Originally Posted by Alexlebrit

Maria, I was going to say Mark Manley's the man to talk to but he's here already

The longest I've done on my Derbi is a 300 mile day, she didn't seem mind though. The thing I find that slows me down I not the bike's top speed but the choice of road. My 300 mile day started French dual carriageway but after 90 miles of being blown by the turbulence of passing vans, the constant mirror watching to see if there was a space long enough combined with a stretch of road flat enough to allow me to overtake the convoys of trucks cruising at 10 mph slower than me and the sheer horribleness of being tossed about in the wind and rain I came off onto the roads.

As soon as I did that the whole ride changed (the sun coming out helped) and I firmly believe that my 125cc Derbi was no slower than any other bike on the road. Why? Because then it was the that slowed me down not the bike. Suddenly my Derbi's top speed was 15mph faster than the speed limit between villages so I throttled back and enjoyed the road. Of course I ended up going through every town and villaand not roundthem so my speed was further decreased by the frequent 30mph speed limits. And because I was going through interesting places with nice cafés I stopped more and chatted more.

So what I find with 125cc touring is that it's not the bike that slows you down it's the roads you take and the desire to stop and look.