2000 Bimota YB9 SRi – $19,500

2000 Bimota YB9 SRi for sale

SELLER SAYS: Bimota YB9 SRi – Aust compliance 2000. EURO 1997 model. 600 Yamaha Thundercat engine – Weber Marelli fuel injection. Paoli suspension. Brembo brakes. Akrapovic exhaust. Memjet fuel mixture controller. Comes complete with aftermarket race fairings (bike has never been raced). Bike is road registered (historic). One very careful lady owner since 2005. 26,000km. Contact Louise on 0437 283 112 (Joondalup, WA).

EDITOR TERLICK SAYS: From a time, not all that long ago, when fuel injection was a new thing and 600cc engines producing more than 100 horsepower were virtually unheard of, comes a beautiful piece of exotic, mid-weight, high-performance, collectible Italian glory. Bimota already had a YB9 on its model list in the first half of the 1990s, running Yamaha’s FZR600 engine and breathing through carburettors. With the SRi, Bimota spiced things up with EFI, adding both performance and civility to an engine it had already tweaked for performance. Reviews back in the day pitched the Bimota as a direct competitor to Ducati’s wonderful 748. Both were Italian-made road-legal mid-sized track weapons of the highest order, and the Bimota offered more horsepower (despite the smaller engine capacity) and substantially less weight. While Ducati’s scale and global network enabled it to sell about 25,000 of the 748s, Bimota produced less than 250 of the YB9 SRi. So no, you’re not likely to bump into one at the cafe or, frankly, anywhere else. This bike of Louise’s looks like a stunning example, with its low mileage brushing off it’s quarter-century age like water off a duck’s back. This is definitely a bike for the collector, but hopefully will find an owner who will let it stretch its legs and carve corners as it was designed to do. Bellissimo.