Feels like I’ve been spending a lot of time on the blog writing about the glory of the new Duc, but very little on the Beemer…Which really isn’t fair to such a wonderful bike and such a brilliant marque.

In case anyone’s missed it, sitting next to the Duc in the garage is a 2002 BMW R1100S - which if you ask me is one the most forgotten bikes in all of motorcycling. Here you have a truly fantastic bike that everyone at BMW Motorcycles has forgotten about. I’ll be the first to admit that their marketing department has a incredibly tough task - here’s a BMW bike that is neither a full blown sport bike nor a full blown tourer and I think it’s safe to say it’s probably not even the sportiest sports-tourer in the current BMW line up. It’s something else entirely. Almost a throw back and yet a modern evolution. Clearly a rip off of the Ducati 916 body style and yet somehow entirely German in aesthetic. A bike that carries the famed BMW ‘S’ designation and yet has ABS.

In many ways the only definite thing you can classify it by is it’s contradictions.

Matter of fact if you look at it’s touring characteristics, it’s not a bike you can tour all day through the Rockies or Alps on and you won’t win or place in an Iron Butt rally race with it. Swing all the way over to the other side of the fence, towards the true sportbike side and you don’t stand a chance if you aspire to beating the 600cc or liter class bikes off the line. Yet even though it doesn’t excel in any one category, it’s a tremendously well rounded bike. Something that let’s you enjoy the ride for two hundred miles on the superslab before you get to the real ride.

And perhaps it’s just human nature and something that happens to every marque, but ultimately the ‘S’ is a fantastic model that fits none of the categories that most people attribute to BMW Motorcycle community. This was not a bike built to satisfy the BMW faithful nor cater to their bike buying demos. It was a bike built to hark back to history and probably a bike built to satisfy David Robb or one of the other BMW designers’ passion for the brand. I doubt anyone in Münich ever thought the ‘S’ would sell in gigantic numbers. In many ways I’ve always thought that the ‘S’ had to be intended as a loss leader, a bike purely built to stand on the cover of next years model guide and ‘look’ sexy.

It’s also clearly a parts bin bike. BMW already had the engine, the front suspension and all the cockpit features. The only truly original items here are the body work and exhaust system. Add to that the fact that when BMW Corporate recently updated the boxer engine, bumping the displacement from 1100cc’s to 1150cc’s and then eventually 1200cc’s, they didn’t do it with the ‘S’. They did it with the ‘R’ (1150) and the ‘GS’ (1200). Today the ‘S’ continues to be sold with the 1100cc Boxer engine. Honda, Yamaha or Ducati would ever introduce a larger displacement engine in anythhing but their sportiest bike.

Yet for all the bike’s awkwardness, it still has something that few other motorcycles have, an amazing ability to morph to your tastes. So many bikes today are what they are; a Yamaha R1 is a full blown sport bike and you really can’t do much else on it, and conversely a Gold Wing or KLT doesn’t go to the track. Yet the ‘S’ plays in both fields, equally well. And as an added bonus if you want to park it next to a Duc at the Rockstore nobody thinks twice.

I’ve had my ‘S’ now for over 10,000 miles and roughly two and a half years (give or take half a year). It’s as rock solid as the day I left Marty’s BMW in Torrance, CA and it’s been just about everywhere in California. From ‘The Lost Coast’ to the middle of the Central Valley to the Shoreline from top to bottom. And I have yet to discover so much of this great state. I can ride it for 8 hours and cover 150 miles or cover 300 miles and be just as happy.

While I love the Duc, it’s a luxury. The Beemer on the other hand is the life saver.