"Emotional Touring" goes the tagline for MV Agusta's first crack at a luxury mile muncher, but it left us far less weepy than we might have expected. The Turismo Veloce Lusso is a quick, quirky and clever machine with some very nifty tricks up its sleeve.
Storied Italian brand MV Agusta is best known for its highly-strung exotica, but the focus has shifted in recent years towards bikes people will really wanna ride, with a range of bikes built around a rip-snorting 800cc triple engine that's built for serious road riding thrills.
A decade ago, the idea of an MV Agusta luxury tourer would've been crazy. But today, Donald Trump is the President of the United States, and here's the Turismo Veloce Lusso.
As far as luxury tourers go, this is very much on the Ducati Multistrada/BMW S1000XR side of things rather than, say, the BMW K1600GT side – but with a package that's lighter and more compact than any of those, if just as tall at a seat height around 850 mm. It gives up a few horsepower, with a peak of just 110, but the way the power's delivered makes it feel almost as quick and gives you an excuse to stay harder on the gas.
There's certainly no complaints about fitment – from the multi-level traction control and ABS, through heated grips, up/down quickshifter, USB charge points and cruise control, it's got all the good stuff. There's also built-in Bluetooth connectivity that talks to your phone to let you manage media on the go.
Perhaps one of the most impressive bits is the iPhone app, which interfaces with the built-in datalogger and also lets you set up your own custom riding mode, complete with a magnificently intricate suspension adjustment tool.
The suspension is an active Sachs system that reads the road and adjusts itself according to the conditions and how you're riding it. But in the iPhone app, you've got the ability to draw your own curves to tell the forks and shock how to react to different inputs. Magnificent.
At AU$24,990 in Australia (US$19,298 in the USA) you're paying a decent premium over the base model Turismo Veloce for the active suspension, cruise control, standard center stand and heated grips the Lusso model gives you, but in the couple of weeks I had the thing, I made good use of all of them.
More information: MV Agusta
