METEOR 350 VS RIVALS NEW WINES IN OLD BOTTLES

The modern-retro genre promises new tech in old-school stying and this segment has heated up to an all-time high with the entry of two new 350s!

- ROHIT PARADKAR

If you are a biker then the environment around you will tell you that neo-retro motorcycles are quite a rage at the moment. That environment is a product of the Royal Enfield lineage. And motorcycles like the CB and Imperiale are a product of that environment. Honda has been working openly on its Royal Enfield rival for a long time now, but that has also allowed RE enough time to develop an all-new 350 platform which debuts with the Meteor 350. It is bound to spawn a new Classic 350, but until that happens we have the original on this test, because, well, it kick-started this modern-retro genre. The Imperiale 400 proved that the Classic is ageing and there is room in the market for a nicer motorcycle from even an unassuming brand like Benelli – room that looked like Jawa would capitalise on, but the brand has failed to meet the demand of the consumer, eventually making people shy away to other options. In fact, it’s so scarce that we couldn’t get one for this test either, so we let it be. Even the CB350 wasn’t easy to come by, but OD reader and friend Rohan Shrivastav came to the rescue. He chose this motorcycle over anything else because Honda promises to bring reliability and low cost of ownership to this segment. For those very reasons, the entry of Honda certainly has RE worried, but since Honda will be battling RE’s cult-following more than a particular motorcycle, it will be the smaller players like Benelli and Jawa who are likely to feel the heat the most, provided Honda sorts out its sales and distribution strategy. Read on to know why.

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