One tank of gas through Spurgeon's 2021 KTM 890 Adventure R Rally

Sort of like dogs and owners that start to look alike, it doesn’t take much imagination to see why my friend and Highside/Lowside co-host has gravitated toward this KTM 890 Adventure R Rally. And likewise, you won’t be surprised to hear that I was excited to review Spurg’s cherished chariot. Anyone who knows him will tell you that any critique someone aims at a KTM 890 Adventure R Rally might as well be taped to a brick and thrown through Spurgeon’s front window. What a gift, a work-related reason to point out all of the crappy things about my buddy’s bike.

In Spurg’s defense, it’s only fair to admit that this motorcycle is a clear leader in the adventure-touring market. Most of the opinions I respect in the world of ADV’ing seem to agree that KTM’s 790 and 890 Adventure R platforms are the sharpest weapons for whatever midsize trouble you pursue.

The Rally-spec version of those machines ratchets the aggression up even higher, with an Akrapovič exhaust, dirt-specific wheels, a taller seat, larger foot pegs, and an upgraded electronics package which includes a quickshifter and cruise control as standard. Plus, the crown jewel, WP Pro Components suspension with nearly 11 inches of travel, front and rear. Want to know what a cone-valve fork is and how it works? You’re in luck, Spurgeon researched and documented it in nauseating great detail in this article.

How can something be medium-sized and also extreme? Engine displacement is the obvious metric, this KTM’s 889 cc powerplant being larger than other so-called mid-sized bikes — think Aprilia Tuareg 660 or Yamaha Ténéré 700. But, it’s also much smaller than full-size ADVs, machines like BMW’s R 1250 GS or KTM’s 1290 Adventure. By that measure, the 890 Rally is on the high end of medium.

On the scales, it’s the opposite. Spurgo’s KTM weighed in at our West Coast office at 476 pounds, only 20 pounds up on the Tuareg 660. More impressive than that, not only is it lighter than flagship ADVs like the 1250 GS (565 pounds) but it’s also lighter than various other adventure-ish products; think Suzuki’s V-Strom 1050XT (543 pounds), Kawasaki’s Versys 650 LT (503 pounds), and Ducati’s Desert X (~500 pounds). That’s a good showing for the 890 Rally, which has all of that suspension travel, tubed and wire-spoke wheels, and more than five gallons of fuel on board.

Big-ish engine and light-ish weight is a good start, but the real reason this bike leans toward “extreme” is clear: that up-spec suspension. The WP Pro suspenders mean a couple of the 890 Rally’s numbers aren’t so small, the first of which being the price — MSRP for one of these bad Rally models in 2021 (Spurg’s vintage) was a cool $20,000. The other undeniably large number is the seat height, which is just hair north of 37 inches. A KTM 890 Rally won’t tolerate a lack of confidence, in your wallet or your inseam.

For my test of this bespoke and beloved machine, I started by riding to and from work a few times, because there’s nothing like the Daily Rider route to get to know a bike. Also, Spurgeon sent his bike to California for the April edition of Get On! Adventure Fest and therefore outfitted it with fresh knobbies. As his friend, I wanted him to know that the first thing his virgin TKC80 blocks saw was L.A.’s 405 freeway.

In the context of a city commute, I feel safe in saying that a 37-inch seat height is not ideal. The high-spec WP suspension eats potholes like finger sandwiches, but even at six feet, two inches tall I lost a little dignity at each stoplight having to scoot off the seat to get one foot flat on the asphalt. My favorite part of the commute was leaving our RevZilla West office by riding over the eight-foot grass embankment separating our parking lot from the street.

Eventually, I had a morning to dedicate to the bike affectionately known as Sally the Rally and I aimed for Santiago Peak, one of the most prominent (and accessible) bundles of radio towers in Greater Los Angeles. From my Long Beach neighborhood, getting to the peak entails 23 miles of highway, five miles of suburbia and stop lights, 14 miles of meandering pavement, and eventually about 10 miles of progressively gnarly dirt road. An ideal ADV gauntlet.

For the first 30 miles I didn’t glean anything I hadn’t learned on my commute. Knobby tires erode braking performance and rider confidence, same as always. On the plus side, the 890 Rally’s shorter-than-stock windscreen does just fine on the wide-open road, blasting air away from my torso and leaving my helmet in an almost-clean rush of wind. 

I also appreciate that the cockpit is thoughtfully designed; typical KTM fonts on the dash with bright colors and intuitive switchgear. Heck, even the Rally-spec seat is comfy, which many people might not expect. The quickshifter is great, too, once I turned it back on — Spurgeon says he finds the shifter feels “soft” and somewhat less connected in low-speed, off-road situations, and those are the situations he likes most. Good on him for just shutting it off when he doesn’t want it, instead of whining about the option.

As the snake of blacktop coiled more tightly into the foothills and the surface decayed, Sally the Rally came into its own. When the road finally turned to rough dirt, topped with gravel and powdery sand, the bike was truly in its element. The water bars, about a yard tall, that run across the road are tempting but dangerous on full-size street bikes — sirens calling ADV riders to smash their hulls upon the rocks.

Where most bikes would bottom out, though, the 890 Rally only asks for more. Dusty ruts, awful knuckles of rock sticking out of the trail, washes of sand and loose stone, everything just rolled under Sally’s wheels and was forgotten. Wheelies, jumps, braps, all of them, again and again, and all the bike wanted was more. A full-on Rally mode allows for nine levels of traction control adjustability and tweaking the throttle map. Not totally necessary, any of it, but it’s purposeful, and fun.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Zack Courts (@zackcourts)

The best part of this Spurgeon-spec suspension isn’t even all of the travel, though that does help. It’s the way it damps, so precisely and solidly, everywhere in the stroke. As soon as the bike touches the ground from a wheelie or jump the fork and shock are instantly in control. No blowing through an inch or three of travel before it starts working. It is immediate. And in using all 11 inches of the stroke doing good work, it makes the rider feel very, very good. 

As an aside, if you’d like help imagining what I looked like riding up my local dirt road, feel free to watch this video of Toby Price and Sam Sunderland riding 890 Rallys. Yeah, I looked just like that. Or, at least, it felt just like that.

I moseyed out to the tip of the precipice at the top of Santiago Peak, Sally’s Akrapovič pipe grumbling politely and dust wafting off the wheels, where there is usually a stunning view. On this day, the mountain was buried in fog. So, instead of gazing out at the ocean and the sun-kissed sprawl of Orange County laid out 5,000 feet below, I looked at the bike.

What a thing. It’s pretty easy to make fun of Spurgeon for buying the all-caps version of an ADVENTURE MOTORCYCLE, I feel like I’ve proven that. There’s so much pomp and circumstance around this model. But, for once, instead of an ADV trying to be the baddest by making the most horsepower or having the most features, KTM focused on the things that riders like our dear Spurg care most about. Namely high-spec suspension, widely adjustable electronics, and of course the word “Rally” plastered all over it.

In many ways, this is very much the Spurgeon Dunbar of motorcycles. Large and loud, and most comfortable away from pavement. Also, despite its reputation for being good, dammit it might be even better in person.