Why I Chose a Middleweight Motorcycle / Tuareg 660

Anyway, I am out on my new-to-me 2022 Touareg 660, and I love this bike, and why is that? That's something I'll have to talk about with you. Hey guys, out for a new adventure today down in the Macon, Georgia area. Gonna ride some back roads and go get some burgers. Great to be out riding with my son today. He's gonna be on his BMW 800 GS Adventure, introducing a new bike to me and to the channel, the Touareg 660. We'll talk about it a little bit as the ride progresses, but mainly we're just out for a ride for burgers and have some fun. So yeah, we're out for a father-son adventure. We've ridden together before. Done the Wyoming BDR together. He's ridden all the way from Georgia out to meet me in Colorado and Wyoming before, and yeah those videos are up on the channel if you care to go check them out. Yep, I'm out on my Touareg. You know, I'm not a Touareg aficionado. I'm still learning about it, but I know enough that I looked for one for a couple of years. This is a 2022 model. It's got a story behind it too. Maybe I'll tell you about that story. Okay, looks like just 10 or 12 miles out of the gas station. We're on our first red Georgia dirt. Yeah, I gotta get my Adventure motorcycle legs back under me. I haven't ridden in a while, and the Touareg of course is pretty new to me. I've done a very limited amount of gravel, forestry roads. Other than that, tarmac and maybe 300 miles total. So I'll just talk about the Touareg a little bit as it comes to my mind. Like I said earlier, I'm not an aficionado on the Touareg, but I did ride it for a couple of miles on the trail in Idaho back in 2022. A guy let me take it out for a little spin, and almost immediately when I threw my leg over the thing, I thought, wow, this thing fits me ergonomically. And then I went down the trail a little bit, and it just tractored along in first and second gear, and that's about all the faster I got on the thing. And then all the really good reviews from Ian over on Big Rock Moto, where he put one through the ringer and covered it extensively, just confirmed that, hey, if I ever want to move up into a middle, mid-weight bike, the Touareg's where I'm setting my sight. And like so many other people, the T700 was on my radar just immediately when it was announced, and I looked at it and looked at it, and it wasn't available as everybody knows. So then the Touareg comes out, and it's available. Got more options, overall a better bike in many ways, which we can talk about some. I'm not an aficionado on either one of them yet, but I know some stuff, and we'll talk about it. And the T700 mainly, you know, just wasn't available for so freaking long. Yeah, a little bit of sand going on here. So I bought this bike used a few months back. Had about 9,000 miles on it, and it came with a lot of goodies already on it, but it came with a brand new set of Dunlop Mission tires, which Mike has used on his GS800 a lot. And they are just phenomenally good on the highway, and they're pretty adequate on many trails that we want to do. In fact, he rode from Georgia to Wyoming, rode the entire Wyoming BDR with me, no issues, and we didn't run into a lot of mud. But he had no problems riding that GS800, and then later, another year later, he came out and met me in Colorado, and we rode the Transamerica Trail a good bit all the way back from Colorado to Arkansas. So the fact that this came with a brand new set, unmounted Dunlop Missions, I wasn't going to complain about it. So I have the new Dunlop Mission on the back, which was in bad need of being replaced. On the front is the Karoo, and it has plenty of good tread left on it still. So left it on, and here we go. Wow, this is something. Whoa! That just shows you can never leave, lose your attention when you're out adventure riding. Unless you're going down a trail you know real well, anything can pop up at any time. Yeah, so out here on this Georgia clay, this red Georgia clay trails, if it were to be wet, it would be a real mess. But right now they're damp for the most part, and that's a help because it tamps things down, and there's little to no dust. This is a good chance to feel this Tourig out a little more on a little more challenging riding. Mike's the leader today. He's got this track. He's been on it before. So we good, or we turn back there? Okay, this is getting a little more challenging. Yeah, yeah, I don't want to be dropping my new bike right off the bat here. Although I have picked it up from a downhill position with no luggage on it, and yeah, I had no problem doing that. I kind of dropped it right in my yard after doing something stupid, which is not unusual. Yeah, I'd like to keep it relatively shiny for a while. This is a pretty challenging looking trail here. A mixture of soft, semi-clay, a little tiny bit verging on mud, some ruts, but good traction. So the Tourig has some riding modes. It has four riding modes. Urban, which is the most restrictive. Next is Explore, and that's what I'm in right now. It gives you a little bit more throttle response, and let's see what comes after that. Off-road is after that, and I haven't really utilized that yet. It turns the traction control off on the rear, and probably opens up the throttle response even more too. And then the fourth riding mode is Individual, and that also I have not explored, but you can set it up according to your desire as far as traction control and ABS goes. Now I'm just keeping it in Explore right now. I don't want to whiskey throttle something and go zipping off into the netherlands. And it's got plenty of pep in Explore. Okay, not the greatest place to meet another vehicle. All right, I guess the old logging vehicles have really put some ruts into this section. I love the sound of that induction. Okmulgee Wildlife Management Area. Mike wants to go down and check that out. Sounds good to me. Now we can just check out how this thing tractors along. You know, if you've been on my channel, I've got a lot of miles under my belt on the old DR650, which is well known for a tractoring beast. And that good old bike is sitting in my garage still around 22,000 adventure miles on that thing. Most of my channel videos are come from that. Been riding a WR250R most recently. Oh, yeah, that's that's nice. Man, that that trail back there, that was that was fun. And this thing did fine, you know, but I kept kind of waiting for it to grab something and slip, you know, out from under me. But so far, so good riding in the Explore mode. Liking it, though. So I'm in second gear, just almost idling along at 10 mile an hour. No problem. You've never seen cotton growing before. Here's our cotton fields. The one thing I got to be careful with while riding behind someone is I do not have a headlight lens grill protective device on this yet. And if it should take a rock in it and have to be replaced, it is very expensive. So got a cotton ball. I don't know. Let's let's see if I can conjure up in my brain and spit it out on this video as to why I went with a middleweight bike after a fairly recent video this past summer of giving reasons why I wanted to go with a light bike. And I do. And I do like my light bike. I really do. The rides out in Utah, New Mexico this past summer proved that value of having a lighter bike to me for sure. But a middleweight bike, especially one with the capability of this Touric, has got great value and it is one of the fastest growing markets in adventure bikes. So like I said before, I have a lot of miles of dual sport bike under my belt and I'm 74 years old now. So that was one reason for wanting to go with a lighter bike. Want to be able to pick it up. Want to be able to maneuver it easier. But here's the thing. On the highway, those little light bikes just do not cut it. Not for me. And a middleweight bike fits that that niche real well if you pick the right one. Great on the highway and certainly good enough, depending on your capabilities, on the rougher trails. And at 74, yeah, I still like getting out on some challenging trails, but I want to do it, you know, probably not solo anymore. I might do a little bit, depending on the circumstance. But I guess what I'm saying is I'm looking to probably do a little less challenging trails, maybe in the future, but still want to do adventure bike riding and go from place to place in a bit of comfort on the highway to get to these other trail rides. So this Tourig has cruise control. It's got tubeless tires. It's got great suspension. It has pretty low seat height as far as getting your foot planted down on the ground. It's not real, real heavy. I'd have to look up the weight specs for you to spit them back to you, but, you know, as adventure bike middleweight goes, it's on the lighter side. It has fantastic wind protection, too. It's the best of any bike I've ridden, and adding this little Puig wind deflector on the top, this makes it perfect. I have no helmet face buffeting whatsoever. Oh, this is how cotton is picked. In 2024. Yeah, yeah, I was a little surprised if you come around that corner and hit that mud right there. Okay, I like its center of gravity. It's very slow turning capable. Low center of gravity due to the fuel tank design, which carries its fuel down low. Down here, more between your legs instead of up high like the T700. And it carries 4.7 gallons, and I haven't done a lot of mileage checks, but I think the last time I was getting over 40 miles per gallon. So at that rate, you're well over 200 mile range sweet spot with a lot of reserve. Probably more like the 230, and that is better than the T700 also. You got plenty of range. Yeah, its balance is really good, too. I mean, you could just, yeah, tractor along doing a slow 180 turn. No problem. It's, I like that. If being tubeless saves me one trail side tire removal and a tube patch, it'd be well worth it to me. I can plug something and just keep on rolling instead of spending at least an hour or more pulling an entire tube off, tire off and pulling the tube out. Yeah, I'm looking, looking forward to not doing that. As far as the full color TFT screen and all the electronics go, you know, I kind of thought, well, maybe those, you know, getting too complicated, but I think they've developed along to the point where they're very reliable now and beautiful display. Different color also depicts what ride mode you're in. Did I mention it has cruise control? I thought that might be hokey, but it works fantastically and believe me, is a very desirable feature when you're out on a big highway and it just relieves your right throttle grip and provides quite a better riding experience. Cruising through a little Georgia community here, a little downtown area. Okay, so I already mentioned a little bit about the ergonomics. This is stock risers. The handlebar sweep and everything is just perfect for me. The leg and foot position is just fine. This does have wider foot pegs on it, which I would recommend always from OEM. I'm 5 foot 10 and a little bit more, but I can put my feet down when I come to a stop and yet you've got lots of off-road travel in the shocks, which are fully adjustable compression and rebound, both front and rear. All right, I might as well talk about some of the negatives that I am aware of. First off, people say, oh, reliability, reliability. Okay, this bike has over 9,000 miles on it. The original owner took it from Virginia to Panama City, Panama, and intended to ride it all the way to the tip of South America, Tierra del Fuego. So he obviously had a lot of confidence in it, which as a brand new bike in 2022, a new model completely, kind of says a lot for his idea of how things would go. And he only made it as far as Panama City, and that's a whole other story. But the only issue he had was a tiny oil leak, which only needed some tightening up of some gasket bolts. I've had no issues, although there is a known issue with the fuel sending unit for your fuel tank was a warranty item to be replaced, and I see mine is coming and going with a flashing symbol. So the dealer network, oh, there's not much dealer network. They're few and far between, and that's true. Doesn't bother me. I'm a mechanically inclined person, and you can get your parts just like you can from anywhere else. A1 Racing in Austin, Texas is one of the biggest dealers, and they ship parts all over if you need them. And as far as reliability goes, if this tells you anything, Aprilia and the Touareg has been smashing it out in the international off-road racing realm. They've been racking up a lot of wins with their bikes. Okay, another issue people have a complaint about is a lot of heat coming off of this right side. The catalytic converter is right down here by your lower right cap, and people have gone in and done a full catalytic delete, and the verdict is out on that as to whether it actually cuts down on the heat coming in on your right leg or not. It's not overly hot at all on a day like today. It's probably in its upper 60s, but it is there. Whether it's, you know, intolerable, I doubt it. Just something that you learn to live with with almost any bike has a quirk of some kind. Georgia's got a lot of backcountry roads down here in South Georgia too. I rode up in the mountains of North Georgia earlier this summer with a bunch of buddies. That was on my WR250. So Georgia got some riding. Got a wide variety of riding. You can do the mountains up there. Beautiful. You can get down here into South Georgia. You've got these sandy red clay through the farm communities, through the farm land. Must be close. Mike's turning in here. The Ride for Burgers. So we're in beautiful downtown Dublin, Georgia. And back in 1944, Martin Luther King gave his very first freedom speech at the African-American church here. Ready for some burgers? Yeah, so we made it here to Crooked Finger Brewing, and they got good food here too. So we're gonna get something to eat. Smash Burger. Dirty truck fries. Brisket nachos. What do you think? Yeah, I thought I'd show you guys the family photo. Yeah, these are all my brothers. He was a crazy one. Is that a booger? That's what I'm talking about. Smash Burger. Mike is riding my Tourig. We're gonna change things up. Let him ride it back to base. And I'm on his 800 GS, which I've ridden before. Very nice bike. Looks like a very cool little old town. Kind of reinvented itself into a little bit of a tourist area. Okay guys, Mike and I are riding off into the sunset back to base. So glad his wife Anna and you could join us in our Ride for Burgers. That concludes my tour of the Tourig. This bike's going to be featured in future videos coming up on this channel. Hope you'll like. Hope you'll subscribe. There's so much more adventure coming. I'll see you out there.