This Is Our First Good Look at the New Suzuki V-Strom

For the past many weeks, we have been talking about Suzuki’s plans to bring back the DR Big name – a moniker that has deep ties to Suzuki’s off-roading prowess, and draw links to the iconic Dakar Rally.

Then, we saw spy photos of a new Suzuki V-Strom 1000, which looked better-suited for the dirty trails, and showed a number of updates to this venerable line of adventure bikes.

Now, we get our first solid look at the 2020 Suzuki V-Strom 1000, as the Japanese brand gears up for next week’s EICMA show in Milan.

Though the video teaser is short, Suzuki certainly isn’t shy about it, essentially unveiling the motorcycle in the opening shot.

From that, we can see the restyled bodywork and what looks like an squarish LED headlight. There is a crash cage for the lower half of the engine, and the exhaust looks noticeably larger (likely due to the Euro5 emission changes).

From the rider’s perspective we see a dash that looks similar to the rally towers on Dakar bikes, with what we presume is a TFT screen. Here, the name “V-Strom” can be clearly seen.

While the new Suzuki V-Strom looks clean and updated, we aren’t quite sure where the DR Big association is going to come into play. The colors seen here do link back to the DR Big lineup, and while Suzuki has some off-road notes in this teaser, the bike isn’t quite the world-romper you would expect from the name.

We will likely have to wait until EICMA to see how the Japanese brand is going to make this link, and of course having the full specifications and details on the motorcycle will likely help as well. Until then, we like what we see.

Suzuki has brought an attractive update to the V-Strom lineup, which was definitely in need of some modernization. We hope that the changes aren’t just skin deep though. We would hate to see Suzuki’s big unveiling for 2020 to be simply bold new bodywork.

We will be at EICMA to witness the new Suzuki V-Strom 1000 be unveiled, so check back for all the details and our other EICMA coverage.

Source: Suzuki (YouTube)

Be sure to follow all of our 2019 EICMA show coverage this over the coming days, for the latest news and releases for the 2020 motorcycle model year.

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