Front End Chatter

Hello dearest ear-owners and welcome to Front End Chatter, source of the most significant soundwaves in British motorcycling since the feral howl of a raging Norton rotary haunted the quiet coastal village of Kirk Michael, or since the words "Go on then, I'll 'ave it" slipped breathlessly from the lips of a Derbyshire-born property developer attending the auction of a defunct motorcycle factory. In this aural delight of an episode, Simon and Mufga regale themselves with a recap of the spectacularly special Highland Fling tours (so good they did them twice), along with: • Loadsa goss about Triumph's Tiger Sport 800 and BMW's R1300GS Adventure having covered 3000 miles apiece • Why MotoGP might be getting interesting again, and why the TT continues to fascinate every corner of the country for more than a century • The forced-induction fabulousness that was the Bennetts Supercharged Showdown, where 50-plus Kawasaki H2 owners took over an empty runway • Simon gets a taste of Ducati's £16,000 Streetfighter V2S • M

Awrite hens and laddies, and welcome to a very special episode of Front End Chatter presented, ingested and recorded LIVE at the Highland Fling tour(s) in bonnie, sunny (no, really) Scotland! With not a lot to discuss in the world of motorcycling at the moment - other than the uncertain future of one of Europe's biggest bike manufacturers, plus a raft of new flagship models revealed by another of Europe's biggest bike manufacturers - our fabulous FECers have boldly stepped into our creative breach. Episode #212 is a Live FECsack extravaganza, with a wealth of wicked wonderings wittered by Highland Fling tourists spaken in the vague direction of Simon McHargreaves and Martin McFitz-Gibbons, including but not limited to… Does the rise of Chinese bikes mean certain doom for European brands? What effect will US tariffs have on motorcycling? Can KTM repair its reputation - and who would we pick to run it going forwards? What substance, material or concept should power motorcyclings's future? If you could only rid

Hello and welcome (and a special hello and welcome to Adam Danger, who reads this 'sometimes')... to Episode 211 of Front End Chatter, the motorbicycling podcast prefrontally-lobotomised by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, two motorcycle journalists who've been doing since their own, personal Day Ones.  We are, as always and hopefully forever, in debt to and grateful for the patronage of Bennetts, Britain's Best Bike Insurers – FACT – and bikesocial.co.uk, the bestest and brightest biking website and YouTube channel, amen.  And on the pod this time around the sun, we have:  • news of BMW's R1300 R  • how to make BMW's £25k R1300 GSA better for £9.99 (with thanks to Neil at NJW Moto YouTube) • Yamaha's half fuel, half battery hybrid MT-09 • KTM in more trouble • Triumph's smashing super smart updated Trident and Tiger Sport 660s  Plus emails and missives from you, dear FEC listener, including a spectacular rant from Martin – bit of a collector's item. Thank you very much for listening, look forwar

Hello you lovely FECers you, and welcome to Episode 210 of the long-running, will-it-never-end, Front End Chatter podcast for motorcycles and motorcyclists, spoken out loud by Simian Hardgleaves and Marsupial Fatz-Domino.  We are, as ever, indebted and beholden unto Lord Bennetts, Britannia's Best Bike Insurers and may his whaling fleet never run out of blubber, and bikesocial.co.uk, the hostess with the mostess, you know, you know... the one that goes up to 11.  And on this month's episode we have, among many other things:  • a bit of gen on Honda's Hornet 1000 and SP, including how much a piston costs and how many years' warranty you get • who Ixion was, what he has to do with Canon Basil H Davies, and why his 1279 miles in 1905 on a Triumph came to be repeated in 2025... • a game of 'If bikes were family members...' • you know what, it's so long ago I've already forgotten but it's jam-packed with yummy goodness, trust me, I should know.  Get him and he on the socials:  @Mugfa @SimonHBikes (or something

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, and it's episode 209 of the 209 episode-long motorcycling podcast presented, and I use the word in its loosest sense, by Martina Fitz-Gibbons and Simone Hargreaves, a pair of transitioning motorcycle journalists whose personal pronouns are 'it'. Fronty End Prongs is supported and comported by Bennetts, Britain's biggest and best bike insurers, and without whom you would all be pretty bloody sorry, I can tell you, so make the most of their offers and support their support of motorcycling ya ingrates. And also BikeSocial.co.uk, the hub of motorcycling's metaphorical Akront rim, with their Youtube channel and website and lots of bike-related content to tuck into. So on this episode of FEC we chatter about:  • the latest news from the ailing KTM factory • bad news from the Nürburgring • last-minute booking news if you're thinking about coming to ride with us in Scotland in May on the FEC Highland Fling 2 tour • a ride on Ducati's Multistrada V2 S and exactly how Ducati is

FEC208  Hello moi luverly FECers and this, believe it or not, is Front End Chatter episode 208 in a long-running series with him, believe it or not, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, believe it or not, Simon Hargreaves.   Believe it or not, you should get your bike insurance from Bennetts, Britain’s best bike insurers and supporters of Front End Chatter since 1894, with massive range of savings and offers on all sorts of kit and caboodle, plus lots of cool policy add-ons like 90 days EU cover and common mods (like road legal exhausts) covered – as standard! And you also get free BikeSocial membership (which you can also buy for £60 regardless of your insurer), which gives you access to all the above offers and savings, plus VIP experiences, cheap track days; the list goes on. And don’t forget to visit bikesocial.co.uk and their Youtube channel for all your biking media consumption needs.  And – last few rooms remaining on the FEC Highland Fling 2 – yes, ride Scotland’s greatest hits this May with Simon and Martin

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s physics-bendingiest motorcycling podcast, a vision formed when eccentric inventors Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons slipped off a toilet seat and banged their heads on a sink. This is episode #207 which, as always, is powered by the suitcase of stolen plutonium that is Bennetts, the bike insurance specialists, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the first ​place you should point your browser for used-bike buying guides, in-depth product reviews, new-bike technical analysis, the week’s hotted two-wheels deals, plus so much more.   And this week, in the absence of much going on in the biking world (other than Simon squeezing Christmas lunch into the panniers of a Triumph Tiger, and Mufga squeezing Christmas lunch into himself several times over), FEC takes a twenty-year trip back in time, back to January 2005, or more specifically the January 2005 issue of Bike magazine. A time when Britain was obsessed with sportsbikes, when Mufga was obsessed with dataloggers, and w

HOT NEWS! The FEC Highland Fling is here!  Yes folks, come ride with Simon and Martin in Scotland in May 2025 – we've booked an entire hotel in the heart of the Highlands as a base for three days of riding the most stunning loops around the most iconic routes in the UK. It's majestic, it's mind-blowing, it's the best riding – and the best hospitality – you'll get in 2025.  The FEC Highland Fling starts with a grand ride-in on Friday 2nd May through Glen Coe up to the hotel near Garve. After an evening of greetings and meetings, we'll spend the next three days exploring the finest roads and scenery Scotland has to offer – the north coast, west coast, and across to the Cairngorms, talking in all the Highland hits along the way. And, on the final night (Monday 5th May), Martin and Simon will host a special live episode of Front End Chatter.  To register your interest in the FC Highland Fling, please send an email to anything@frontendchatter.com titled "I'm interested in the FEC Highland Fling, please send me

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain’s premium motorcycling podcast, hosted by Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves. This is episode 205, probably, and is supported in its endeavours by Bennetts, the 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. And on this week’s FEC we natter about • Motorcycle Live – was it any good, what was the vibe, any hot takes? • KTM – more financial woes, and they thought chocolate cams were bad... • Why the Govt’s failure to have plans to encourage the use of motorcycles isn’t the bad news it might sound like... • ...but we can’t still use all bus lanes • plans to introduce a blanket 50mph speed limit on Scottish single-lane carriageways • when is depreciation slight enough to make an upgrade worthwhile? • some EV stuff Simon doesn’t understand Plus loads... well, *some* m

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's nerdiest motorcycling podcast with him Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, Simon Hargreaves, supported in our double century of biking chatter by Bennetts, the UK's best bike insurance bods of whom let it not be said by any man nor woman nor anyone in between that they take the money and thank you very much. Bennetts put more back into biking than any other insurance company by an absolute country mile, and that's a fact. For example, there's BikeSocial.co.uk, the website with the news, reviews and booze, and Bennetts' mighty YouTube channel with tons of cool consumer content, and bikeclub.bennetts.co.uk – a forum to ask your questions and find your answers.  Right, welcome to Episode 200 – or not, as it turns out – of the podcast... and to be honest, it's a tough listen. For a start, we're both a bit under the weather, and then we completely geek-out over a three-cylinder Honda concept bike for like, about an hour, of informed speculation (him) and idle ignorance

Hello and welcome to Episode 199 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s Longest-Running Motorcycling Podcast, spoken out loud by motorcycle journalists Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons. They, and indeed it, are is am supported by Bennetts, Britain’s Best Bike Insurer, and BikeSocial.co.uk, the web’s best motorcycling, er, website. And on this episode the boys natter at interminable length about a whole bunch of new bikes, including but not limited to: • Honda’s revamped X-ADV adventure scoot • Honda’s remarkably priced Hornet 1000 and Hornet 1000 SP • Triumph’s hits-the-spot Tiger Sport 800 • KTM’s 1390 Super Adventure S Evo • Ducati’s new V2 engine – and what models it might end up in • plus a bit of a natter about Yamaha’s Y-AMT auto gearbox and KTM’s AMT auto gearbox, and wonder what the point is and lament the fact several flagship models are only available as autos • plus a few missives from the FEC Sack re KTM cams Thanks very much for listening, please email in your questions, queries, thoughts, gags

Hello and welcome, dearest FECers, to Front End Chatter, Britain’s best and boldest and brightest biking podcast, bringing a little ray of motorcycling sunshine into the darker corners of your motorcycling minds, hosted by him, the man with the resting disposition of a flattened hedgehog, Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and him, the man with the resting heart-rate of an amphetamine-addled Zebedee, Simon Hargreaves.  We are as always, healed by Dr Bennetts, Britain’s best bike insurer. He’s got a clean bill of health, fit as a fiddle, always ready with a cheery smile to offer a whole host of discounts and money-off deals on biking kit and caboodle, as well as competitions and discounted track days. And if you’re insured with someone else, become a Bikesocial Member in the meantime to take advantage of all that stuff. And you know how in the old days in a doctor’s waiting room you had piles of magazines to look at? Well with Bennetts, you get bikesocial.co.uk, the world of wotorcycling on the web, plus their YouTubes cha

Hello boys and girls, and welcome to Episode 197 of Front End Chatter, a motorcycling-themed podcast spoken out loud by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, very much the Ying and Yang, the Ego and the Id, the – if you will – Laurel and Hardy of motorcycle journalism.  We are supported as ever by our compadres Bennetts, Britain's best bike insurer (which I think we've basically established as fact, now) and bikesocial.co.uk, the most amazingly comprehensive motorcycling website on the, er, web. And not forgetting, as if we could, bikeclub.bennetts.co.uk – the place to speak your motorcycling brains.  And on this episode of FEC we have:  • exhaustive details of Ducati's new Multistrada • extensive details of Kawasaki's new Versys 1100 • executive details of the recall notice for Kawasaki's Ninja hybrid • exemplary details of Triumph's new Speed Twin 1200 • economic details of KTM's woes  • plus your questions, queries, thoughts and musings from the FECSack – please send your missives and misgivings to: 

Hello friends and welcome to episode 196 of the long-running but desperately sporadic motorcycling podcast otherwise known as Front End Chatter, hosted by its own petards, Martin Fitz-Gibbons and Simon Hargreaves.  As ever, we are mightily humbled to be supported and nourished by Bennetts, the UK's leading motorcycle insurer, and bikesocial.co.uk, where all your biking needs – and, indeed, nerds – are well met.  And on this episode of FEC we chatter about:  • the rise and rise of Chinese adventure bikes – Kove, Voge and CFMoto to name but three – and are they any good and how long do they last? • can riding bikes be TOO easy?  • what's it like riding a Multistrada the entire length of the A1?  • and loads of other stuff, including a healthy rummage through the FEC Sack of your emails and questions.  Thanks for listening, please come back for more and tell yer mates about FEC, and see you on the next one! X

Hello and welcome to the most excellent and hospitable Buccleuch Arms Hotel in Moffat, where we're bringing you a live episode of Front End Chatter in front of a special audience of FECers – yes folks, this is FEC Up The Borders 2024!  Thanks as always to our cyberspace hosts Bennetts, the UK's best bike insurers, and bikesocial.co.uk, the UK's best biking website - and a very big thanks to Dave and his team at the Buccleuch Arms in Moffat for extraordinary hosting.  And on this live, unscripted, unprepared and generally ad hoc episode of FEC, we have a bunch of questions from our live audience including: • Pamela's interface with a Honda Rebel seat, • exactly how long is it since Fazer John actually had a Fazer, • how does Stuart's R1M feel on the B709, • has the curse of the Simon struck yet again on a FEC Tour, • how well does an Africa Twin camouflage in bracken, • and much much – well, some – more... Thanks to Paul and Jo at the amazing MCI Tours for being the grown-ups in the room, and – maybe maybe

Hello Geeks and Nerds, and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's Bestular Biking Podcast with him, me, and me, him. Or is it the other way round? Stick to the script!  Anyway, your erstwhile hosts @SimonHbikes and @Mufga are, as always, indebted and in balls-deep with Bennetts, Britain's Bestular Bike Insurers, as voted for by the residents of Mavis Enderby for the fifth year running – and the quietly awesome bikesocial.co.uk, populated with over 6000 pages of news, views and reviews. On the pod this fortnight we have words on:  • Ducati's new V4 Panigale and the absence of a singularly-sided swingarm • possibly Ducati's final V2 sportsbike, the Panigale V2 Superquadro Final Edition (the clue's in the name) • the ongoing KTM cam drama • the very quickly and efficiently executed Suzuki V-Strom 800DE recall (that's how ya do it lads) • Bennetts BikeSocial new Bike Club (don't call it a forum but it is, no shame in that, I use them all the time) • Kawasaki's hydrogen-powered prototype, and why we shouldn't t

Hello one and all, and welcome to Episode 193 of Front End Chatter, Britain’s best motorcycling podcast and winner of the coveted Wooden Microphone at the 2015 International Podcast Awards. Thanks as ever to Bennetts, Britain’s Best Bike Insurers – hey, “It’s insurance by the people, for the people!” (you can have that for free, Newbs) – and bikesocial.co.uk, the website with all the news, reviews, twos, blues and clues. For youse. With lots of lovely YouTube content to digest too. Right, on this episode of FEC we have: • deets of BMW’s R1300 GSA including its built-in coffee cup stand • riding impressions of Yamaha’s blingy MT-09 SP hooligan compared to Triumph’s Street Triple RS • Kawasaki’s rad new H7 Hybrid with the acceleration of litre sports, the performance of a 650 and the fuel economy of a 250 (it says here) PLUS a deep dive through the FEC sack where we chat about all things great and good, such as: • should you buy a bike with your heart or your head? • are auto transmissions the future and can mo

Hello one and all, and welcome to a freshly squeezed episode of Front End Chatter, Britain's most absent motorcycling podcast featuring him, Simon Hargreaves, and him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons.  We are, as always, indebted to and inebriated by Bennetts, Britain's best bike insurers, and biksocial.co.uk, the place to get all your news and views on motorcycling.  And on this return to some kind of form, we have: • what we've been up to (most of the episode, to be fair) including: the FECspagna tour of France and Spain on Suzuki's GSX-S1000 GX+ and BMW S1000 XR TE, Suzuki live, the ABR Festival, and a chat about the sudden appearance of auto gearboxes (including what, exactly, the definition of 'auto' is).  Thank you for persevering and more episodes will be along shortly.  Send emails, questions, queries and abuse to anything@frontendchatter.com  @SimonHBikes @Mufga

Greetings, podcast pilgrims, and welcome to Front End Chatter - just like having a fun chat down the pub with your mates about bikes, only without the drinks, or the ability for you to say anything back, or your actual real-life mates being involved. Or the fun, come to think of it. Alright, so it's nothing like having a fun chat down the pub with your mates, and much more like earwigging in on a pair of motorcycling mid-life crises unfolding in real time, mixed in with the odd history lesson pinched shamelessly from Wikipedia, half a badly photocopied GCSE maths exam paper, and a few swear words. Still, after 190-odd of these things it's somehow gathered enough momentum that neither of us knows where the handbrake is.   And so in episode #191 of this moss-dodging rolling stone, Simon and Mufga cover:   • KTM's return to building sportsbikes, in the thinly camouflaged guise of the new 990 RC R, heading to a Supersport race series near you • MotoGP's plans to drop two dress sizes by summer, slim down those aer

Hello everyone, two, three here we go and welcome to Front End Chatter episode 190 in series one of Britain's best (or at least longest-running) podcast-flavoured semi-occasional long-form motorcycling nattertainment, no thanks to him, Simon Hargreaves, and even less to him, Martin Fitz-Gibbons. FEC has been FECing for a whole FECing decade now, mostly thanks to two things: not knowing when to quit; and the tireless support and encouragement and assistance of Bennetts, easily Britain's best bike insurers. You need some of that motorcycle insurance they have these days? Actually, that's not really a question. You need some of that motorcycle insurance they have these days! And you should head directly to Bennetts.co.uk to get it, or at least get a quote for it. Not only are they wonderful people who put back in the bike industry (like, cough, this load of free ear-muck), but if you buy your policy direct you'll get a year's free BikeSocial membership, which unlocks all manner of exclusive discounts, competitio