I spent today being the most irritating rider in the world, as I stepped up and down through the ’07 R1’s throttle in 500RPM increments testing roll on and hard acceleration from various points. It was quite engrossing and I can only imagine what traffic was thinking as I plodded along, then suddenly took off like a scalded cat or just eased away into the distance. I admit this was often timed just as a BMW or Jaguar owner went out for a sloppy “performance” pass. I’ll give the new R1 this; it certainly can make objects in the rear-views very small.