2015 MV Agusta Brutale 800 review, first ride

The naked bike delivers performance in mega dollops, never once coming across as lacking in any way. In short, the Brutale 800 offers an impressive performance, a soulful engine and caps all that with a smooth shifting, six-speed gearbox.

The motorcycle lives up to its hype. Let’s not forget that the MV Agusta has come to India now, but with a rich racing history and lineage. The first thing we noticed is how softly the suspension  was set up. After firming that up a bit, we were good to go. At first, we were a bit sceptical turning into corners and putting the bike's general handling and cornering manners to the test, as it was raining, and heavily too!

Good luck was on our side though, as the afternoon sun was out again. As the roads dried up, we did manage to find the Brutale 800 corners quite well. Grip from the Pirelli Diablo Rosso tyres is terrific, and we had ample room to lock thighs on the tank to pull off some spirited riding. Not only around the corners but in the city too, and the Brutale 800 does well to feel only marginally heavier than say, a Bajaj Pulsar RS 200. The straight handlebars offer a relatively comfortable riding position. The seat isn’t soft, but thoughtful texturing offers good grip ‘seat of the pants’, and  the stepped rear seat offered the much-needed support when the bike's front went nose happy, as we accelerated hard with all the riding aids switched off.

Importantly, the Brutale 800 boasts amongst the very best power-to-weight ratios in its class. This MV Agusta weighs all of 167kg, dry, which is really light for its class.

As a motorcycle, the MV Agusta Brutale 800 feels simply impressive all-around, a serious motorcycle with serious and sharp-edged performance you need some experience to master. To list this out then: good looks - check, awesome power that you can control thanks to top drawer electronic aids - check, handling - check; you get the drift.

Yes, it certainly looks like MV Agusta and Kinetic, who are bringing the Italian bikemaker to India have a winner on their hands. One we are told does not require any modification to suit Indian conditions. While pricing remains to be seen, and can be expected to be premium for these exotic motorcycles, Kinetic does inform us they will bring all MV Agusta bikes, including the Brutale 800 to India imported in as a CBU for now. The 800 is slated to launch in a second phase, after initially commencing India sales with the fearsome F4, and larger-hearted Brutale 1090.