Triumph 1050 Sprint GT
Triumph ST1050GT Sprint
I think one of my first trips out on this was Irvine, Scotland again…
Will I ever learn…
This was the bike that re-introduced me to touring France, at least touring to a camp site in the Vendee region, staying there for a week or so and then traveling back home.
The cover photo was taken during a trip to Les Mathes, lovely peaceful site, no facilities to speak of just the bare essentials in a little shop in the reception area and a beautifully kept toilet and shower block.
I struggled with this bike over long distances in that my wrists couldn’t really take the barely sporting position and would be in agony after a couple of hours, but boy could it cover the miles. Oh how I wished cruise control was a thing, I discovered on my next bike that it is a thing.
It was during the ownership of this bike that I changed jobs, after 27 years with my old employer I made the bold decision to move on, we made an agreement that I would continue to do the odd job for Practice Net on a daily rate on my days off. This worked really well for me because I now work shifts of 2 x 12 hour days followed by 2 x 12 hour nights and then 4 days off, so plenty of down time to go do extra work which in turn leads to plenty of trips around the UK and Guernsey.
When it came to time to change this bike for a nice new one I took it to the local Yamaha dealership the salesman looked it over and we agreed a price to part ex it for a new Yamaha MT-09.
He wanted to see it again before the sale was finalised with all the panniers and top box on so he could check the overall condition. He took it for a test ride, came back and informed me that the engine was knackered. I was gobsmacked, it seemed perfectly fine to me. So with the deal now off I went to Bevans Triumph. The salesman there gave my bike a cursory once over, no test ride, and made me a great offer for it, and so I part ex’d it for a nice new Triumph Tiger Sport.
I checked the tax status on this bike years later and found it had never been re-taxed or MOT’d so it turns out the Yamaha guy was right.