amazing moto journalists – that’s him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, with me, Simon Hargreaves –  discuss subjects as widely disparate as: • how MotoGP from Mugello (remember that?) was won by a man who used to race an EXUP

• who did what at the wettest TT ever, including how Peter Hickman used an S1000RR engine he didn’t use, why it was a hybrid bike but not a hybrid engine, and why Harrison, not Dunlop, won the Dunlop Senior, on Metzelers, not Dunlops
• why John McGuinness might want to check the details of his Norton pension plan
• why FEC probably holds the lap record for the North Coast 500
• the practical and psychological merits of air-bag suits
• is it a risk buying a new bike in the first year of production?
• does wearing hi-viz make you a fluoracist?
• why oh why isn’t there a magazine website with videos and stories and everything (like, er, bikesocial.co.uk, maybe)?
• are any skills learned off road transferrable to road riding?
• is the polite biker nod a dying habit, and should you wave at other riders anyway?
• are racers made on the roads they grow up riding on?

Thank you so much or listening, we really appreciate it – and please email your thoughts, ideas, questions and stories of helmet paint scheme inspired accusations to [email protected]

Follow @Bennetts on Twitter and Insta and Facebook

Follow @Mufga and @SimonHBikes on Twitter/Insta etc Laters taters.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 94, and the clue’s in the name: for the 94th time, two hoary old motorcycle journalists stand around and make front noises into a pair of microphones for your auralisation – fertilised and fermented by bikescocial.co.uk (the world of motorcycling on a website) and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. Good old Bennetts.

And this week we have, for your listening infuriation:

• gossip and stats from Le Mans MotoGP, including Marquez showing Lorenzo how to stay upright, and Quartararo showing Marquez how to be faster by not crashing
• who’ll top the TT timesheets this year?
• Mud, sweat and beers with two days and 350 miles in Wales, following a rally-style route map on road and off on a Scrambler 1200XE
• News and first impressions from the launch of long-awaited, entry-level Yamaha’s Ténéré 700 and hilarious, expensive XSR700 XTribute
• How young is too young to ride a bike? And what’s the best route into riding for youngsters?
• Why aren’t there more Ducatis racing at the TT?
• What’s the best big naked bike for touring?
• How to avoid the buffering wheel of death on the online MotoGP feed
• Is it an unwritten rule of bikes that you need to go fast, and does that put people off?
• And much, much more... Many thanks for listening to FEC and please come to Cadwell Park on 13th August where, alongside a Bennetts track day, we’ll be recording FEC E100 – LIVE! Wow. Are we? Please send your thoughts, jokes, contentions and opinions to:

 [email protected] And catch Simon and Martin on the social medias @SimonHBikes

@Mufga Thanks again for listening! X

Hello, good morning and welcome to Front End Chatter, E93 in the long-running series of two men talking bobbins about bikes, and if you're looking for someone to blame try bikesocial.co.uk, the bike magazine on the web, or Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, because they're in it as much as we are. 

This week on FEC we have:  • rambling thoughts on Jerez MotoGP, including Suzi Quartararo's hot laps, Zarco's loose lips, how this is the joint closest MotoGP championship since 2009, and a resurfaced Silverstone

• the experience of Yamaha's Off Road Experience

• what off-road bike should you get for you wife, except it's really for you?

• are bike vloggers the new bike journalists?  • is there something in the water in Lincolnshire to create so many great racers, and does it match whatever they put in the water in Catalan? • and much much more....  Thanks for listening to Front End Chatter, download it from bikesocial.co.uk, get your insurance from Bennetts, buy RiDE magazine, we love you, come to Cadwell for FEC 100 #LiVE, and email your thoughts and questions to [email protected]

Look out, it’s Front End Chatter E92, the biking podcast enabled, empowered, energised and veritably triggered by the cosmonauts at bikesocial.co.uk and bods at Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, without whom this would all still happen but much less often.

And this week we have:

• Why being a MotoGP legend is bad for your health (especially if you’re a Brit)
• who’s actually likely to win the MotoGP title the next time Marquez doesn’t?
• what happened at the unfeasibly warm Bennetts British Superbike season opener at Silverstone
• why we won’t be watching the 2020 Dakar Rally from Saudi Arabia
• ideas to replace a Honda Blackbird with a £4500 sporty all-rounder
• why fixed spring rates are a great unspoken compromise of biking
• is the cost of insurance is putting off new riders?
• should you wait and get a used Svartpilen 701 or Iannone your KTM 990 SM?
• if you could spend two weeks touring in the UK, where would you go?
• ...and lots lots more. It’s a vintage FEC-sack.

Thank you to you, to BikeSocial.co.uk, to Bennetts, and see you at Cadwell Park on August 13th.

Please email thoughts, questions and comments to:

[email protected]

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E91, the nearly-but-not-quite episode, supported, enabled and triggered by www.bikesocial.co.uk – or is it just bikesocial.co.uk? – and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. And what a bounteous springtime episode we have, containing gossip such as: • COTA – or is it GOTA? – with Marquez beating himself while Rins wins on a Suzuki and Rossi is runner-up again again again (he’s going for another record: Pedrosa’s “Most Perennial Runner-Up” Award)

• A half-naked Lorenzo adds to his list of embarrassing advert

• World Superbike’s Dave Bautista demonstrates it’s easier to adapt from a V4 MotoGP bike to a V4 WSB bike than from a V-twin WSB bike to a V4 WSB bike...

• Brief chats about Husqvarana’s Svartpilen 701 – a KTM 690 Duke in a frock or chainsaw on wheels? – Yamaha’s Tracer/Ténéré 700 GT and BMW’s new R1250R...

• Custom-moulded ear-plugs v foam plugs?

• How Fairy Liquid solves visor misting

• How to approach your first road race

• Why aren’t more bike journalists nicked riding like idiots on foreign launches?

• Why riding more makes you enjoy riding more

• Is Yamaha’s Niken the perfect camera bike for filming cycle racing?

• Why seat height isn’t actually a good measure of the height of the seat...

• ...and so much less. I mean more. More. Much more. Thanks for listening, please keep emailing your thoughts, ideas and questions to:

[email protected] Also remember to download this podcast from www.bikesocial.co.uk, and nip out and buy RiDE magazine! You can catch Simon and Martin on the Twitters:

@SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello, good morning and welcome to Front End Chatter E90, Britain’s most least favourite biking podcast, veritably triggered by www.bikesocial.co.uk, the world’s biking on the web, and Bennetts, the bike and travel insurance specialists. And this fortnight we have, for you aural delectation, spoken words on: RACING

• MotoGP is back, at Qatar where Miller’s seat comes off, Mav goes backwards, Rossi goes forwards, Marquez and Dovizioso repeat last season’s last lap, and Ducati plot a spoiler
• why MotoE isn’t coming to a short circuit near you soon
• Dave Bautista keeps on winning in WSB, but it’s not Ducati’s fault...
• ... so no pressure in BSB then, Scott...

BIKES

• first ride on Moto Guzzi’s new V85 TT ‘classic enduro’

PLUS!

• do business biking miles count as much as personal biking miles?
• more hi-viz pros and cons
• trail braking explained properly
• the great seat height debate, and how to make bikes fit more people more of the time
• more ideas on getting kids into bikes – and were 125s better in the 1990s?
• which brands offer the best value for money?
• why are there no wheelies in bike magazines any more?

... plus much more rubbish, nonsense and stuff.

Thanks for listening!

• email your thoughts, questions and comments to [email protected]
• visit www.bikesocial.co.uk,
• get your insurance from Bennetts,
• book yourself on the FECtacular/FECstival on 13th August at Cadwell Park,
• follow @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on the Twitters, Instas etc

Hello and welcome to Episode 89 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s most insured motorcycling podcast delivered fresh to your ears by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons – enabled by the humanoids at www.bikesocial.co.uk and supported by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. This week we’re chattering about:

• Andrea Iannone’s smelly secretions
• Jonathon Rea’s Book Of Excuses
• first ride of KTM’s new 790 Adventure and Adventure R
• how practical and fun is Enfield’s Interceptor?
• which bike can renew the sense of fun in your biking
• is £200 for a one-piece leather race suit on Ebay worth buying?
• should we feel guilty about NOT riding our bikes much?
• what’s the best non-sportsbike for track days?
• does Fairy Liquid work as an anti-misting visor coating?
• how to find the right people with whom to tour Europe
• ...and much much more...

 Thank you once more for listening to out nonsense, and contributing with your thoughts, queries and opinions: email

 [email protected] Please add August 13th to your diary, when Front End Chatter will be recorded LIVE! at a BIkeSocial Bennetts track day at Cadwell Park! More info at www.superbikeschool.co.uk Simon H and Martin are on Twitter:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

...and you can also fund us on various other social media platforms...

Hellooo and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s most homoerotic motorcycling podcast, supported and empowered by www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

And for your aural delectation this week we have gossip on:

• Andrew Iannone’s jawline
• Maverick Marquez and his pants
• Dave Bautista’s Rea-beating form at Phillip Island
• the perfect Franken-racer
• unfeasible plum-o-meters in the BSB paddock
• why is bike gear so expensive?
• what bike did Nev buy? And is a BMW R1250RS better than a Z1000SX?
• how do we know when not ride a bike but take the car instead?
• tips for touring in Alaska
• why there are no exotic small-bore race replicas and how to get more young riders on bikes
• and much, much more (but definitely no chat about motorcycle magazines; well, a bit...)
• ...plus! Super-really-very-exciting news of the 100th episode FECstravaganza at... Cadwell Park in Lincolnshire, Tuesday August 13th; a Bennetts/BikeSocial/California Superbike track day – and at which we’ll be recording FEC’s centenary episode in front of an eager audience of grass and air. You’re welcome to sign up to the track day, or just come along and have a listen... more details of the 100th episode FECstravaganza in the next FEC!

Meanwhile, thanks for listening and supporting what we do, keep the emails coming to anything @frontendchatter.com – don’t listen to Mufga, you write what you want to write – and catch us both on Twitter: @SimonHbikes & @Mufga, and on Insta/FB/the usual. Love and rockets

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 87 #Remy Gardner... it’s only just occurred to me, but what kind of name is Remy? Is he named after a cognac or something? Anyway, welcome, one and all, to surreal bantz supported, enabled and triggered by the meaty skinbags at www.bikesocial.co.uk – the best resource for all things motorcycling on the interwebs – and under the munificent auspices of Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. This week we have:

• why Suzuki Hayabusa mirrors remind Simon of Rosa Klebb’s shoes • a timely review of the 2002 Assen MotoGP, back in the days when races could be won by a two-stroke or a four-stroke, and when one four-stroke in particular appeared to be so much faster than the others it was like cheating...
• ...and how a last lap manoeuvre foreshadowed a more notorious coming-together 13 years later...
• a mini-review of the new Honda CBR650R and CB650R and is it a ‘new’ CBR600F? And how does the CB compare to a KTM 790 Duke?
• ...and why does no-one makes a Dakar replica?
• effective anti-rain visor solutions
• why do we wear the kit we wear?
• more on police/scooter tactics
• an inverse game of ‘what bike should I buy?’, with ‘what bike have I bought?’
• have some bike magazines may have lost their sense of humour, and is there a correlation with the demise of sportsbikes?
• ...and much more natter chatter...

...and if you’re interested in attending a FECstravaganza in August in Lincolnshire, let us know! Many many thanks for listening, please continue to download FEC from www.bikesocial.co.uk. Email your thoughts, queries, questions, observations and comments to:

anything@frontendchatter

....and catch us on Twitter

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Happy New... oh, is too late for that? Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s most enduring motorcycling podcast (much to chagrin of Les343) presented by me, Simon Hargreaves and him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and supported by the humanoids at www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance people.

And this month, FEC sinks its teeth into:

• the Greatest Grand Prix Of All Time, aka the 1990 Australian 500cc Grand Prix, feat. Sir Mick of Doohan, Lord Wayne de Rainey, Baron von Gardner and the Marquis of Schwantz going at it hammer, tongs and forceps • the 125cc side-spectacle of Hans Spaan aiming a punch at Fausto Gresini and Loris Capirossi winning his first world title
• the year of 2019 in review, as FEC jumps into the Chatter Tardis and zooms 12 months into the future – including the best bike of 2019, the Brit GP from Donington, and some shocking new Suzuki news – yes, you read that right
• a deep dive into the FECsack with contributions on topics as varied as
• buying used instead of a new bike on PCP,
• the mechanics of trail braking and why it’s a good (and bad) idea,
• how tightly controlled the Triumph 765-powered Moto2 series will be,
• the reliability of KTM electrics,
• how odd is it that Marc Marquez’ dad is STILL hanging around his pit box,
• bike community garages in the US,
• a FEC track day in August,
• how to make MotoE more of a spectacle by using an accountant from Bromley, • why is insurance so bloomin’ expensive?

Thanks for listening, please keep emailing your thoughts, ideas and questions to:

[email protected] Also remember to download this podcast from www.bikesocial.co.uk, and nip out and buy RiDE magazine! You can catch Simon and Martin on the Twitters: @SimonHBikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to a festive Front End Chatter, delivered with a ho-ho-ho by the Santa Claus of motorcycling websites, www.bikesocial.co.uk, in association with Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. In episode 85 of FEC Martin and Simon turn back time to August 1993 and re-live the fags, mags and bags of a classic British Grand Prix at Donington Park when:

• Doohan played skittles with Schwantz and Barros
• Yamaha’s Luca Cadalora followed team orders – Suzuki team orders
• Foggy needed a reserve tap
• Mackenzie needed no invitation

Also in this week’s FEC:

• Guy Martin’s Irish driving licence
• Triumph’s Scrambler 1200 XC and XE ridden and crashed
• more on police scooter crash tactics
• how to accidentally spend £18k on a winter bike, and how to protect it
• more advice on PCP v credit cards
• why there’s life in magazines yet! Simon, Mufga and all at www.BikeSocial.co.uk would like to wish all you FECers a Merry Xmas and Happy New Year, and look forward to filling your ears in 2019.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 84, presented for your ears in association with the multi-purposed humanoids of www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance experts. And this week, Simon H and Mufga present, for your consideration:

• Moto2 testing from Jerez, and the lap record-shattering debut of Triumph’s 765 engine, plus the emerging sibling rivalry of Marquez and Rossi brothers (ish)
• MotoGP testing gossip from Jerez, including Nakagami’s pace (who?) and the size of Johann Zarco’s... task
• Lewis Hamilton testing gossip from Jerez, including how slow, or not, he is, or isn’t, on a WSB-spec Pata Yamaha R1
• the rights, and wrongs, of police officers hitting scooter-riding criminals with their cars (contentious, this), and what has all this got to do with the Met Office?
• and, speaking of teenager hoolies, a few details from the launch of Kawasaki’s Z125 and Ninja 125

Plus a selection of your amazing emails, including:

• should I sell my Ducati SportClassic to buy a new Moto Guzzi TT85?
• is PCP better value than buying a bike on a credit card and bouncing it between 0% cards for the life of the repayment?
• is a lightly tuned R1200GS likely to be as chippy as a new R1250GS? • will JLo and Marquez pinch points off each other in 2019, making a Dovi world title more likely?
• which will be the best naked hyperbike if they end up with a racing class at World Superbike?
• what makes the Kawasaki ZX-10R the winningiest World Superbike?

Thanks for listening, please email your thoughts, musings, questions and anything else you want to us yammer about to:

[email protected] (record is 180 characters, so far)

or do the Twitter/Instagram thing: @SimonHbikes @Mufga

And please remember to nominate, via email or the Twitter, your favourite MotoGP race from Dorna’s archive for FEC to review. If that’s actually what you want us to do.

Welcome to Front End Chatter E83, and what a perfectly formed audio package it is too – supported and sustained as forever and always by the magnificent humanoids at www.bikesocial.co.uk and their Bennetts-ian, bike insuring benefactors. And wow! Scoop! Front End Chatter has a world exclusive interview with none other than the youngest man-child ever to win a grand prix – fresh from his Valencia Moto3 victory, we present Mr Can Öncü, fresh from his crib, literally. But apart from that, this week we waffle interminably on the following:

• winners and losers from the final round of MotoGP from a predictably, or not, sopping-wet Valencia...
• ...and happy bunnies and sad hedgehogs from MotoGP testing at a largely dry Valencia
• will Triumph enter a factory team in Moto2 at some point, like, 2020, maybe to coincide with the launch of a Daytona 765 road bike?
• hits and misses from that 2018 Motorcycle Live they had then
• Triumph’s new Street Twin and Street Scrambler, ridden at the launch in Portugal (in case it’s unclear)
• comparing the sound of BMW’s R1250 flat twin v the R1200 engine, and what it can tell us about the development of the new engine
• Renthal’s chain expert gives his opinion on dealing with burst O-ring seals down a ropey phone line
• what’s the best road sport tyres for a Daytona 675 for less than £200?
• what bikes can you buy now that will only increase in value, effectively giving you free biking? And is it worth buying a bike as an investment when you’re 50, anyway?
• why does no-one make a great touring naked bike, in the mould of BMW’s Rockster?
• what’s the best small-capacity bike that commute, do a bit of two-up and cope with a more generously-proportioned rider for less than £1000?... • ...and, in contrast, should a man, who isn’t the bass player in the Foo Fighters but could be, sell his already exotic bike collection and then buy something truly, fabulously, exceptional? It’s a tough one.

Many, many thanks for all your emails; please keep ’em coming to:

[email protected] And catch Simon and Mufga on the Twitters at @SimonHbikes

@Mufga Until we meet again!

Hello lovely people and welcome to our humble musings on the world of two wheels, otherwise known as Front End Chatter. 

FEC is supported by [email protected], your 24-hr convenience store for biking information, and Bennetts, the bike insurance experts.  Here we are again with a marathon podcast to make up for lost time, and we have:

• a teeny bit of Moto GP gossip, including why Lorenzo should not be henceforth be known as 'Sicknote'

• all (most) new 2019 bikes fresh from the Eicma show they have now, including some detail on BMW's R1250 GS v R1200 GS, as seen on [email protected] and Ducati's Multistrada 1260 Enduro • listeners' emails, on subjects as varied as new Chinese v used Japanese 125s, which new bike to buy if you don't want to lose too much money, are Royal Enfield's new twins better than an old Bonneville... and much more.  Thanks for listening, thanks for downloading (feel free to subscribe on iTunes or your Android pod app, but if you download from [email protected] we'd be very grateful!), and please email us on [email protected]

Thanks! @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Oh my lordy lord, here’s Front End Chatter E81, hot on the heels of E80 and ploughing an ill-informed furrow through the field of motorcycling podcasts, supported and upheld as ever by the munificence of www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance people. And this time out we have topics as varied as: • Jonathan ‘Nice’ Rea’s fourth consecutive World Superbike title – and which previous WSB champs congratulated him...

• Ana Carrasco and her maiden – literally – WSSP300-on-a-400 world title

• Jorge Lorenzo, who crashed at the first corner of the Aragon MotoGP race by sheer will power alone

• New bikes from Royal Enfield, yes, that’s Royal Enfield, with Simon riding the Interceptor and Continental GT at the launch...

• ...and even more new bikes, from the Intermots they have now – including, er, well, not all that much, really – apart from Suzuki’s GSX-S1000-in-a-frock Katana and Indian’s FTR1200 flat-tracker, Moto Guzzi’s V85 TT, Kawasaki’s 125s, Triumph’s Street Scrambler & Street Twin, and Yamaha’s Tracer 700GT...

• FEC listeners’ emails including:

– making engines ‘emulate’ other engines

– what to do in the Isle Of Man instead of riding motorcycles

– should Gore-Tex be waterproof after two hours in heavy rain?

– are paddock/pit-bikes any good?

– is feeling for grip affected by suspension set-up?

– is a cheap track bike a bad idea?

– best winter hack for £1500

– do we wear different kit for different trips, and should we get upset about riders choosing not to wear appropriate protective clothing?

And much, much more. Please enjoy, like and susbscribe (if you download from iTunes, but we’d much rather you went to www.bikesocial.co.uk) – and please email your questions and comments to

[email protected] Get Simon and/or Martin on all the socials mediums:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Ta-raa pet!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E80, brought to you from the girded loins at www.bikesocial.co.uk and supported by bike insurance humanoids at Bennetts.

This week, chatter topics for your aural entertainment are:

• Romano Fenasti – the hot-headed ex-Moto2 rider is definitely cracked, but should he be sacked or backed following his Misano misdemeanour? • Mufga’s been riding BMW’s new, enlarged, Shiftcam (careful!) R1250GS...
• ... and Simon’s had a go on Yamaha’s Niken with some BikeSocialists (and a FECer; hi Dan)...
• ... and they’re not the only ones; other FECers who’ve tried the Niken let us know what they think,
• plus loads more of your emails, including

     Harley out-selling Triumph, Ducati and Suzuki in Europe last year, is MotoE going to be any good, why V4s don’t sound like inline fours, is it possible to ‘see’ grip, best mods for Aprilia’s RSV-R, advice for smaller riders... and lots more. Thanks, as always, for listening, please bookmark www.bikesocial.co.uk and get your insurance from Bennetts, and follow us on Twitter @Mufga and @SimonHbikes

Hello and welcome to Never mind all that usual bobbins, we've got an actual interview with actual Marc Márquez!

In episode 79 of Britain's best biking podcast – supported, sustained and stimulated by Bike Social (that's www.bikesocial.co.uk) as well Bennetts, the record-breaking, crash-saving, championship-leading prodigy of the bike insurance grid:

• Fallout from the washout at Silverstone. What happened (or, rather, what didn't), why it happened, how it happened, who's to blame, who's not, who thinks they should have raced, who decided to cancel, who thinks they shouldn't have cancelled, is anyone going to accept responsibility, and can we cover all this without getting threatened with legal action?
• You can't stop the rock – but you can stop all motorsports activity at Rockingham. Britain's newest race circuit is about to become Britain's newest former race circuit – we explain why it's shutting, when it's all over, whether we'll miss it, and what it's going to become instead.
• And the main event: a solid gold interview with Marc Márquez himself, live and in person (and courtesy of Shoei), talking his place in history, his regrets, his outrageous riding technique, his future, whether winning or having fun is more important, saving the front, the best rider of all time, his favourite rider, and how many crash helmets he gets through each year given all his trips to the tarmac.

We hope you enjoy it – and please email us your questions, comments, feedback and more on [email protected]

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and E78 of Britain's finest motorcycling podcast, presented, in the loosest possible sense, by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, although it's a sobering thought that in an infinite universe it's a certainty there's an Earth-like planet out there with a motorcycling podcast presented by Martin Hargreaves and Simon Fitz-Gibbons.  Anyway, whichever universe you're in, we give thanks to the omnipotent and almighty deities at www.bikesocial.co.uk, the UK's most all-encompassing biking website, and Bennetts, the bike insurance people.  Right, in this episode we have:  MotoGP action from the Czechs... Big Harley-Davidson news, including a guess as to why they're revealing their plans for the next 5 years now... Martin's thoughts on riding the Yamaha Niken... And all your lovely emails – and there are many. We'd love to tell you about them but the damn cat is mewing at the back door and I can't concentrate. Download, listen, you'll find out. Thanks for your ears; please email your questions, musings and ruminations to [email protected] Lucv ya,  Right, where's the Whiskas?

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter episode 77! Courtesy of the alliterative, improvised, indigenous tribes behind Bike Social (that's www.bikesocial.co.uk) and spoken through the mouths of veteran motorcycle-journalists-slash-opinion-havers Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, this near-two-hour extravaganza covers all the latest comings, goings, rumours and controversies across the motorised two-wheeled universe. Including, but not limited to:

• The Goodwood Festival of Speed: what it's like, what it isn't, who goes, who cares, who enjoyed their first taste of a Duke's private passage and who gets all bah humbug about it.
• BMW Motorrad Days at Garmisch: what it is, where it is, the bits we can talk about (and the bits we can't), plus the new bikes announced there (and the bikes that weren't).
• KTM's Adventure Rally in Wales: an orange dirtstravaganza which we didn’t actually go to, only we sort of did but were a day or two late. Plus some insights into the forthcoming 790 Adventure and its curious pendulous saddlebag petrol tanks.
• More new bike news and rumours, including whether Kawasaki have a new ZX-6R up their green sleeves, and what it might mean for the supersport class.
• What to wear in a heatwave: full leathers, mesh textiles or heated vests? No, really…
• MotoGP from Assen. Wow, etc.
• The questionably successful but unquestionably first episode of Can You Guess What Bike I Ride If I Give You Some Hints About Me And My Riding Background.
• Motorcycling must-haves, things to take touring and things to leave at home, old bikes with modern technology and much, much more…

Thank you once again for letting us into your ears, and thank you once again to www.bikesocial.co.uk – the place you should be going to download this podcast, and the place you should be going for all your online motorcycle needs (and, heck, why not get an insurance quote from Bennetts while you're there?)

Get in touch with Simon and Martin on the Twitters (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga disrespectively), or less socially by sending an email to [email protected] (literally anything).

Hello and welcome to episode 76 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s most argumentative motorcycling podcast, presented in the loosest sense of the word by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and spilling seamlessly into your ears courtesy of www.bikesocial.co.uk – the motorcycling world on a website – and Bennetts, the bike insurance people who put back more into biking than any other insurance company, and that’s a true fact.

On E76 we have:

• Jorge Lorenzo – why’s he started winning on a Ducati, why’s he signed to ride for Honda in 2019, what’s in it for new teammate Marc Marquez, and is there a conspiracy theory we can generate from it all? (The answer is yes)

• Peter Hickman’s astonishing Senior TT lap record, and a lengthy discussion (again) about whether discomfort at supporting the event is legititmate

• Why so many motorcyclists dislike football

• How to do 200mph on the cheap

• Should there be courses in basic motorcycle understanding?

• Why Honda’s NC750X is a good bike. But only if you don’t test ride a Yamaha Tracer 700 first

• Suzuki GSX-R750 – is the best middleweight sportsbike on the road?

• Can anyone actually name Jonathan Rea winning a “really close and exciting race that will go down in history”?

• ...and much more (well, a bit) Thank you very much for listening, please visit www.bikesocial.co.ukfor all your motorcycling media needs, and please subscribe on iTunes or your Android device to make sure you get every episode of FEC.  Please email your thoughts, questions, musings – in either written or .mp3 formats – [email protected]

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, episode 75 of Britain's sweariest motorcycling podcast, presented before your ears by two motorcycle journalists called, literally, Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and furthermore enabled by the humungous humanoids at the UK's most enhanced two-wheeled web experience, otherwise known as www.bikesocial.co.uk – which is itself a mere digit on the mighty, but gentle, hand of Bennetts, the bike insurance people.  Among the topics for discussion today are:  • Is the TT more important than MotoGP?

• MotoGP silly season, including why Lorenzo will never, in a million years, take a seat at Repsol Honda, oh, he just did... 

• TT latest including the unbelievably spectacular riding at this year's race, some slightly troubling consequences, and what's the point of the Superbike class?

• How many horsepowers do we a) need, b) want and c) can use?...   • ... and where does Ducati's V4 Panigale sit on that scale? 

• What are the worst bikes ever (and haven't we been here before)?

• What effect will Yamaha's Niken have, if any, on motorcycling? ...and much, much less. More. I meant more.  Thank you very much for listening, please visit www.bikesocial.co.uk for all your motorcycling media needs, and please subscribe on iTunes or your Android device to make sure you get every episode of FEC.  Please email your thoughts, questions, musings – in either written or .mp3 formats – to [email protected] Simon on Twitter @SimonHBikes

Martin on Twitter @Mufga  

We’re back! Welcome to Britain’s most paternal motorcycling podcast, Front End Chatter Episode 74, supported by the infinite patience of our friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk, in association with Bennetts, the bike insurance specalists... and while we can’t quite make up for lost time, we can chatter about a bunch of stuff including:

• armchair gossip about current MotoGP shenanigans – mostly from Argentina, for whom no-one is crying apart from Marc Marquez who, upset at not being disqualified for riding the wrong way up the track, went on to effectively disqualify himself from the race, several times over – what is Marc Marquez on, is he becoming MotoGP’s bad boy, and is he heading for a biggie?
• a bit of catch-up with WSB and BSB, including a refreshingly new look to the top step of the BSB podium at Donington in the shape of a myopic mop-head from Kent called Bradley Ray...
• ...plus a bit of chat about Triumph’s Tiger 1200 XRT v BMW R1200GS TE Exec v Ducati’s Multistrada 1260S Touring v KTM’s 1290 S Super Adventure • ...and a bit about Kawasaki’s Z900RS v BMW’s RnineT Pure and Yamaha’s XSR900...
• ...and exactly how extraordinary is Kawasaki’s H2 SX SE?

Plus!

• what’s the point of KTM in MotoGP?
• does being a dad slow you down?
• which retro naked bike has the sportiest character?
• should Triumph release a Speed Triple RS half-faired sports tourer?
• can you do a track day on a BMW R1200 GS?
• is the VFR800Fi a future classic? • can we form an emotional attachment to an inanimate object?
• why do some bikes have unadjustable suspension that works, while some have adjustable suspension we struggle to set-up?
• why do journalists criticise adjustable suspension, then comprehensively fail to actually be bothered to adjust it?
• hello to Jason Isaacs
• what’s the best bike to get married on?

...and so much more! Thank you for sticking with us, and please remember to visit www.bikesocial.co.uk to give us a Like. You can catch us on the usual social media things they have now:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

...or on Front End Chatter’s Facebook page.

And please email your questions and thoughts to [email protected]

Hello and welcome to a slightly sweary, distinctly snowy Front End Chatter Episode 73, supported as ever by nos amis at BikeSocial (wwwbikesocial.co.uk) and Bennetts the bike insurers – and which ignores the current level of white precipitation (sounds iffy) while resolutely chattering on about:

• last weekend’s racing season opener, with World Superbike at Phillip Island – was it or wasn’t it dull, and what’s the difference between an exciting race and dull racing?
• recent MotoGP testes, and what’s the likely outcome of Tech 3 and Yamaha announcing their conscious uncoupling?

...and then FEC73 dives headlong into proper motorcycling and confronts pressing issues such as:

• the launch of Triumph’s new Speed Triple S and RS, and when is a hooligan not a hooligan?
• how does Triumph’s Daytona 675R rate against MV Agusta’s 675 and 800 F3s?
• is it only us thinking this, or have Triumph got some massive holes in their model line-up, and does that presage a completely new, large-capacity engine powering a range of new models in the near future?
• would we buy a Panigale 959 Corse if a) we wanted it and b) could afford it? • are some new bikes ‘better’ than other new bikes, and does it matter, or is modern motorcycling more about deciding what the bike feels like?
• what’s the wisdom of filming ourselves for vlogs – does it make motorcycling look bad?
• should we feel guilty about not using a bike all the time?
• how much does rider weight and fitness level affect our ability to ride a bike?

Plus there’s loads more of waffle about grid boys, why manufacturers build the bikes they build, and a satisfied FEC customer! Thanks for listening, and please keep sending us your questions, thoughts and queries... and picking us up on our errors (that should get a few emails). Email to: [email protected]

@Mufga

@SimonHbikes

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 72, Britain's most rambling, shambling biking podcast supported as ever by our gender-neutral comrades at www.bikesocial.co.uk (and definitely *not* .com) in association with Bennetts, the bike insurance people. It's like a great big biking family, packed with road tests, new bikes, used bikes, buying guides and kit git guides; come in, the water's lovely. On a crammed FEC 72, Martin and Simon waffle about: • Sepang MotoGP testing results • the cancelled Welsh Road Races: why it's been postponed and how much damage has been done to the reputation of the organisers and a potential 2019 event – plus some sensible mathematics  • a surprisingly measured and informed opinion on the great grid girls debate... from a man • McGuinness signs to race the Norprilia at the TT • news from the launches of the 2018 Honda Africa Twin Adventure Sports (not in Africa) and Triumph Tiger 800 (in Africa) • embarrassing crashes, heart-breaking crashes and unpredictable crashes (aren't all crashes unpredictable?)   • do we get the new bikes we want, or the bikes manufacturers think we want... and how are new bikes developed, anyway?  • what were the best-selling bikes in Europe and who were the biggest manufacturers in 2017?  Thank you for your ears, and please get in touch at [email protected]  or on Twitter @SimonHbikes or @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s mostest biking podcast, supported by nos amis at Britain’s foremost and most comprehensive biking website, www.bikesocial.co.uk, and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. And in this week’s compact episode Simon (me) and Martin (him) natter about such diverse matters as:

• the second darkest winter in northern Europe since records began
• results from the Dakar rally, and whether the race is getting too tough (it’s not), and whether the IOM TT is harder
• will Michael Dunlop’s recent test on the MotoGP Suzuki GSX-R RR R at Sepang, Malaysia, presage an entry in the 2018 Senior TT, and do we think he was worried about taking to the track alongside MotoGP regulars?
• what else might or might not happen at the first MotoGP test session of 2018 at Sepang?
• why has Hutchy jumped on John McG’s ‘unlucky’ Honda Fireblade for next year’s TT?
• more news on the Ducati, Aprilia and KTM models affected by Brembo’s master cylinder recall
• first riding reports of Ducati’s V4 Panigale and Honda’s new Gold Wing are in – and if they’re as brilliant as everyone says, how can we tell when it seems like all new bikes are brilliant?

Plus (and sorry, we only have time for a few) your wonderful emails.

Thank you as ever for continuing to listen to our ramblings, and please get in touch at [email protected] with your questions, thoughts, musings and chit-chat.

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 70, the world’s most eclectic motorcycling podcast, supported by www.biksocial.co.uk, the UK’s most informed and entertaining website, and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

My name is Simon and that man over there is Martin, and today we’re nattering about:

• the masochism of riding in winter, and whether a hot bath at the end of it is worth the suffering
• the masochism of riding a Kawasaki H2 and an Enfield Himalayan in winter
• ...or the historical perspective of riding three generations of GSX-R750 on an old runway in Cornwall
• details of a Brembo brake recall in the USA; what it is, what bikes are affected, and whether there’ll be a recall in the UK
• how, despite the Kawasaki H2 SX and Yamaha Niken and BMW F850GS, the Kawasaki Z900RS might just be the best bike of 2018
• an enlightened approach to selling a used bike, and how faith should overcome fear...
• ...or just ask your local dealer to sell it for you
• why Honda’s Crossrunner is always overlooked when discussing used all-rounders
• the crazy new bike deals about last year, such as Honda’s Africa Twin DCT PCP deal of no deposit, 0% finance at £70 per month for three years – and the implications for the values of used Africa Twins
• how cold is too cold to go for a ride?
• and introducing the Hall Of FEC – what bikes are in, what bikes are out (starting with 2009 – which turns out to be a particularly bad year for new bikes)

Thanks for listening, please email your nominations for FEC’s Hall Of FEC, or indeed any other thoughts, questions, requests to:

[email protected] Thanks for listening! @SimonHbike

@Mufga

Had enough of cold turkey? Fear not, here’s your fix of Front End Chatter Episode 69, served in a very small tin foil hat with a side-order of www.bikesocial.co.uk in association with Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists. And, following on from the last episode’s fab interview with Julian Ryder, this time it’s business as usual as we read through a veritable mountain of your occasionally lengthy emails, on topics as varied as: • Does the motorcycle industry do enough to attract young riders?

• Does uploading fancy software and a few items from the accessories catalogue justify adding a few grand on the price of a new bike and calling it a premium model?

• Is motorcycling becoming too tribal?

• Will we be seeing more examples of forced induction on new models? • How British Superbike is also brilliant if you live in the US

• Why does no-one build a modular, adjustable motorbike?

• Where is the Husqvarna Vitpilen?

• Why riding a bike a great cure for illness.

• PLUS loads of other nattering and chattering...

Many thanks for your continued ears, please tell everyone you know to download the podcast and please email you thoughts, considerations and questions to:

anything@ frontendchatter.com

You can get us on the Twitter:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga Hope you had a great Christmas and look forward to a splendidly two-wheeled (or three) New Year!

Hello everybody and welcome to Front End Chatter, the biking podcast powered and empowered by the super-swell folk at Bike Social - that's www.bikesocial.co.uk.

In episode 68 Simon and Martin welcome a FECing guest for the first time in a long time. And not any guest, but the one and only Julian Ryder (@MotoGPJules) - journalist, broadcaster, author, antiques dealer and former WSB, 500GP and MotoGP commentator.

Fresh from putting the finishing touches to the official MotoGP Season Review 2017 (a proper book, with "not too many cockups", on sale now at Amazon), Jules talks all about one of the best racing seasons in recent memory, whether things really were better in the good old days, the greatest racers of all time, tribal fans, the MotoGP riders' rider of 2017, why each of the top names performed the way they did this year, how he'd fix World Superbikes (and whether it's important to fix), and which racing series Jules's dulcet tones might (or might not) be gracing next.

Thank you once again for allowing FEC into your ears and brain. If you enjoy it, please tell your friends, colleagues, co-worked and fellow riders to find us on www.frontendchatter.com or, better still, on www.bikesocial.co.uk.

You can also find us on Twitter - @SimonHbikes and @Mufga - and we eagerly await any and all of your emailed correspondence at [email protected]

Cheers until next time!

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter 67, the Shakey’s Racing Age episode, ably supported by our friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk who are in turn supported by bike insurance bods Bennetts.

This week we natter about the small matter of a race in Valencia, some racing in Wales that actually looks like it might happen, some more gossip about the Motorcycle Live bike show they had last week (including how manufacturers cheat on seat heights), and answer a veritable raft of your emails on subjects as wide ranging as what bike you should buy.

Thanks again for your continued ears, and please spread the word of the words we speak.

You can find on Twitter – @SimonHbikes & @Mufga – and you can download this on iTunes or from www.frontendchatter.com – but we’d much rather you listened at www.bikesocial.co.uk, not least because you can lose yourself for hours browsing the library of all sorts of archived biking stuff.

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E66, supported by our good friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists – and who better to insure your gleaming new, 2018 motorcycle? Because this week’s podcast is stuffed full of new bike news, gossip and opinion (admittedly, more of the latter pair than the former), fresh from the Milan bike show. In no particular order, we natter about:

• Kawasaki’s 200bhp sport-touring mega-bike, the ZZR1400. Sorry! We mean the new H2 SX/SE
• Ducati’s V4 Panigale, and whether it’s better-looking than the 1299
• Yamaha’s Niken and whether it’s actually a motorcycle
• plus chatter about Yamaha Tracer 900s, Kawasaki Z900RS and Café, Honda’s Africa Twin Adventure and CB1000R, BMW’s F850GS, Triumph’s Tigers, Ducati’s Multistrada 1260 and KTM’s 790 Duke...
• ...and seeing as how few of us can afford any of them, should we be interested?

Plus we have a brief natter about the forthcoming final MotoGP showdown at Valencia, and answer a few of emails (but not all – more to come!).

Thanks again for listening, and please email your thoughts, questions and comments to us here: [email protected]

Or catch us on Twitter:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello and welcome to the long-awaited (well, about a month) Front End Chatter Episode 65 – supported as ever by our magnificent colleagues, pals and beneFECtors at www.bikesocial.co.uk and Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

This week FEC bangs on about subjects as wide and varied as:

• how does three-time World Superbike champ Jonathan Rea’s win-race ratio match to Carl Fogarty’s, and how to fix World Superbike (again)
• did the three-way Showdown final British Superbike round at Brands and the subsequent love-in make us want to watch it next year?
• ...and compare all that to an epic MotoGP race at Motegi

PLUS! words of gossip about what we know about 2018’s new bikes (or do we?) including

• the 2018 supercharged, sports touring Kawasaki H2R GT...
• ...and their Z900RS, and how close it’ll be to the existing Z900
• Honda’s NSC ‘New Sports Cafe’...
• ...and if the motor is based on the CB650F inline four
• Honda’s new Goldwing with its funny front end...
• KTM’s 790-800cc Duke parallel twin which probably won’t have bungees pulling the pistons back to TDC
• Yamaha’s MT-07-based T7 budget adventure bike
• Triumph’s, er, well, definitely not a 765 Daytona, say Triumph...
• Harley-Davidson’s new Softail range of, er, big V-twins including the rather splendid Fat Bob

PLUS! listeners’ questions, including:

• what supermoto as a second bike
• the law around on-bike dash-cams – and can plod nick you using your own sat nav’s ‘snail-trail’ as evidence?
• are smaller bikes less likely to get you in trouble?
• can you buy a decent used bike for the price of a new iPhone?

Thank you for listening and putting up with us – and please email any biking questions (or any questions you like) or comments to

[email protected]

or get us on Twitter @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

And don’t forget to check out www.bikesocial.co.uk and get your bike insurance with Bennetts.

Hello and welcome to a special, John McGuinness Front End Chatter Episode 64, supported by our good friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk, supported by Bennetts, the bike insurer par excellence, bar none. And what a treat this week – apart from the usual nattering about subjects as random as:

• tech details from the launch of Ducati’s 210bhp V4 Stradale engine, which is coming to a chassis that may or may not but probably will look remarkably similar to a 1299 Panigale this November
• Rossi’s broken leg bones, Cal’s severed tendon, the ramifications for the MotoGP title, and who Valentino gets to sign the plaster cast...
• why Silverstone’s MotoGP was so poorly attended (conspiracy theory alert)
• how lovely BMW’s R nineT Racer is, and why don’t other manufacturers make bikes that, simply, look beautiful?
• will the news Welsh police are actively encouraging dash-cam users to upload footage as evidence for traffic offences make you ride any differently?
• how to learn how to pronounce Ikea, Abba and Öhlins on a Magic Motor Experience tour on a Yamaha XT660R, in Sweden...

... the jewel in FEC64’s crown is the audio version of BikeSocial’s interview with TT legend John McGuinness, in which he talks about:

• the physical side effects of ‘that’ crash (caution: not for the squeamish!)
• how it’s affected his head
• what caused it and what he really thinks about the 2017 FireBlade
• what happens to his career now
• how important the race fans are to his recovery

Hope you enjoy, please say nice things and spread the word, and please email any and all questions, comments and ideas to [email protected] Thanks for listening! @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Hello everybody and welcome to Front End Chatter #63, brought to you by the definitely-not-primates at Bike Social (that's www.bikesocial.co.uk where, as well as all the latest news, views and reviews of all things motorcycling, you'll also find a handy link to the superb insurance services of Bennetts). In this not-especially-numerically-significant episode of Britain's best biking podcast, Simon and Martin chatter about:

• MotoGP from Austria, where someone cleared off for a bit, then there was a bit of a ding-dong and someone won and someone didn't, and there was a last-lap, last-corner, last-gasp move that was actually just a bit silly even though nobody seems to want to say it (except the bloke who won).
• British Superbikes from Cadwell Park, which neither of us watched even though one of us was actually there, and which turned out to be pretty brilliant.
• The new 158bhp BMW road bike that we've both ridden but only one of us can talk about.
• Touratech going insolvent, which is all very curious given almost everyone seems to be riding an adventure bikes these days.
• Plus all of your emails - sent to [email protected] - including whether Triumph's new Street Triple 765 RS lives up to the hype, how to survive a group ride with complete strangers, the interweb going crazy over the GS fork recall and the reality of the situation from an owner, Sprint ST vs a Glasgow winter, whether you can tell if someone's riding style is "outright dangerous" from a photo, and plenty more.

Thank you very much for listening (hopefully through www.bikesocial.co.uk if you'd like to kindly support the folk who kindly support us). We are, as ever, @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on the Twitter, and eagerly await your thought, opinions, questions and ponderings arriving on email via [email protected] (yes, literally anything).

Ta-ta for now!

Hello everybody and welcome to Front End Chatter, the semi-regular spoken word salad that refuses to stray into nostalgia (other than to remember when nostalgia was better than it is today). Episode #62 continues to be supported by the wondrous website known as Bike Social (that’s www.bikesocial.co.uk) where you should definitely go to check out all the latest motorcycling news and reviews. And get an insurance quote. Go on.

In this 90-minute natter extravaganza, Simon and Martin discuss:

• MotoGP from Brno, which was either brilliant or boring, where the winner won by a move of either sheer genius or random fortune
• Is it time to wave the chequered flag on flag-to-flag races?
• Guy Martin’s future plans, and whether he’s quitting, retiring, or quitting retiring?
• The new ‘global partnership’ between Triumph and Bajaj – and how many badges can you bodge on a Bajaj?
• Is the London scooter crime spree creating a potential new marketing opportunity?
• The most expensive zeroes and ones in motorcycling

Plus all of your emails covering everything from a little-known but much-loved Australian bike-gang film, recalling recalls and more GS stanchion shenanigans, the exceptional machines of Honda’s golden period, overlooked V-twins, bargain sports-tourers, the value of ABS, a reason to speed, the blame game, and the best bikes we’ve crashed.

Thank you very much once again for listening. If you’d like to chatter back, email us on [email protected] or find us on the Twitters – he is @SimonHbikes and he is @Mufga

And if you’re going to fire up your interwebsitebrowser, don’t forget to point it towards www.bikesocial.co.uk !

Hello everybody and welcome to Front End Chatter – Britain's best biking podcast, powered (and empowered) by the wondrous two-wheeled website known as Bike Social (that's www.bikesocial.co.uk – and you should definitely check them out).

It's episode 61, which as everybody knows is the **must remember to search Google for an obscure name of somebody who once raced a motorcycle with number 61 here** episode. Which, ironically, has very little racing at all, being mostly composed of:

• Chatter about the front end of BMW's R1200GS, and how the previous service campaign – not a recall – to fix the fork stanchions is, erm, ahem, cough, now a recall.
• Martin rides to a village in the German Alps to drink beer in the company of 40,000 bikes, while Simon rides to a café near Whitchurch for the world's largest all-female bikers meeting.
• Aprilia's Shiver 900, and why are "middleweight"s getting so big now?
• Plus roughly one trillion and seventy-two of your finest emails, covering everything from Yamaha Tracer adverts, insurance groups, the best bikes ever to grace the silver screen, Simon gets his helmet out to demonstrate something to Martin, is the new Fireblade changing its tune or is that just the rider, and lots and lots and lots more.

To chatter back to us, email [email protected] or Twit us on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

And, of course, go take a look at Bike Social!

Welcome to Front End Chatter E60, sponsored as always by our good friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk and backed by Bennetts, the bike insurance boys and girls. And what a scandal-laden FEC we have this week:

• despite a truncated MotoGP/racing section we still manage to disrespeculate on Lorenzo’s future at Ducati and compare his debut season so far to Rossi’s disaster in 2011...

• get into the financial fall-out from the shambles formally known as the Circuit Of Wales...

• details of the new Ducati V4 replacement for the Panigale, after the Final Edition – which, it turns out, might not be so final after all, and will be available from September this year and will cost £35,000...

• ...and why the V-twin is the most versatile engine layout ever built

• BMW’s service campaign to check all R1200GSs and GSAs built between late 2013 to date, to make sure the forks aren’t about to fall off – and why we should or shouldn’t be alarmed by it

• and how Honda’s blighted 2017 FireBlade, both base and SP versions, stands up at a Mallory Park track day – a Bennetts Mallory Park track day, no less – against Suzuki’s new GSX-R1000R All this takes so long we don’t get time to read any emails at all, so apologies – but at least it means we’ll have a another non-racing FEC in a few weeks’ time! Thanks again for listening, and please email us at [email protected] with questions and comments, or get us on the Twitter:

@SimonHBikes & @Mufga

Welcome to Front End Chatter E59, brought to you in association with our good friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk, sponsored by Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists.

AND! What an episode we have!

Just in time for the Assen MotoGP race this weekend, Front End Chatter recaps the previous round at Catalunya (apologies for the delay, delay, delay and don’t worry, because it was so long ago we keep it brief) – and it’s worth reminding ourselves what a hilarious, thigh-slapping sit-com of a race weekend it was with riders using the wrong track (but still in Spain), other riders falling over things and some riders falling over themselves.

We also cover – unusually – a cracking World Superbike race from Misano and find it a rewarding experience. Which is more than can be said for Ducati’s Charles Davies.

We’ve a bit more race goss, including a possible return to racing for former WSB champ and ex-Yamaha MotoGP star Bens Pies, Iannone moving from Suzuki to Aprilia, why it would be cool to see Jonathan Rea switching from WSB to jump on the MotoGP Suzuki, why tyres ‘spin’ on the rim, the latest British Superbike round from Knockhill, and who is Jake Dixon and is he in the RAF? Plus a bit of natter about Hutchy’s awful Senior TT crash. Yikes.

We also read out a few of your emails, including:

• more disrespeculation about Honda’s FireBlade,
• wrist relief on motorways,
• recommended heated clothing,
• a bit of a rant about why magazine and web new bike ‘tests’ may or may not be all they seem,
• the blurring of distinction between PR and journalism, and
• is riding fast an addiction, and what can you do about it?

We think that’s quite enough controversy for one episode, so if you enjoy FEC please

a) tell your mates,

b) email us with a question or a topic for discussion,

c) insure your bike with Bennetts and

d) buy RiDE magazine. We may be bought and paid for, but at least we’re honest about it. Thanks, and talk at you again soon! @SimonHbikes

@Mufga

[email protected]

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 58, supported by www.bikesocial.co.uk and sponsored by Bennetts – and a very special, fully employed episode it is too; featuring, as it does:

1) Mugello MotoGP goss including

• Rossi’s motocross crash
• a worrying resemblance to a CGI character from Lord Of The Rings
• a bad case of the shlitz
• fast Ducatis
• how to celebrate a win
• Mattia Pasini’s odd riding controls and his clutchless downshifts
• Triumph’s Moto2 deal

2) TT goss including – in fact almost entirely – semi-informed speculation about the travails of Honda, the 2017 Fireblade, and riders Guy Martin and John McGuinness – with an attempt to understand the connection between their accidents and the road bike (if there are any)

3) Loads of your emails, on wide-ranging subjects from the health of World Superbike and a few ideas on how to make it better, cheap motorway bikes, Husqvarna Nudas, more best-looking non-sportsbikes, and tons of other chattering.

As ever thank you very much for listening, and thank you even more for downloading it from the top folk at Bike Social (that’s still www.bikesocial.co.uk). Please email us on [email protected] or get us on that there Twitter using @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter episode 57, which is really episode 69, powered by the mighty online juggernaut of two-wheeled infotainment that is Bike Social (that's www.bikesocial.co.uk).

This time round Martin and Simon chatter in their front-endy style about: 

• Nicky Hayden: the man, the talent, the achievements, the infectious passion, the generosity, the tears at Estoril, the tears at Valencia, the incredible strength of character, the smile. 

• MotoGP from Le Mans, where General Zarco was propelled by patriotism, Lorenzo was stumped by strine, a small fall by Rossi led to a big fall in his championship standing, and Simon got in a huff and turned his telly off before the end of the race and went to spend some time in his log cabin that Danny Kent still hasn't turned up to finish yet. 

• The red-bike, red-flag, red-fireball fest that was World Superbikes from Imola. 

• John McGuinness's crash at the North West 200, what might have caused it, and whether it might have anything to do with the slightly peculiar throttle response on the 2017 road-going Fireblade. 

• By popular demand (no, really), an excessively comprehensive review of the most promising (if hardly imaginatively named) electric road bikes yet. 

• Your emails, including plenty of air expended about the pros and cons of airbag suits, do MotoGP fans like football, does FEC hate WSB… and finally… and finally?… and finally... a forgotten and (questionably) attractive non-sportsbike from Yamaha. 

As ever thank you very much for listening, and thank you even more for downloading it from the top folk at Bike Social (that’s still www.bikesocial.co.uk). Please email us on [email protected] or get us on that there Twitter using @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and episode 56 brought to you in association with our pals at www.bikesocial.co.uk.

This week, between blackbird interruptions, we look back at the fallout from the spectacular Jerez MotoGP race – which isn’t the same as the Corby Grand Prix – including:

• race weekend perfection from Daniel Pedrosa
• Yamaha’s asymmetrical grip
• the world’s least safe safety car
• a last corner clash that failed to materialise
• the closest championship since 2009
• do the riders, premium athletes to a man, actually pop a can of Red Bull in parc fermé?
• the trials and tribulations of ex-Moto2 rider and sometime World Champ Danny Kent, who’s not from Kent

Plus – a re-evaluation of Ducati’s SuperSport, the merits of A2-licence friendly inline fours or parallel twins, and news of Avon’s new Spirit ST, their ‘hypertouring’ tyre.

Plus – some of your emails, including more of your best-looking non-sportsbikes, is speeding as socially unacceptable as drunk driving, who is General Zarco, what is the Kuiper Belt, is an MOT really necessary, what is defensive riding, how to fix a heavy throttle, and how to spot an idiot bike seller.

Thanks for listening, please support our friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk, and please email us on [email protected]

Welcome to Front End Chatter episode 55, powered by the good people at Bike Social (www.bikesocial.co.uk), where Simon and Martin discuss:

• MotoGP from Texas, where we got the first mouth-watering tease of a proper Marquez v Vinales MotoGP scrap during qualifying, only to have all our hopes and dreams cruelly snatched away during the race in a massive shower of disappointment.
• The great GP lost-and-found phenomenon, including Lorenzo losing his temper and finding it caught on multiple HD cameras (and other great racing tantrums of our time); Loris Baz losing the front and finding himself praised for it (and other great racing non-crashes of our time); and Valentino Rossi losing his piece of racetrack to General Zarco and finding himself handed a 0.3-second penalty (and whether any of this should have ever happened at all).
• British Superbikes from Brands Hatch Indy circuit, where a nice smart young man appeared to come of age (not to be confused with his race number), won two races, shattered a circuit record - and, sorry, who is he again?
• BMW's new HP4 Race - which may or may not have been developed through racing, may or may not be eligible for any racing, and may or may not ever actually be raced by anyone ever - and where it ranks on the Front End Chatter exoticometer.
• Plus all of your emails, including the morality of riding fast on the street, whether magazines encourage law-breaking, the hidden costs of BMW's bargain K1200LT, back-torque talk, the world's best sub-95bhp motorcycle, why radiators are where they are, yet more Honda build quality complaints, the very best-looking bikes of all time ever, plus loads more!

Thanks for listening, and please:

- Visit our current official home at www.bikesocial.co.uk

- Catch us on Twitter at @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

- Send any thinkings, feedback, complaints, abuse and self-serving compliments you like to [email protected]

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E54, brought to you as is our wont, by our friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk.  Subjects for discussion in E54 include: 

• MotoGP from The Hot Springs Of the River Hondo circuit in Argentina – who won, who fell off, who thought they should've won, how many miles per gallon Cal Crutchlow gets from his RCV, and a whole bunch of nerdy stats including some so nerdy we can't actually work out what they mean

• World Snoozerbike from Aragon where

• British Superbike from Donington Park

• plus some bikes we've ridden including a thorough review of KTM's revamped 390 Duke, and a less coherent mention of Honda's new Rebel, CB1100s and CBR and CB650F

• plus your emails, which is easily the best bit, including why no-one makes 750 sportsbikes, why Rea could become the most winningest rider ever in WSB this year, and why swapping a Daytona 955i for a Versys 650 is a good idea. Thanks for listening, please visit www.bikesocial.co.uk to download FEC (or buy insurance from Bennetts), get hold of Martin and I on Twitter at:

@SimonHbikes and @Mufga And please keep firing in those emails about anything you want to correct us on, or want us to find out for you, or... whatever you want. Email: [email protected]

Thanks!

Welcome to Front End Chatter 53b – made possible by www.bikesocial.co.uk; go check them out! – and it’s a special FEC dedicated to answering, or failing to answer, your emails. Topics up for Front End Chattery include:

• what’s happened to the UK sportsbike market?

• do ex-police bikes make good winter hacks?

• why a BMW K1200LT is the best-value used bike out there

• the best set of one-piece leathers for under £600...

• ... and what should be worn under them?

• more headphone chat (that’s quite enough of that – Ed)

• what’s better: being faster or being safer?

• why MotoGP frames are hand-made and production bike frames aren’t

• is a Honda Varadero more comfy than a Pan European, and are they more comfy than a VFR800? And where does a CBF1000 fit in all this? (and what about a BMW K1200LT?) 

•  why there’s a TAT, might one day be a TET, but probably not a TIT or a TWAT

• more Honda heated grips gripes – and turns out it’s not just the Africa Twin that suffers

• more top five favourite bikes, and a few least favourite bikes... including Honda’s 929 Blade and Kawasaki’s 2007 Z750

• how to decode new bike launches, why they’re honest, and why context matters

Thank you very much for continuing to listen to our ramblings and thank you even more for contributing with your emails, thoughts and questions – all are welcome; if anything pops into your head, or if we can help, or you disagree with us, please write and tell us at:

Email:                    [email protected]

Twitter:                  @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Visit our shop:         www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter

FB:                         www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

And don’t forget, click on www.bikesocial.co.uk – then go buy insurance from Bennetts!* *other insurance brokers are available, but they’re all the same with the lights out and, to be honest, with this one you get to help fund FEC!

Welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 53a, powered yet again by our friends at www.bikesocial.co.uk – and yes, it’s the first of two FECs; 53b will be along shortly. Or at least soon.

In the meantime, feast your ears on the will they, won’t they two-wheeled soap opera of Qatar MotoGP – including:

• how recording BT Sport in hi-def when you haven’t upgraded your package can result in missing the race
• the argument for and against remounting a crashed bike
• how Tech3 Yams (pronounced ‘Trois’, but don’t tell Simon) do well at Qatar until a certain Moto2 champion gets carried away
• disrespeculation about why Crutchlow crashed
• some nerdy stats about top speed
• what exactly Lorenzo is packing in his lunchbox
• plus chatter about World Superbike, World Supersports 600 and 300 at Aragon, and BSB at Donington – including a guest appearance by Martin Fitz-Guintoli...

We also say farewell to Sir John Surtees, have a quick tour around Suzuki’s new and rather wonderful V-Strom 650, the less new and less wonderful V-Strom, and chatter about the launch of the least powerful, least torquey, most heavieriest and most expensive Yamaha R6 ever which neither Martin or Simon attended, but about which they have an opinion anyway. Typical.

Thanks for listening, your emails will be answered in FEC53b, and please please please get in touch via:

email – [email protected]

Twitter – @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Facebook – Front End Chatter

And, of course, please listen to FEC from our new home at www.bikesocial.co.uk

Chatter again soon!

Welcome to Front End Chatter, episode 52 – and it’s a very special episode of Britain’s least regular but much-loved motorcycling podcast because this is the first to be brought to you by the lovely people at Bike Social (www.bikesocial.co.uk)!

 Front End Chatter is a podcast spoken at length by us, a right pair of motorcycle writers called Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves, and we chatter about every and any subject with two wheels and an engine: racing, news, new bikes, old bikes, and the issues that effect you, me and him (like what bike should you get next, how to ride, what kit to wear, and generally why things are the way they are). We don’t know all the answers (in fact we hardly know any of them) but we now people who do.

Bike Social – and if you’re not reading this on their website, WHY NOT? – is Britain’s most comprehensive biking website, packed with road test, new bikes, old bikes, features and news. It’s like a bike magazine, but on the web, created by Bennetts, the bike insurance people. Did I mention you can find it here: www.bikesocial.co.uk So if you’re a long-time FEC listener, it’s good news because it means we’ll be coming in your ears twice a month.

 And if you’re a Bike Socialist, it means FEC will be brightening-up your browsing experience. We may even have a few other bits and bobs about the place after a while. So, from now on, please get your Front End Chatter fix from www.bikesocial.co.uk – and it’s on with the chatter...

 This episode may contain nuts: • MotoGP 2017 is nearly upon us, so we have look at the final test from Qatar and rate the chances of the major runners and riders courtesy of William Hill (other bookmakers are available)

• World Superbike, on the other hand, is underway and the burning question is: can the WSB racing from Thailand live up to the craziness of the opening Supersport 600 race from Phillip Island a few weeks ago? • KTM 1290 Super Adventure v BMW R1200 GS Rallye Sport: we’ve been lucky enough ride both bikes recently – one in Portugal and one in Peru – so we compare our experiences and discover how one is genuinely capable off-road bike for novices while the other is one of the best road bikes in the world, in a frock. Plus, is semi-active suspension really ‘better’ than comparable standard suspension?

• more news on the Honda Africa Twin heated grip saga

• The best waterproof textile jacket and trouser combo for £400, with buying advice help from www.sportsbikeshop.co.uk

• why covering your bike in aftermarket tat isn’t the smartest idea

• why photochromic visors don’t go black faced with car headlights (it’s obvious)

• your five dream bikes

• why MotoGP bikes don’t have vacuum die-cast frames. Or do they?

Please send you questions and comment to: [email protected]

You can follow us on Twitter:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

Thank you for listening, thank you for your support, please listen to us and download from Bike Social at:

www.bikesocial.co.uk

Say hello to Front End Chatter Episode 51, a numerically insignificant episode that nonetheless contains much chatterage about:

• the opening round of World Super Brits from Phillip Island – although if you haven’t seen the racing you’ll be none the wiser afterwards because we watched it and still manage to get the race result wrong not once, but twice...

• MotoGP testing from the very same Phillip Island at which, it seems, “They’re all going really fast...”

Plus!

• how Ducati’s new SuperSport is less sports tourer, more sportsbike

• why Kawasaki’s new Z900 is a 123bhp entry-level naked bike

• and why the new Ninja 650 is, er, an entry-level bike with a full fairing

And there’s more:

We read out your lovely emails on subjects as wide and wonderful as:

• the great hi-viz debate – to yellow or not to yellow

• bike security in London

• the wisdom of modifying modern sportsbikes

• a comparison of the average increase in rider skill v the increase in motorcycle performance

• the great Honda Africa Twin underperforming heated grip and corroding spokes problems – BOTH SOLVED! Ish.

• why some new bikes are released with obvious problems you’d think the factory would sort during testing

• what’s the better choice – a six-grand Triumph Daytona 675 or Suzuki GSX-R750?

• why we should argue more often (‘no we shouldn’t’, etc)

• why photochromic visors are a good idea

• how FEC is ‘helping’ native Spanish-speakers with their English comprehension

• Honda’s DCT v quickshifters

• what bikes do we prefer – riding older, nostalgic machines or sampling the new stuff, with modern technology?

• how oe fitment tyres are completely different to aftermarket tyres with the same name from the same manufacturer

As ever, we remain humbly grateful for your continued ears. Thanking youse! You can get us on:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

 And please email [email protected] with whatever thoughts stray across your mind

www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

Buy merch at www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter

Welcome to Front End Chatter Episode 50 – yes, you’re not imagining it, it’s really real, and only a week after Episode 49.

Anyway, with next to no racing to chatter about, we’ve finally got round to answering all your emails (at least, the ones that had a question) – some from as far back as last September; sorry about that. So, in some particular order, we natter about:

• Sportsbike luggage systems
• What will happen to production racing when there are no more production sportsbikes
• Why sports 600s are dying out
• The best headphones for on bike entertainment
• The perils of Hi-Viz
• An extremely long-winded and rambling piece about girls in bike sport
• Does size matter? (this is a different point)
• Why you only see Ducatis in the Ducati factory car park
• Who’s better – Rossi or Marquez?
• Why Honda’s Deauville is desirable
• The future of electric bikes
• A whole heap of buying advice for several FECers which always seems to end up in the recommendation of a Ducati Multistrada or a BMW R1200GS
• ...and much, much – some would say too much – more

Thanks for enduring this one – it’s a monster – and look forward to some exciting news regarding Front End Chatter in the near future. Email:            [email protected]

Tweet:           @SimonHbikes

                     @Mufga

Webshop:       www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter

Facebook:       www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter/

Welcome to FEC49, finally – at least in the sense it’s been a long time coming, not in the conclusive sense. And, despite no actual racing to talk about, we find enough to fill half a podcast: • Why MotoGP team launches are fake news – and, worse, they even have fake soundtracks

• Why testing is a pointless guide to the outcome of the season, but it’s worth taking notice of because it’s some motorbikes going round a track

• Crazy new World Superbike rules

• How BSB should fill a Supersport-sized gap with naked bikes and Moto2

• Who will be the busiest Aussie racer in 2017

• Why this year’s TT will be the best ever

• What that crazy Guy Martin has been saying about his TT comeback and why modern bikes are rubbish

PLUS! We have a few mini-reviews of some 2017 bikes, including:

• Kawasaki’s Z1000SX and why it’s better than before but has odd steering
• Ducati’s 950 Multistrada and why comparisons are odious
• Ducati’s sportier-for-2017 Monster 1200 S
• Suzuki’s perfectly nice but slightly ordinary GSX-S750
• Ducati’s properly off-road Desert Sled Scrambler

Thank you for bearing with us always, please keep emails coming, and we’ll read them out in FEC50...

...WHICH WE’RE RECORDING NEXT WEEK, WE PROMISE!

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

[email protected]

www.frontendchatter.com

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter E48, which you'll be pleased to hear has no racing at all apart from a brief discussion about the merits of being called Danny Kent but not actually coming from Kent, unlike Danny Webb who does come from Kent.  Anyway, this one's all about 2017's new bikes you *can* buy, and 2016's bikes you can't any longer.

Thanks for listening, hope you like it, and see you at Motorcycle Live at the NEC.  Email: [email protected] Twitter: @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Hello and welcome back to Front End Chatter E47 - it's been a while, so we've come back with an episode purely about racing – who's won what, why, how, and what will happen next year – and we introduce a new word to the English language: disrespeculation. 

Thanks for bearing with us – more episodes will follow soon, about 2017 new bikes, and reading your emails and answering your questions. 

Email: [email protected] Twitter: @SimonHbikes and @Mufga FB: www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter/

Welcome to Part Two of FEC's Summer Special, featuring your emails and assorted chatter about:  • the pros and cons of riding at night

• the ethics of washing bikes and bikinis

• the truth about new tyres

• how best to listen to music while riding

• is the future electric?

• have electronics spoiled racing?

• is Ducati's new Supersport a Monster in drag with the wrong engine?

• what's the best adventure bike for a tall Hamburger?

• why buying a Crossrunner is a good, good, good thing

• why sportsbikes might not be the best idea for people with little self-control

• what's the best bike to strap to the back of a motorhome? And as if that isn't enough, you can hire Simon to come and play bass at your party/wedding/festival etc. Once again, we thank you for listening!

Hello, and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's original... most original... oh, whatever. It's a podcast mostly about bikes, with added swearing. This is the Front End Chatter Summer Special Part One, which is only special by virtue of being a) shorter than usual and b) accompanied almost instantly(ish) by Part Two. So this half is the usual racing chatter, including gossip from the Austrian Red Bull Ring Pull MotoGP round, followed by mini-reviews of a couple of bikes we've ridden recently, and Part Two will be along in a while with a sackful of readers'... no, listeners'... emails. Of which there are many, and for which we thank you. We read all of them, even if we don't read them all out. It would take a long time and there aren't enough seconds in, well, a second, basically. Thanks for your patience in waiting for the least consistent podcast in all creation, and please get in touch via [email protected] or @SimonHbikes or @Mufga

Welcome to Front End Chatter E45 featuring not much racing, shock, partly because there hasn’t been much since E44 but mostly because we didn’t actually watch what there was. Which, as it turns out, was a wet Assen MotoGP (always a pleasure, never a chore). So we talk about a race we didn’t see, plus wings they aren’t going to use for a safety concern (or issue) they may or may not have. It’s just like actually being there, only with your eyes closed and with fingers in your ears.

We also find time to chunter about:

• BMW’s 2017 F700 and F800GS with thrilling new Euro 4 compliance
• Ducati’s 939 SuperSport sporty sportsbike that fills the gaping hole in their range for a non-entry level, non-track day road sporty sportsbike
• Yamaha’s MT-07-based 700 Tracer that has the same performance as a 1992 TDM850 but at a fraction of the price
• Triumph’s rumoured 765cc Street Triple roady sportsbike-ish
• The recently opened David Silver Honda Collection based near Ipswich, for fans of vintage Hondas
• The very excellent Champions Flat Track School, run by our mate Boastie, which introduces noobs to the noble art of going slideways Plus! Some of your emails, including more on BMW ESA suspension replacement/service info, the absence of Irish bike MOTs, why the bloke at the back of a group ride always ends up speeding, and more! Thanks for listening, keep writing in, spread the word among your friends, and visit us on Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga) or Facebook.

And you can purchase Front End Chatter merch here: www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter

Welcome to Front End Chatter #44, in which Mufga and SiH talk about a couple of MotoGP races that happened ages ago – and including the tragic loss of Moto2’s Luis Salom at Catalunya, the slightly unedifying fallout, the race itself with torpedoes and last lap thrills, and a very necessary handshake to cap it all off. 

We also natter about TT racing – and in our excitement over the difference between letting a MotoGP bike race in the Superbike class but chucking out a rider for coated cam buckets in another, completely neglect to offer condolences to the family and friends of lost riders Dwight Beare, Ian Bell, Paul Shoesmith, Andrew Soar and Dean Martin. Which we do here.

Mufga and Si also discover the joys of Bluetooth headsets, muck about in Wales on BMW’s GS Challenge, ride KTM’s 1290 GT (for the next issue of Bike magazine) and chunter about BMW’s R1200 GSA v KTM’s Super Adventure v Triumph’s new Explorer v Ducati’s new Multistrada Enduro (check it out in a forthcoming issue of Ride magazine). No spoilers. Ok, maybe just a couple. After all that, we run out of time to read out your emails so they’ll be in the next episode of FEC, out sometime next week. Blimey. Love and rockets, email us on [email protected], Tweet us on @SimonHbikes or @Mufga, check out Facebook, and buy T-shirts and stuff from somewhere. Follow the link on www.frontendchatter.com

Welcome to Front End Chatter E43, brought to you in association with the enjoy-while-it-lasts British summer. In this episode, Simon and Mufga chatter about: 

• results and matter arising from Jerez and Le Mans MotoGP including Brad Binder's hooky software issues in Moto3, Rossi's lauded flag to flag win, Lorenzo's flag-to-flag win that no-one cares about, synchronised crashing, more wings and things, being beaten up by a tangerine, and even more about who goes where, and who's talking about who's going where, in 2017. And why. And are you Team BTSport or Team MCN/MotoMatters?  • Chaz Davies' WSB double for Ducati in Imola and a great weekend's racing at Oulton Park in BSB • a world first podcast review of TomTom's new Rider 410 sat nav, plus a bit of Garmin Navigator Street • loads more emails and questions covering topics as diverse (I nearly said 'perverse') as Circuit Of Wales, fantasy British MotoGP tracks, burying bodies, dropping other bodies on their heads, crashing a Desmosedici into a pig, best MotoGP books, Marquez' strategy for crashing, riding in fear, riding faster in groups, and what could possibly go wrong with 30,000-mile BMW ESA suspension?  Thanks for your time, please subscribe on iTunes, tell your friends and tell them to tell their friends about FEC, write emails to motorcycle manufacturers explaining how important FEC is in your buying decisions, check FEC out on Facebook, follow @SimonHbikes and @Mufga on Twitter, buy stuff from our shop (www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter) and all that other stuff.  We are genuinely flattered, humbled and grateful for your wonderful emails, Tweets and downloads. 

I dunno, you wait ages for an episode of Front End Chatter, and then two come along at once. Welcome to FEC#42, which is (almost) solely devoted to reading your emails and answering your questions on subjects as wide-ranging as:• riding the B500 in The Black Forest Gateaux, a nice road in Croatia, and what's the best off-road bike for a father and son (like we'd know)

• why a 2 x British world champ is doing a bit of half-naked Turkish oil wrestling on TV but isn't coming across as a nob

• choosing between a BMW R1200RT and a Suzuki GSX1250FA• whether a Honda VFR400 handles better than a Ducati 748 - or a modern sportsbike • on-bike tracking systems for £13• how the risk of riding a bike could put you off riding altogether• what bike manufacturers get from racing• why F1 cars blow up more than MotoGP bikes 

Plus, a bit more natter about Circuit Of Wales wrangles and other bits and bobs. Please don't make me listen to it again just to fill this bit out. Thanks for downloading, please leave a review on iTunes and/or subscribe, and join in with Front End Chatter on Facebook, or on Twitter: @SimonHbikes and @MufgaYou can also visit www.frontendchatter.com, follow the links and purchase T-shirts, key-rings, mugs and mouse mats. 

We're back! After a prolonged absence, which we find is the best kind, Front End Chatter returns with post-Argentina MotoGP gossip – and, let's face it, it had the lot: tyres, crashes, more tyres, boo-ing, early silly season, and some highly ill-informed nonsense about reverse-spinning cranks. Plus, Martin (him) and Simon (me) natter about some new bikes we've ridden, and where you can read about them. Ish. Thanks for listening, and thanks for remembering we exist. The next episode will be along shortly. x

Episode 40 of Front End Chatter, the Finger On The Pulse episode, comes not so much hot as slightly tepid with gossip from MotoGP testing (at Sepang, Malaysia, not Phillip Island). Fortunately, the big issues are still the same: will Casey race in 2016? Will the new Michelin tyres and retro-spec ECU mix results up this season? Will Lorenzo win the title by mid-season? When will someone first say ‘silly season’? 

There’s also plenty of FEC-ing tittle-tattle about:

• Guy Martin’s no-show at the TT this year
• Triumph’s new Tiger 1050 Sport
• 6000 houses created at the Circuit Of Wales site. Sorry, we meant ‘6000 jobs’
• why splitting WSB races over two days might be a good idea
• why manufacturers don’t make more of their Dakar race success
• reviving the Transatlantic race series – good idea or not? And are any American racers good enough? Or Brits, come to that
• are anti-theft bike tracking systems a good idea or a bit ‘after the fact’?
• does a near-miss take the shine off biking?
• is it okay to still like being a biker, but go off actually riding bikes?
• choosing between a Suzuki Bandit 1250 (too old school?), Kawasaki Versys 650 (too tame?) or a Yamaha Tracer (too expensive) for hustling mountain roads, touring and commuting. Or just pick a Yamaha FZ1 Fazer. • what are the best tyres for a Yamaha XJ6?
• choosing the fabulous FEC theme tune. 

Please email questions, comments and/or abuse to: [email protected] Twitter us at: @SimonHbikes & @Mufga Facebook: www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCgeS_FcXLqwZgirmG2OCW0w Please visit support FEC and visit our shop for T-shirts and mugs: www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter Subscribe on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/front-end-chatter/id827471484

We're also on Android podcast apps. Thanks for listening! Keep watching for new episodes (and sorry they're so sporadic etc).Simon & Martin

HelloAndWelcomeToEpisode39OfBritain'sFavouriteBikingPodcast! And breathe...

In the first FEC of 2016, Simon and Martin discuss:

- The Dakar Rally, who's winning, who isn't, and who's paying any attention?

- All the new rules for MotoGP, whether we can predict anything before anything has happened, and whether that feller who said he doesn't want to race again will, in fact, race again.

- What's going on with WSB's barely comprehensible new format, and whether it will detract from what otherwise has the potential to be a pretty great year.

- Who in the BSB paddock recently failed a drugs test, who will be making a welcome return to the BSB paddock, and who in the BSB paddock has just made a pretty dramatic career change.

- Plus loads and loads (and loads) of your emails frantically read, mumbled, debated and, in a few cases, answered.

It's a busy one...

Email us: [email protected]Twitter: @SimonHbikes and @MufgaFacebook: www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatterYouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCgeS_FcXLqwZgirmG2OCW0wFEC shop: www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatteriTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/front-end-chatter/id827471484

Front End Chatter E38 looks back at 2015: the best bikes, the best races, the best racers, the biggest losers, and Martin and Simon's personal fave moments – plus the absence of British world champs on BBC Sports Personality Of The Year and FEC's New Year Resolutions.

Have a merry Christmas, you FECers!

Thanks for listening, and please get on touch on email: [email protected] or Twitter: @Mufga@SimonHbikes 

...and try our Youtube channel!https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgeS_FcXLqwZgirmG2OCW0w/videos

Welcome to Front End Chatter E37 in which, now the dust has settled, Martin and Simon discuss the ramifications of that race from the point of view of someone who was in the grandstands at Valencia, and someone who had the benefit of replays on the TV (*SPOILER ALERT* hardcore Rossi fans probably shouldn't listen to this). Oh, and there's something about the NEW BRITISH WORLD CHAMPION... but we sort of forgot to mention it at the start...There's also a load of chat about 2016's most interesting new bikes (plus a couple of less interesting ones) with the usual disagreement (and one notable agreement), plus emails and exhortations to buy magazines and merchandising. Thanks for listening, and please get on touch on[email protected]@Mufga

@SimonHbikes And if we don't speak again before Christmas (which is entirely possible), have a cracker!

Welcome to Front End Chatter, Episode 36 – the Scoop/Meltdown episode – in which Martin and Simon reveal details of Triumph's 2016 range of Bonnevilles, Thruxtons and Street Twin – what they are, why they are, why they've taken so long and why there's no Scrambler. The second half of the podcast is all about who said what to whom at Phillip Island, and who subsequently rode into who at Sepang, and why Keith Huewen had better cut down on his meals for a few days and get used to the taste of Arai. It doesn't seem like much, but at least it feels much longer when you listen to it. Thanks very much for downloading, spread the word, and

Visit our shop

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Subscribe on iTunes

itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/front-end-chatter/id827471484?mt=2

Twitter us at @SimonHbikes and @MufgaCheck out our Facebook pagewww.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

And try FEC visual treats on YouTubewww.youtube.com/channel/UCgeS_FcXLqwZgirmG2OCW0w

Welcome to Front End Chatter E35, which contains details of Kawasaki's forking-great 2016 ZX-10R, BMW's gravity-defying G310 concept bike (and why, if it really does break the laws of physics and hover, it also breaks the law in Britain), the ramifications of the technology-sharing pact between Honda, BMW and Yamaha, and the usual wild MotoGP speculation and gossip. Thanks for listening, and please get in touch:

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga[email protected]And visit https://www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatter to get stuff. 

Front End Chatter E34 – the Less Than Honest Episode – in which:

• Martin and Simon get their riding assessed and ride very sensibly – almost as if their livelihoods depend on it (which they do) 

• VW are caught cheating on US emissions tests, but are bike manufacturers doing the same? 

• details of Ducati's 2016 models are accidentally revealed online, by the same US emissions board who 'outed' VW (who own Audi, who own... Ducati)

• Suter release a Grand Prix replica two-stroke, with an engine based on a late 1990s V4 500 motor but which mysteriously turns out to be 576cc• more MotoGP gossip in which Simon professes a sneaky change of heart and can't remember which rider it was caught on TV swapping his mouthguard for a false tooth• plus chat suggested by a selection of listeners' emails, including why are so many parallel twins about now, why Front End Chatter merchandise costs so much, why some bikers seem to hate that fashion and culture they have now, and the origins of Yamaha's speedblock paint design by someone who was there.Thank you very much for listening, please subscribe on iTunes or Android, and leave a review. You can find us here:@SimonHbikes@Mufgawww.frontendchatter.comhttps://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/front-end-chatter/id827471484?mt=2www.tshirtstudio.com/marketplace/front-end-chatterwww.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

Back to scotch rumours of its (not our) demise, Front End Chatter E33 sees a lucid Martin and hungover Simon cover a wide range of two-wheeled gossip including:

• Jonathan Rea’s record-breaking World Superbike title, and whether Danny Kent winning the Moto3 title might be seen as a bigger deal

• new bike chat about the 2016 Kawasaki ZX-10R, Honda’s Africa Twin, KTM's parallel twin, Yamaha's XSR700 and Ducati’s Monster 1200 R (and whether it is really is their most powerful naked bike ever, or if they’ve forgotten they also build the Diavel)

• the dubious merit of a short ad film featuring a new Triumph and the 'pseudo hipster saviour of motorcycling', Mr David Beckham
• the current state of the MotoGP championship, plus a review of Hitting The Apex, a film that definitely isn't about colonoscopy
• listeners' emails including the fine line between deliberately causing an accident on track, and just making a mistake
• and details of where you can purchase Front End Chatter's range of T-shirts, mugs and key rings. Blimey. Thank you for listening, and spread the FEC word!

Coming to you fresh out of last week and looking all the way into next year, Front End Chatter #32 covers:

- Speculation, rumour, gossip, semi-educated guesses and, in a few cases, actual established facts about the new motorcycles we can expect to see in 2016 (and 2017).

- Whether BMW's new hi-tech flashing brake light gizmo is really such a bright idea.

- MotoGP recap from Sachsenring, the battle for championship points still to fight, and the battle for focus Martin found himself fighting during the race.

- Plenty of talk ahead of British Superbikes' crazy £50,000 scheme at Brands Hatch, including what it all has to do with Hulk Hogan.

- Plus all your Tweets, emails, faxes and telegrams including two-strokes, racing at Daytona in the 1970s, racing at the TT in your 50s, the future of the 300cc sports class, and plenty more.

Be a part of Britain's best motorcycle podcast by emailing your thoughts, opinions, feelings or questions to [email protected]. We're also on Facebook (www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter); Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga) and iTunes (bit.ly/iTunes) - where you can subscribe or download old episodes FOR FREE. And, of course, good old-fashioned www.frontendchatter.com.

No animals were harmed during the making of this podcast. Apart from one dog.

Britain's original motorcycle podcast is back once again with a hundred minutes of talk, discussion, argument, ill-informed rumour, shameful name-dropping and awful impressions covering:

– Everything that happened at the Isle of Man TT races, including asking the question NOBODY IS EVER ALLOWED TO ASK!

– All the last corner antics from the Assen round of MotoGP, including Rossi vs Marquez and Niklas Ajo vs his knees.

– Whether getting the ’80s and ’90s GP band back together in Spain is a race we'd want to see in Britain – and whether it's really a race at all.

– All the excitement surrounding Honda's absolutely staggering RC213VhyphenS. It's Márquez's race bike on the road! Well, apart from the engine. And the frame. And the suspension, brakes, wheels, tyres, petrol tank…

– What it's like to take on 241 other BMW owners at the UK round of the BMW GS Trophy qualifying event. And, indeed, exactly what any of that actually means.

– Plus all your questions and emails answered, or at least read out loud.

Thank you, as always, for downloading us, subscribing to us on iTunes, liking our Facebook page (www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter), following us on Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga), and telling everyone you know who rides a bike about the veritable audio feast that is Front End Chatter.

Front End Chatter, Britain's best motorcycle podcast, celebrates its 30th episode with a Q&A special. This time we've passed the handlebars over to you, dear listener(s), as Simon and Martin spend a full hour finding, inventing, and in some cases, actually knowing, answers to your questions. Topics include:

- Why many riders find life gets in the way of riding, often for years at a time

- Are bikes getting taller? And does size (of a bike's seat height) really matter?

- Is the Ducati Scrambler "completely wanky"? (Not our words...)

- 10 (or so) great roads to ride in Europe (and one in Wales...)

- The invention of the British SuperCeleb championship, where Hollywood (the culture) meets Hollywood (the baker) at Hollywood (the corner)

- Are the DVLA being sneaky buggers, or are some people just not paying enough attention?

- Plus an ex-pat makes us all feel better by bursting a few bubbles about the reality of riding in Australia

Thank you for downloading and, hopefully, listening. All questions, comments, replies and general communication is welcomed to [email protected]

You can find us on Twitter at @SimonHbikes and @Mufga or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

Subscribe to Front End Chatter for free on iTunes (bit.ly/FECiTunes) or find us direct at www.frontendchatter.com

After six weeks of sponsored silence, Britain's least-consistent motorcycle podcast is back. In episode 29, Simon and Martin discuss:

- Why watching MotoGP racing is a bit like watching two walruses fighting, or a Shakepearean play, or something.

- Will Valentino win the title, will Ducati win a race, and will Melandri win a point?

- The North West 200 race that was won by a movie star.

- The new Honda Africa Twin, and whether it would have been much, much better or much, much worse if it was more like a Varadero.

- Why Royal Enfield have bought Harris (not Rolf), and whether there are any warnings to be learned from Hero investing in EBR

- The passing of Geoff Dukeobe (sorry, Duke OBE) and whether TT spectators in the 1950s got better value from slower racing.

Thank you very much for listening. If you like, or at least tolerate this, check out all our other podcasts at www.frontendchatter.com or search for Front End Chatter on iTunes - and subscribe! Email [email protected] with questions, comments and anything else, or find us on Facebook (www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter) and Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga).

Welcome to Front End Chatter episode 28, in which Martin and Simon:

• discuss the drama of the 2015 season-opening MotoGP race from Qatar

• preview (just) the upcoming 2015 season-opening British Superbike race from Donington

• interview BSB Series Director Stuart Higgs in the back of a van and talk about what’s in store this year, why BSB is a success, whether the rules on electronics and the Showdown are a good thing or a bad thing, and what he regrets most after seven years in charge

• ruminate on Dani Pedrosa’s poorly wrist and Casey Stoner’s unlikely MotoGP comeback

• and read out listener’s emails on subjects such as Marco Melandri’s performance, why the law is an ass, the current status of Front End Chatter’s T-shirts and what we think of the current BT Sport MotoGP line-up.

Hope you enjoy it; please send in your questions (verbal or written), subscribe via iTunes or Android, like our Facebook page (www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter) and talk to us on Twitter

@SimonHbikes

@Mufga

Front End Chatter, Britain's best motorcycle podcast, considers joining The 27 Club and contains:

- A 30-minute preview of the 2015 MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3 seasons with respected journalist and racer Mat Oxley (@matoxley), including: whether Ducati really has turned a corner in turning corners; whether Jorge Lorenzo will fit into his leathers; why Moto2 isn't as exciting as it was; and why the young Spanish rider who could dominate Moto3 is slightly less Spanish than MFG thinks.

- All the two-wheeled excuses that have got in the way of us making podcasts recently, including: BMW F800GS, Ducati Multistrada 1200, Suzuki GSX-R750, Honda NSR250RSP MC28, Triumph T595, Ducati Monster 1200S, BMW R1200R, Triumph Street Triple Rx and the Ducati Scrambler.

- Your questions and, in few cases, some answers to them, including: whether you're a twat if you film yourself crashing while attempting a wheelie, and whether that makes you enough of a twat to deserve a suspended prison sentence; what new riding kit to buy if you leave your old riding kit on a train and blame it on a podcast; and what one single motorcycle you'd pick to ride for the rest of your life.

- A surging (and unexpected) response to a casual request for Young People to get in touch, and the revelation that they may in fact be a lot like People.

Thank you, once again, for listening. You can email Front End Chatter about anything motorcycle-related on [email protected], get in touch with Simon and Martin on Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga), and now visit FEC's shiny new Facebook page at www.facebook.com/FrontEndChatter

You can download (or stream) every episode of FEC for free at www.frontendchatter.com and/or subscribe to us (also for free) on iTunes or, indeed, any Android podcatchy software. Now #goFECyourself

Episode #26 of Front End Chatter includes:

- Britain's best motorcycle podcast celebrates its one-year anniversary by being ignored at the London Motorcycle Show. And Martin finally fulfils a four-year promise.

- World Superbikes recap from Phillip Island, including the record-breaking (not in a good way) return of Troy Bayliss, why the podiums resembled the setup to a rubbish old pub joke, and the frank confessions and bruised buttocks revealed by social media.

- More intrigue from MotoGP pre-season testing, where Ducati appear to have successfully turned a corner (for once), Melandri appears to need a montage, and scooters appear to be influencing race bike design.

- Simon discovers how much MotoGP riders earn, where in the world they take it home to, and what the sponsors who fund the whole shebang do aside from taking up space on the side of 200mph race bikes.

- Getting righteously indignant at the politics behind the Donington/Silverstone/CircuitOfWales fiasco, then even more righteously indignanter still at proper politics when it turns out the political party that seemed to be the nice guys really don't like motorcycles at all, and really don't want you riding them either.

Plus plenty more. Well, a bit more. Regardless, thank you so very much for listening. If you enjoy it, you can check out our first year of FECing on www.frontendchatter.com; subscribe for free on iTunes; send us an email to [email protected]; and Twit us on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga.

PS - If you spot the not-as-deliberate-as-we-wish-it-was mistake, email us on [email protected]

Episode 25 of Front End Chatter, Britain's best and most superlative biking podcast, returns from a lengthy absinthe to discuss the first stirrings of a MotoGP season from testing at Sepang, Malaysia, and whether anything can be inferred from said performances other than some bikes and riders will definitely be on the grid at the start of the season, and some will be faster than others (the chances of a dead heat involving the entire field in every race are slim). Episode 25 also features the FEC Pointless MotoGP PR podium, a celebration of banal soundbites and talking nonsense, in which Alvaro Bautista is showing great pre-season form...

Front End Chatter also nearly breaks a Yamaha press embargo on the new VMAX Cartoon... sorry, Carbon... and notices Suzuki's best-value bike, the GSX1250 FA, now comes with full luggage in its £7999 price, which is great until remembering the standard bike (without the luggage) was on sale for £6865 six months ago. FEC#25 also worries about biking getting older (it's a proper Saga) and wonders where the new blood is coming from (if there is any), why kids don't ride mopeds, whether Triumph should put a Tiger 800 motor in Street Triple chassis and slap a half fairing on it, the pros and cons of riding in winter, and marvel at the eccentric life of Maurice Seddon, the man who cooked his supper in his panniers and 'invented' heated clothing for bikers.  Hope you like it; please subscribe and tell everyone you know to do likewise.  See you after the London bike show :-) @Mufga @SimonHbikes 

Episode 24 of Front End Chatter does not, sadly, contain Kiefer Sutherland defending the world from a series of increasingly improbable terrorists. Instead, Simon and Martin discuss:

- The two-week, 5000-mile Dakar Rally compressed into 10 minutes

- A pre-pre-season preview, as MotoGP prepares to start testing, World Superbikes prepares to start racing, and the internet prepares to start using the c-word about Casey Stoner

- Why the 2015 Isle of Man TT has turned into the world's fastest group test (and why a Kawasaki H2R might appear after all...)

- Why things are looking up if you're in the business of selling motorcycles

- The Frankenbikes we would build given an imaginary angle grinder and welder

- The events to get in your 2015 diary, from London to Barcelona to Coventry

And finally, to find out if reports of Superbike magazine's death have been greatly exaggerated, we speak to editor John Hogan (@JohnatSuperBike) about the title's past, present and future.

Thank you very much for listening to Britain's best biking podcast. If you enjoy it, subscribe for free on iTunes, and check out all of our previous episodes (which would take more than a day of non-stop listening to get through). You can also play or download every episode free from www.frontendchatter.com

Talk to us either on Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga) or send us an email about anything you like to [email protected]

The first Front End Chatter of 2015 covers such diverse subjects as:

- Simon enters a race through a village on his FireBlade, only to find out that's it's not really a race.

- The first (and last) Front End Chatter 2014 Manufacturer Countdown, pop-pickers.

- Listeners' problems solved (or at least answered), from trials clubs to tourism advice.

- Does racing sell road bikes?

- Do tall-rounders make sportsbikes look silly?

Plus, Front End Chatter's off-road correspondent JP (@Jonpe23) returns to discuss the ins, outs and upside-downs of the Dakar Rally, including:

- Who nearly didn't even make the start line this year.

- What the words "mousse", "liason" and "fesh-fesh" mean.

- Why you don't necessarily want to finish first (but to finish first, first you have to finish...)

- Was the Dakar better when it actually went to Dakar?

Thanks very much for listening. As ever, please subscribe (for free) on iTunes or elsewhere, check out our previous 20-odd episodes (for free), and spread the word by telling friends (and strangers) about Britain's best biking podcast.

You can also shape future episodes by emailing comments, suggestions, questions and observations to [email protected] or by getting us on Twitter on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga.

This year's final episode of Britain's best biking podcast comes to you from the jungle... no, Andorra... no, Benidorm. And Sicily.

In this hour-and-a-bit, Ant and Dec - sorry, Simon and Martin - cover:

- Is Britain officially in love with Foggy once again (the stats suggest so), or did he just surf a wave of cult nostalgia (the stats suggest so...)? 

- Marquez moves out of his parents' house, cries, then proves he's the greatest rider on the planet even in the off-season. Plus, a review of his new biography.

- Reports from the launches of the new BMW R1200R (a simple bike that's incredibly high-tech), Kawasaki Versys 650 (the small bike trying to be a big bike) and Versys 1000 (the adventure bike that wasn't really an adventure bike and definitely isn't an adventure bike any more).

- Front End Chatter discovers what it's like to ride a Kawasaki H2.

- Plus your emails answered, some light bickering, and much more.

If you enjoy this (for free), you can subscribe to Front End Chatter (for free), check out our past episodes (for free), tell a friend (for free) or shout about us online (for free).

Send us an email about anything ([email protected]) and find us on Twitter (@Mufga and @SimonHbikes).

Thank you very much, and we'll be back in 2015.

Happy Christmas.

Welcome to Front End Chatter episode 21 v2.0 (apparently the dog ate episode 21 v1.0). This week Martin and Simon visit Motorcycle Live and wave a microphone at Kawasaki’s H2R, use the word ‘artisan’ twice, dissect Carl Fogarty MBE’s stellar performance on a reality TV show and whether drinking a puréed kangaroo testicle really is tougher than winning four World Superbike titles, discuss air-bag protection, lament the passing of the thrust curve, and Simon reveals how talking out loud while you’re riding, recording it and putting on YouTube is problematic. But only to him.

Thank you very much for listening, please spread the word, subscribe, and come and read other Chattersome nonsense at:

@Mufga

@SimonHbikes 

*if you’re only interested in the Carl Fogarty bit – and who can blame you? – it starts around 42m 30s.

Front End Chatter, Britain's best (and original) biking podcast celebrates its vigintennial anniversary by remembering about the good old days. Actually, it doesn't. Instead, it gets totally lost in the seemingly bottomless pool of brand new bikes and their impenetrable acronyms. Opinion and analysis abounds, including attempting (or not) to answer:

- Might Kawasaki's new H2 be a tiny weeny bit of a porker?- Will Honda's road-going RC213V really happen?- Is Yamaha's new R1 deceptively good looking?- Just what does A&S, AOS-II and CFRTP mean, and is it all a LOB?- Was any baking paper used in designing the MT-09 T-Racer (sorry, Tracer)?- What does Ducati's Scrambler have to do with a polar bear having a shave?If you enjoy any of this nonsense please subscribe and/or tell your friends about Front End Chatter. You can download it through iTunes, from any Androidy thing or direct from www.frontendchatter.com.

Feedback or topic suggestions actively welcomed by email ([email protected]) and Twitter (@SimonHbikes and @Mufga).

Thanks very much.

Front End Chatter, Britain's best (and original) biking podcast, returns for an hour of fun and games (literally) including:

- What Ducati's latest high-tech acronym actually does- What Yamaha's latest high-tech acronyms might do- Whether the 2015 BMW S1000RR is any good to ride (Simon's back from the launch, not that he mentions it much)- The frantic debut of Hipster Bingo- The remarkable true story of how a man who once set his own beard on fire drinking cocktails is at the centre of fresh chaos surrounding one of the most famous bikes in film history

Plus all the usual talk about racing, your emails and plenty more too.

Download Front End Chatter via www.frontendchatter.com, search for us on iTunes, or find us through any other Androidy apps. We're even still on SoundCloud. If you enjoy FEC please subscribe, tell your friends, check out old episodes, and email feedback to [email protected]

Oh, and Twit us on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Thanks!

Britain's best and... hang on, have to stop you there. Anyway, this week's/month's/insert-random-time-interval's episode of Front End Chatter is all about new bikes – Kawasaki's supercharged H2R, BMW's S1000RR and R1200RS, Suzuki's GSX-S1000F and Ducati's Hipster, sorry, Scrambler – and a newly-crowned MotoGP Wold Champ, which is like a World Champ only from Lincolnshire, not Spain. There's some other stuff too. We hope you enjoy it, and please spread the word, subscribe via iTunes or an Android thing, leave a review, or Tweet us at @SimonHbikes and @Mufga (or get Simon on FB, but not Martin). 

Front End Chatter, the UK's finest biking podcast, goes all supercharged this week, in honour of Kawasaki's much rumoured, substantially teased and probably very exciting new sportsbike, the H2 (although it turns out your level of excitement depends on your promiscuity, gullibility and general willingness to indulge in fantasy). We also talk about the other noteworthy 2015 bikes likely to debut at the forthcoming Intermot bike show in Cologne, why sportsbikes may or may not be making a comeback, a bit of MotoGP chat, why Donington is nicer than Silverstone (apart from the toilets), and take a serious moment to discuss the ethics of watching bike crash videos on Youtube.

From physics to metaphysics, only in Britain's favourite biking podcast.

Please download, subscribe, share as widely as possible, leave us some feedback, email us at [email protected], or Tweet us on @Mufga or @SimonHbikes. Thanks!

Welcome to Front End Chatter episode 16, brought to you live, in the sense we're breathing, from Silverstone MotoGP – or is it? There's a lot of chatter about the race itself, and plenty of ill-informed gossip surrounding the event, and... well, let's just call it a wide-ranging conversation that takes in men in public toilets, why sportsbikes appear to be in decline, which one you should buy anyway, crashing on a protest ride, Aussie police, no new bike news, stolen racing trophies, how manufacturers treat customers better these days, and lending idiot wannabe journalists demo bikes. It all sounds better than it really is. But thanks for listening anyway! x

Front End Chatter hits the big one-five chattering about Marc Marquez crashing (or not), new bike news including Suzuki's big naked, Yamaha's semi-naked and BMW's wish-it-was-completely-obscured, why Welsh taxpayers may end up paying Silverstone (not in Wales) to host a Grand Prix in 2015, and lots more ill-informed chit-chat about this and that on two wheels (guaranteed to drive anyone who knows anything about bikes to distraction). We hope you like it, but have sympathy with those who don't.

If you like quantity over quality, then the longest-ever episode of Front End Chatter, Britain's best (and only) biking podcast is for you.

Simon and Martin return with nearly 90 minutes of words, covering:

- Cal Crutchlow's last-minute change of heart. And employer- Live (though not live by the time you listen to it) commentary from the Thruxton round of British Superbikes- A new cruiser we both like the look of, and one we definitely don't- Why a great value bargain new offer might not be so great or bargainous after all- Why the radical anarchists of motorcycling might not be so radically anarchic after all- Whether two clutches are better than one- The super-advanced production bike nobody (except Simon) is paying attention to- The retro custom bikes everybody (except Martin) is paying attention toAnd all while trying (and failing) not to be distracted by the telly.If you've been affected by any of the issues raised in this program, Twit us at @SimonHbikes and @Mufga or email us on [email protected] End Chatter is available on iTunes, Soundcloud and all manner of Android podcast catching widgets. Thanks for listening.

After two months of radio (or, indeed, not-radio) silence, Britain's best (and only) biking podcast is back with episode 13. But what happened to episode 12, you ask? You'll have to listen to find out...

Front End Chatter #13 also covers:

- Who's going (or staying) where in MotoGP, and should they?- The hectic year of the world's foremost freelance racer (who may or may not be French)- Why top-name racers don't appear at the Suzuka 8-hour (because they do?)- Unsubstantiated speculation about a new Yamaha R1, including who will care most (a racer) and who won't (anybody buying a new bike in Britain, going by the sales figures) even if it turns out to be real after all- A radical solution for all the deserted supermoto tracks gathering dust (and aren't they supposed to do that?)- Everything we lost from Episode 12, which originally took two hours but can be crammed into five minutes- The debut (and possibly finale) of Front End Chatter's Realityometer gameSorry for the delay and we hope the wait was worthwhile. If it is, or isn't, please email us at [email protected]

Find us on The Twitter on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga

Thanks, and tell a friend. Or just spam your email address book.

Front End Chatter episode 11 is here and contains, for your aural pleasure, Simon and Martin chattering about the following:• The Isle of Man TT – who's winning, who isn't, BMW's first win for 75 years (or is it?), when's a Norton not a Norton, when a TT racer should call it a day (or not) & Twitter incontinence ('he's Twat his pants!')• Marc Marquez' autobiography (Chapter One: Womb With A View, Chapter Two: My Time With The Midwife, Chapter Three: Going Home From The Hospital etc)• Ducati's new Monster 821• Our predictions for new bikes in 2015 • How to behave on garage forecourts• and lots of musings on life, two-wheels, and forgetting to print off people's namesMany thanks for downloading, and hope you enjoy the chatter. Contact us on Twitter:

@Mufga@SimonHbikes

or email: [email protected]

The tenth episode of Britain's best (and only) biking podcast is bursting with astounding revelations, such as:

- Marc Márquez isn't the fastest rider in MotoGP

- Bike racing isn't the same as football

- One city has more bikes than the whole of Europe

- Two genuinely interesting electric bikes are launched in the same week

- Ducati make lots of money by selling very expensive sportsbikes

And some other stuff too.

Twit a twit on @Mufga or @SimonHbikes, or email [email protected]

Subscribe to Front End Chatter on iTunes, download us on Soundcloud, or find us through any old bit of podcasting software you like.

Enjoy, tell a friend, and thank you very much.

After a two-week hiatus (that's a posh word for slacking off), Britain's best (and still only) biking podcast is back to cover all the goings on, in, over and under the two-wheeled world.

There's talk about whether MotoGP's getting dull now Marquez has won every race (it isn't); how long Marquez can win every race for (not long... probably); and whether we should all be watching World Superbikes instead (we aren't, but why not?)

Then there's stuff about a bike with a small-capacity engine (Yamaha's MT-125), a bike with a big-capacity engine (BMW's S1000R) and a bike with a zero-capacity engine (BMW's C evolution).

All that plus Martin busts an MOT myth, and Simon talks about his helmet.

If any of this makes you want to say something, you're welcome to say it to [email protected], @Mufga and @SimonHbikes

Oh, and thank you.

The eighth episode of Britain's best (and only) biking podcast spreads its wings wider than ever, with irreverent (who said irrelevant?) discussion of road bikes' past (Kawasaki's KR-1, which Simon has just ridden), present (Suzuki's GSX1250FA, which Martin has just ridden) and future (electric bikes, and does anybody want to ride them?).

There's also the usual racing rambling, including our attempt to work out a religious building based heirarchy for circuits around the world. And Front End Chatter welcomes its first studio guest, www.dirtbikesportnews.com editor Jonathan Pearson. Fresh from winning at Britain's toughest enduro, he explains how to use other riders as grip...

As ever, emails are welcomed to [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected].

Twit us on @SimonHbikes and @Mufga.

Subscribe to Front End Chatter on iTunes, or find us on Soundcloud.

Welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's best (and only) biking podcast. In this week's shambles of an episode, the gun-slinging Magnificent Seventh, Martin and Simon chatter about last weekend's stunning (or not) MotoGP race from Texas, interviewing TT racers (or not), putting the entire Japanese motorcycle industry to rights (or not), a new, road legal, two-stroke V4 (or not), why Honda's new CB650F isn't very good (or not; neither of us have ridden it).Hope you like it; please leave a review.

Thanks!

Contact us at: [email protected]

In the sixth episode of Front End Chatter, Britain's best (and still only) biking podcast, Simon and Martin look back at the fact-filled career of Colin Edwards, preview this weekend's racing action in both Texas and Aragon, explore Simon's mid-biking-life crisis at the Yamaha Off-Road Experience, and discuss the stark differences between BMW's new R1200RT (which Simon has ridden, but didn't realise) and Honda's not-so-new VFR800 (which neither of us have ridden). Plus, our tribute to Massimo Tamburini and why his legacy deserves to be far greater than two gorgeous bikes, even if they weren't quite so lovely to ride...

As ever emails are welcomed to [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected]

Twit us on @SimonHbikes or @Mufga

Thanks again, and moo.

In the fifth episode of Front End Chatter - still Britain's best (and only) biking podcast - Simon and Martin discuss the opening MotoGP race from Qatar, new bike news, riding a pair of new V-twins in the shape of Ducati's Diavel and Erik Buell's new EBR 1190RX sportsbike, plus some other stuff including a review of James Toseland's new album. 

We hope you like it, despite a passing jet about halfway through.

If you're a Twitterist, we're on @Mufga and @SimonHbikes. Emails to [email protected], [email protected], or absolutely anything you can think up @frontendchatter.com

After the naive first episode, a difficult number two, the critically panned and self-indulgent third episode, Front End Chatter, the UK's best (and only) biking podcast, returns after a week away with a stream-lined, sleek, punchy fourth episode: FEC the 4th.I can't remember what we talk about because I had a late night last night. But there's some stuff. 

Hope you like it! Please email us at [email protected] or get us on Twitter: @Mufga or @SimonH_on_bikes

In the critically panned third episode of Front End Chatter (the UK’s best, and only, biking podcast), motorcycle journalists Simon and Martin road test Yamaha’s new MT-07 and talk about Ducati’s new Diavel. Plus, there’s gossip about ludicrous last-minute MotoGP rule changes, the re-opening of Mallory Park and bike manufacturer’s sales figures.

FEC E03 also features a special Guess-The-Engine competition (with the chance to win a Front End Chatter mug. Or two) and a musical interlude during which a cocktail of high-calorie refreshments will be available in the foyer. 

Podcast also available on iTunes and at www.frontendchatter.com

All emails to [email protected]

Twitter: @SimonH_on_bikes or @Mufga 

Thank you!

In the difficult second episode of Britain's best (and only) biking podcast, Martin and Simon discuss the World Superbike racing from Phillip Island and interview Voltcom Crescent Suzuki boss Paul Denning, discuss MotoGP test times and 'a bit of politics' from Sepang, Simon gets hot under the collar about BMW's S1000F (whether it exists or not) and gets a completely noncommittal answer from BMW themselves. Plus Yamaha’s new Super Ténéré, what Martin and Simon really think about BMW’s R1200GS, Martin’s knees and Simon’s empty stomach.

In the very first episode of Britain's best (and only) biking podcast, we discuss the new Yamaha MT-07 (which we haven't actually ridden yet) as well as the Ducati Monster 1200S and MV Agusta Dragster (which we have); analyse BT Sport's new MotoGP presenter line-up while trying to work out what it takes to watch it on TV; look at supercharging, including who's likely to do it, who's already doing it and who did it ten years ago; and Simon explains why he's bought a 1996 Honda FireBlade.