CCM GP450 - Lucy's Test Ride in the Lakes...

Lucy has wanted to try to ride one of the CCM GP 450's since I did a test ride a couple of month's ago. The salesman from CCM, a guy called Darren was up staying with family in Cockermouth so had brought one with him and offered Lucy a chance to ride one today.

CCM GP450 2015

This particular bike has a new engine in it and is due to go out to Italy in a couple of weeks, so needs a good run in before it heads off south, hence the ride up here, Darren is an ex TT racer and used to race for CCM in the day, so needless to say he was pretty handy on the bikes. The bike was loaded with all the toys, including the full bash plate, raised screen, Garmin 660 mount, rear racks and bigger rear brake pedal.

We all swapped around during the morning with Lucy taking the lead on the GP as it was her test day, as before the riding position was great, the dashboard is really clear, standing up is very relaxed and better even than Lucy's KTM.

Playing in the puddles on Mosser Fell

Off road the bike likes to be ridden quick, the suspension seems better when you push it harder and it absorbs the bumps and ruts really well. The Brembo brakes and discs are really good, you can feel the bite as soon as you touch the lever, I like this.

We had a play in the puddles on Mosser Fell, taking some pics of Darren and Lucy splashing about before finishing up back in Cockermouth. A lovely ride out down some fun little local lanes.

A bit of banter about bikes in general!

CCM GP450 2015.

As before I personally found the throttle at low revs quite jerky, Lucy felt the same, some of this can be put down to us riding carbed bikes all the time, so not used to the response of an injected bike, some of it is definitely the injection system on the bike. Darren says this has been softened from the original race spec engine which just sat on the rear wheel every time you pulled away and I can see this.

 I think Darren was quietly impressed by Lucy's off road skills, she is becoming a very handy lady on a bike and this bike seemed to compliment her style of riding too.

Both of us really like these bikes, they have a cool presence on the road, you feel like your on a bike you can ride for  long way. I like the separate fuel tanks and the off road capability alongside the road manners.

Now it's down to numbers really, can we afford to buy two of them... we'll see...