The new Ducati 797 Monster takes its looks from the big Monster 821, and its engine from the Scrambler. Does this laid-back hooligan offer the best of both worlds?
We’re heading out towards the Monster 797s lined up in the pouring rain when Beppe Gualini, Ducati’s launch route leader, warns us: “Beware of the zebras and black snakes – they’re really dangerous!” Beppe’s not talking about the wildlife, but slippery pedestrian crossings and lines of black overbanding on a day of filthy weather in the south of France.
The zebras and snakes might be dangerous, but these Monsters could hardly be more friendly. The smaller versions of Ducati’s naked V-twin family have been popular entry-level models ever since the Monster 600 and 620ie of the Nineties. More recently, the air-cooled Monster 696 and 796 took that role, before being dropped on the arrival of the Scrambler two years ago.
And now the small-capacity air-cooled Monster is back. The new 797 has been created in response to customer demand, after Ducati discovered that many of the younger, less experienced and female riders who traditionally buy their smaller V-twins prefer the Monster’s sporty naked style to the Scrambler’s more classical, laid-back approach.
The 797 is very much a Monster, complete with 821-style headlight and petrol tank. Its front end also bears a very close resemblance to the old 796 model, but in place of that bike’s aluminium rear subframe, single-sided swingarm and twin, high-level silencers, the 797 sticks to tubular steel for the complete frame, and has a new twin-sided aluminium swingarm, and a stubby single silencer at the end of its Euro 4-compliant exhaust system.
This story is from the July 2017 edition of Motorcycle Sport & Leisure.
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This story is from the July 2017 edition of Motorcycle Sport & Leisure.
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