MV AgustA F3 800

Can MV Agusta’s mid-capacity supersport impress where its larger sibling failed to?

- Priyadarshan Bawikar

Until recently, I would’ve given an arm and a leg to ride the MV Agusta F4 – the most beautiful superbike in the world, in my opinion. Just a few months ago, I got to ride it, that too at the Madras race track. Sounds like a dream come true, right? Well, I actually came away rather disappointed. Its riding position is too tall, even for my 5-foot-10-inch frame. The overall ergonomics are excessively aggressive and, worst of all, in today’s day and age of cutting-edge litre bikes, the F4 feels positively primitive. They say you should never meet your heroes. So, I have all of this running through my mind just before I get on its smaller sibling, the F3 800. It’s quite similar to the F4 when it comes to looks, so the riding experience should be similar too, right?

A WORLD APART 

Wrong! The moment I straddle the F3, I know that this is an entirely different beast. Smaller, narrower and more importantly, shorter. I’m immediately comfortable with its 805mm saddle height and the bars feel closer and slightly taller as well. Make no mistake, it has a committed supersport posture, but I get a feeling that this is something I could get used to. Thumbing the starter, however, brings back some of the earlier doubts. At idle revs, it almost sounds like something in the engine is broken, with a strange rattle emanating from under the bike. But the moment it gets going, I breathe a sigh of relief as that rattling gives way to a muffled rasp that hints at a sonorous symphony from the three tiny slash-cut exhaust pipes.

ITALIAN STALLION