2009 Aprilia 450 MXV - First Test

This bike is banned in AMA professional motocross. That should be enough to send a shiver down your spine or have everyone rushing out to get one. But it hasn't. This bike drew more attention out at the motocross tracks we took it to than any DR test bike in recent memory, including the 2009 Honda CRF450R. And it just plain sounds cooler than any bike at the track. Dirt bike riders, meet Aprilia.

Since the MXV's first appearance a few years past as a supermoto and enduro mount, the company has been on the leading edge of the design curve. Not afraid to toss out convention and add style, it will leave you looking elsewhere for a sizable sidepanel or a grab handle, forget whatever the braces on the front fender and numberplate do. The peashooter end-mufflers are eye-catchers as well.

This is a kickstart-only machine, and it is also equipped with electronic fuel injection. The bike has a self-setting starting servo on the throttle bodies that reset themselves each time the bike is shut off with the kill button. Sometimes it takes a few kicks to "charge the system" but it starts as well as a CRF450R, which we'll call average. There is a way to "precharge" the system with a battery, but we never needed it.

The engine can be set up to run in two configurations-the standard "Big Bang," firing the cylinders in a more closed firing gap (less degrees between ignition), or you can retime the cams and activate another ignition and FI mapping to set the motor in the "Screamer" setting-running like you'd expect a standard twin.

Our first day out was with the Big Bang. It sounds very 250F-like but has a poppy tone to the exhaust note, all the while being pleasant to the ears of trackside spectators and sounding really healthy to the rider. Having an airbox in front of you has that effect. The bike has a very free-revving and lighter-than-expected pull, almost like there is very little or no torque-but there is, and a lot of it. On bigger bikes torque feel has a way of making the rpm build feel slower, and on this MXV there is no sluggish action to the pull. It is linear, smooth and explosive all in one. There is a two-position ignition switch, and you can feel the difference between the settings. The more traction there is and the bigger the pull you want to feel, especially in the mid and top-end, go for hard. If you like a really controlled pull that loves to grab traction, soft is proper.

The Screamer configuration is like the hard setting of the Big Bang and then some; there is good reason Aprilia doesn't sell it like this. In fact, running the hotter of the ignition maps in Screamer is all but pointless because the hit is so violent.