SPYDER SPINS ITS WEB

Look what we’ve found – the coolest boulevard cruiser

Tested Can-Am Spyder from Al Boom Marine Dubai Story Hamid Munir Photography Karl Jeffs Model Justina
Agency Phototechnics

If you want a totally different way to cruise the great open roads of the Gulf jump on a Can-Am Spyder and get amongst that throttle. The Spyder is a three-wheeler bike, but it’s completely different from a trike because you’re dealing with two wheels at the front and one at the back.

The beautiful big lump should be better value than your outlaw-Abu Dhabi accountant’s Harley and big sports-touring BMWs. It’s hard to know whether it’s better to be an experienced bike rider or a novice. Your tester has two decades of highway and dirt bike riding up his Karachi-made leather sleeves. This means he found it a bit weird to start with as there are salient differences in riding style.

But what a buzz!

By motorcycle standards it’s mega-big; nearly 2.7m long and just over 1.5m wide, so you won’t duck through the Spinneys car park like you would on a two-wheeler. You will envy the courier as they weave in and out of the traffic, but you’ll be having more fun and they’ll envy your comfort,  power and posing.

There’s just nothing like it on the road. It looks unusual but has tremendous presence and part of that is due to the striking black-and-yellow livery ours had.And, most importantly, the three-wheel configuration of this machine feels really safe and stable which means for a long stretch on the road, the Spyder is a comfy and cool way to handle the highway.

To take one of these babies for a test ride all you’ve got to do is get in contact with Al Boom Marine in Dubai. That’s what we did and then it was all about hitting the road in style. There’s a bit of tuition and safety briefing required before the Al Boom folk turn you loose. For those who’ve ridden a bit before it’s different when you get on the Spyder but not daunting.

Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP), which brings you the three-wheeled (or ‘Y-architecture’) Can-Am Spyder Roadster, is probably the world’s best-known manufacturer of everything but cars and bikes. It invented the snowmobile, the sit-down personal water craft and the two-seater all-terrain vehicle (or quad).

Motivation is provided by a 998cc DOHC Rotax V-twin. BRP owns the Austrian engine specialist) . BRP has known all along that the Spyder is not a motorcycle; instead, it’s a road-powersports vehicle that’s affordable, accessible and forgiving.

BRP has known all along that the Spyder is not a motorcycle; instead, it’s a road-powersports vehicle that’s affordable, accessible and forgiving. In these speed-restricted and traffic-constricted times, it’s increasingly difficult to get more fun out of our wheels.

The first prototypes built during 1998 were, in fact, converted snowmobiles, though BRP design chief Denys Lapointe - who, in 1985, worked on a stillborn, Bombardier/Daihatsu small-car project – once said his designers weren’t initially locked into anything. “By definition, a motorcycle is a straddle-type product with three wheels or less. “Some of the early ideas even had one wheel (the Embrio concept). There were two wheels, three wheels, retractable wheels, all kinds of geometries that were explored.”

The reverse lever on the left-side handlebar, along with the absence of a front brake lever on the right handlebar, is about all that’s different from being astride a motorcycle. Otherwise, clutch lever on the left, twist-grip throttle on the right, up/down gear lever at the left foot and brake lever at the right foot, is all conventional two-wheeled stuff. A cool bottom-end difference is in the Spyder’s five-speed gearbox in which the motorcycle’s sixth has been replaced with an idler gear allowing a real, mechanical reverse. The additional money tends to be for whether you want to go manual or auto and colour is a factor too. The seat is firm but very comfortable. You’ll need to remember that front and rear braking is all via the right foot, and that cornering requires physically steering the handlebars. But the handlebars and footpegs are also perfectly placed for a relaxed seating position. I spent days in the saddle and was as comfortable at the end as when I left the apartment.

The ride? Initially a bit unusual, but great. The Spyder handled some bumpy stuff better than many two-wheelers thanks to its wide stance.  The most unusual aspect – and this isn’t a criticism - is the steering. Speed-variable electric assistance looks after a lot of the effort. You’ll find the turning circle tighter than a car’s but not as tight a bike’s. Anyone outside our office in the Dubai Media City could bear testimony to this as the crowds that gather whenever the Spyder appears insist on seeing it do its stuff. The mini-roundabout has never been circumnavigated so often.

On the road, it seems the less motorcycling experience you have, the less you’ll need to forget to become used to it. I’d have loved to take this baby from Karachi to Lahore, some of the great bike riding country in the world.

The V-twin engine is an absolute treat – nice and torquey. Image-wise you probably won’t be getting a gig in the movie version of Hell’s Angels by Hunter S. Thompson because this is one upmarket piece of metal but it has a bad-boy edge if you crank it.

The ABS calibration for the strong triple-disc brake system is excellent as our tester can bear witness. A pick-up sliced in front of me on Emirates Rd in one of those Gulf tarmac ‘moments’. This was panic stations – I braked and hung on and was at a standstill in a blink of an eye. I needed to be as this guy had cut so closely in front of me I thought I was going to hit the vehicle. The Spyder’s brakes saved the day.

Steering and cornering is fascinating.  When you ride a bike, on the track or to the office at Dubai Creek, you make all sorts of little subliminal movement to keep your balance. It’s the counter-steering that’s the most significant, whereby you tip the bike into a turn by putting pressure on the  handlebar in the opposite direction. You did this on the pushbike to school as a kid too. But the correct technique on the Spyder is to physically lever it into a corner with the handlebars, while bodily leaning forwards to the inside of the vehicle to counter the lateral g-forces. The Spyder will then roll towards the outside of the corner. Nothing particularly unstable or uncontrollable about that; even a lofted inside-front wheel is handled by the ignition-retarding ESP. There’s lots of Bosch stability electronics to keep the Spyder where it should be.

It does the sprint of zero to 100km/h acceleration in 4.5 seconds which is pretty swift and might cause a few raised eyebrows from the local boy racers heading to Zinc.

The Spyder gets some things just so right. Like the 44-litre boot in the nose – perfect for the spare helmet, jacket, some groceries, copies of Middle East Car, Total Sport and Men’s Style. My only whinge is that the giant tank gets a bit hot and that could be telling during summer when you’re sitting on it.

You rarely need to change down to overtake, just wind it on. A sophisticated electronic stability programme monitors throttle and handlebar position, backs off the power to prevent rear wheelspin if the handlebars aren’t pointed straight ahead and modulates the anti-lock brakes. It also checks yaw and roll and reduces power if the Spyder picks up the inside front wheel in a corner.

The footprint of the 165mm-wide front tyres and the Spyder’s 316kg dry weight would ordinarily make the steering too heavy so Can-Am has fitted electric power-steering. The ride quality really is excellent, given the sports-touring niche.  The forward-leaning, sports-tourer riding position is fine. Sometimes felt I wouldn’t mind sitting back, but you couldn’t beat the comfort. And there’s something pretty groovy about all that attention too. Is it the future of bike riding, a revolution in getting around? Dunno, but it’s sheer bliss, the best fun on wheels I’ve had in yonks.

Who will buy this gorgeous cross between a jet ski and a snowmobile? Can it pull the Harley crowd? Gimme a break – you’ll see these everywhere at Dubai Marina and on the corniches in Jeddah and Doha. Superb boulevard poser-cum-cruiser. A pat on the back to Al Boom Marine for bringing it to town.