For years now, MV Agusta’s been promising us a new adventure bike … but, MV Agusta’s been promising a lot of things, with little sign of coming through. That is, until now, with the new Lucky Explorer Project set to debut at EICMA next week.
Obviously, the Lucky Explorer name is a take on the old Lucky Strike-sponsored Dakar teams, back before Big Tobacco was kicked out of motorsports sponsorship and everything fell apart. Back in those days, Cagiva had a relatively strong Dakar effort; these days, MV Agusta appears ready to revive the feeling of those times with a flashy new adventure bike or bikes.
It’ll be a full-sized machine, not a piddly 450-class bike, as currently required by Dakar rules. In other words, the new bike won’t actually be Dakar-legal … but you can bet it will appear at many of the other rally raid-style events that run all over southern Europe (SWANK Sardinia Rally, etc).
Will it actually be mechanically reliable, and have proper suspension? Uh, who knows? But knowing MV’s reputation, it’ll look good, and it’ll be loaded with the latest tech. If your plan is to only ride to for-fun events and otherwise hang about Starbucks, then those are the most important features anyway.
