Kawasaki has brought back the Ninja title for a re-engineering of the impressive Z1000SX, but does it have the stealthy fighting characteristics of the bike that first used the name?
The previous iteration of the Z1000SX was a rather impressive machine, and will make for a wonderful purchase on the second-hand market.
However, for 2020, Kawasaki has revitalised the model, not just with an addition to the model’s name with the Ninja moniker, but with a significant number of alterations, especially in the technology that has been added to the big sports tourer for its fourth incarnation.
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History of the Kawasaki Ninja name
Kawasaki first brought in the title of Ninja with the launch of the GPz900R back in 1984, creating a whirlwind of attention with the level of new tech and performance.
The first bike to have a water-cooled 16 valve inline four engine, it also used the powerplant as a stressed member, had the camchain tunnel on the left-hand side to reduce width, featured anti-dive forks and made a healthy 115bhp as standard, and so became the first production motorcycle to exceed 150mph.
Read the FULL feature covering the Kawasaki Ninja 1000SX in the April edition of Motorcycle Sport & Leisure – on sale now.
