2021 Triumph Trident 660: your in-depth guide to the new British middleweight | MCN News

Remember the Triumph Trident that dominated the TT in the early 70s? How about its return in Triumph's new 90s model range? Well now, it's back again. But this time as an entry-level roadster aimed squarely at the economical naked middleweight sector. Triumph have made no secret of the fact that this bike is made to compete with the Yamaha MT-07, Kawasaki Z650 and Honda CB650R. And with a slick combination of old and new styling, high spec components and a £7,195 price tag, the British brand have certainly come out swinging. But it's in for a tough fight. The Honda and the Yamaha really are the bikes to beat. The MT-07 is incredibly popular with its characterful parallel twin engine and cheap and cheerful mentality. While at the other end of the scale, the CB650R is a more grown-up and more powerful option, but has been accused of being a bit beige. Triumph look to be aiming at splitting the difference, with a torquey and characterful three-cylinder engine combined with a smattering of technology and impressive spec level. But haven't Triumph already got an entry-level roadster in the form of the 660 Street Triple, I hear you ask? Well, yes and no. Although the Street Triple S can be restricted for A2 riders, it still shares the aggressive riding position of its 765cc siblings and costs £1,000 more than the new Trident. And the differences don't end there. Although the new bike's engine may share the same capacity and number of cylinders as the one found in the A2 Street Triple, that's where the similarity ends. The new Triple puts out about 80bhp and 47.2ft-lbs of torque. Triumph also say you'll get 90% of that torque across most of the rev range. Here's Chief Product Officer Steve Sargent. I think one of the things that people naturally think when they hear that it's a 660 is, well they've just taken that 660 engine that they've already got and they've just put it in a new chassis, which, you know, is absolutely not the case. The reason for that is, again, because we wanted to match the twin-cylinder engines low-down and in the mid-range. We really focused on, well, what's the best way of doing that? So, some of the things we've done, so we've reduced the size of the bore in the engine and increased the stroke of the engine. The knock-ons to that is it's got its own unique crankshaft, it's got its own unique pistons. We changed the camshaft profiles to match the power delivery that we were looking for. The input and output gearbox shafts are different, the selector mechanism is different. The whole intake system is completely new. So, from the throttle bodies through to the intake is all different, completely new airbox. All of those things together are needed really to deliver the performance that we're looking for. So, we know the Trident is all new and sits right at the bottom of Triumph's price range, but low cost doesn't mean low spec. You get Showa suspension front and rear, Nissan brakes, a sleek yet simple new digital dash with Bluetooth connectivity and traction control. You also get two riding modes, Road and Rain, that change both the throttle map and the traction control. Or, you can switch off the traction control altogether through the dash. The Trident uses an all-new tubeless steel frame instead of the aluminium one you get on a street triple, but it still has a claimed wet weight of just 189 kilos. And although the seat height is 805 millimetres, it's really easy to get your feet on the ground as the bike is so narrow at the tank. You can tell that newer riders were in Triumph's crosshairs when the bike was designed, but the combination of low down torque and a narrow lightweight chassis should mean a bike that's great fun for more experienced riders too. Not only is the asking price competitive, Triumph say the ongoing cost of ownership is low too, with services coming every 10,000 miles. Steve Sargent again. That really came out of the research that we did speaking to customers of these kind of bikes, and one of the things that was quite key to them is the total cost of ownership. So, we focused on hitting that really kind of attractive price point, but to follow on from that, we want to make sure that this is an affordable bike for people to use every day. It certainly looks impressive, but the question is, will the Trident still have enough of that Triumph specialness when it's been built to such a competitive price? We won't have to wait long to find out. The bike will be available in Triumph dealers from the end of January 2021, and is available in four colours. As soon as we're able to ride one, we'll bring you a full review, so keep your eyes peeled on MotorcycleNews.com.