If you have to be a man's-man in the numbers game Kawasaki will make your chest thump the loudest.
2007 450 MX Scorecard
Chassis/Handling
1. Honda
2. Yamaha
3. Suzuki
4. Kawasaki
Fork
1. (tie) Suzuki/Yamaha
3. Kawasaki
4. Honda
Shock
1. Suzuki
2. Honda
3. (tie) Kawasaki/Yamaha
Motor
Honda again rules the weight scales but the biggest surprise was how the Kawi swelled from 2006.
1. (tie) Yamaha/Honda
3. Suzuki
4. Kawasaki
Ergonomics/Rider Controls
1. (tie) Suzuki/Honda/Yamaha
4. Kawasaki
Brakes
1. Kawasaki
2. Honda
3. (tie) Suzuki/Yamaha
Transmission/Clutch/Gearing
1. Honda
2. Yamaha
3. Kawasaki
4. Suzuki
Suzuki stunned us with its super-quiet exhaust but only Kawasaki was over the AMA limit of 99 dB. It's good to see these manufacturers striving to meet and exceed the regulations because they're only going to get stricter.
If you were to tally all the individual component scores, the overall order would be different than the one listed below. That's because our final word is derived from having our testers rank the bikes as a whole. After all, you aren't buying just a transmission or set of suspension. Some will argue that a bike is only as good as its weakest link, but as far as cliches go we prefer the idea that a machine should be considered as the sum of its parts. That being said, here's how our crew ranked each 2007 motocross bike as a race-ready machine with the number of first-place votes received in parentheses.
Overall
1. Yamaha (3)
2. Honda (1)
3. Kawasaki (1)
4. Suzuki
Back to the
2007 450 MX Shootout.
