The moment I first laid eyes on Monster Number One, I was unmanned. I wasn’t even yet a proper man, but I was unmanned. It was a magnificent behemoth and I was dreadfully intimidated by it.
That Kawasaki even dared to build it filled me with awe.
It was 1979. I had finished school and was enthusiastically ruining my life forever buy buying the biggest motorcycle I could afford and riding it as fast as I dared as far as I could.
To my youthful eye, Kawasaki’s colossal Z1300 appeared to be half again as big as any other big bike around at the time.
It was marketed as an “autobahn stormer”, and while I had no idea what an autobahn was at that age, I was in no doubt the Z1300 would do a marvellous job storming it.
Its contemporary, the Yamaha XS1100, was dwarfed by Kawasaki’s flagship. And for a teenager just coming to terms with the might and power of his brand new Suzuki four-pot GSX1100EX (which I had purchased because I was too impatient to wait for the Katana), the Kwaka’s monolithic six-cylinder engine said: “You and everything like you, is my bitch” and I believed it. So I didn’t buy it. I bought the GSX instead.
My nights were filled with bizarre regrets.
Maybe I should have manned up and bought the Kwaka. It was a six! Mine was a four. It was vast and manly and overwhelming, and everyone appeared to be terrified of it – the press, the public, the cops, small children. Was it too late to trade the Gixxer? That reptile who sold it to me would rip me off badly on the trade-in, but maybe it would be worth it?
I wondered how anyone could ride one in anger. But because I was 18, I was certainly intent on finding out if and when I managed to buy one. Or borrow one.
Some years later, I saw one ridden with such venom and élan, it took my breath away and I almost drowned.
I was stuck in a creek-crossing on my way to the inaugural and legendary Rough Road Rally, and my wet girlfriend was yelling at me from the bank.
My Gixxer was balanced precariously on a rock in the middle of the thigh-deep creek, and I was…in extremis a bit.
As I stood there contemplating my next move, a Z1300 (two-up and with a small blue Smurf glued to the front guard) came whooshing down the hill and splashed into the creek at full noise.
Did the rider back off? Did he shit. He kept the throttle pinned and roared through the water, spreading a foot-high bow-wave that almost toppled me from my rock, and rocketed off up the hill on the other side.
So they could indeed be ridden in anger provided you were angry enough. If I was not holding my bike upright, I would have applauded.
When the Z1300 first surfaced in 1979 it quite simply overwhelmed people with its immensity and subsequent touring ability. It produced 72.3kW, weighed a zesty 322kg fully fuelled and oiled, and if you were a proper man, you could coax its torque-rich, silky smoothness to propel you to a top speed of about 230km/h.
It even boasted a huge 27lt petrol tank, which was the biggest one available on any production bike at the time. It could carry immense loads at quite a fast clip, had a reasonable shaft-drive on it, and provided you didn’t expect too much from its handling (and what did we even know about proper handling those thin-framed days?), it was quite capable. Many of them were quickly turned into sidecar-toting hacks by sidecar lovers who instantly saw its potential in that area, but the rest developed a true cult following that persists to this day.
And I still wonder what direction my motorcycling career would have taken had I bought one.
Would I have been as terrified as all the droogs who bought one, emptied their bowls in fright and quickly bolted a sidecar to the monster so it would be easier not to die?
Would I have learned how to ride one in anger and then gone racing at evil circuits like Amaroo Park, only to fire the massive bastard into the wall at Stop corner and go to my Jesus in a ball of flame?
Would I have become one of those Belstaff-wearing uber-tourers belting around Oz on a bike that literally towered above every other bike, and would cut through stray cattle like howitzer round?
It really is impossible to say.
There aren’t many Z1300s getting around anymore.
But now and again, in the car-park at vintage race meetings, or in musty garages where grey-bearded old men sit and wonder about their youth, you might find one gathering dust.
And looking just as massive and menacing as it always did.
Bow your head in respect.
The monster’s time has come and gone.
It’s like will never be seen again.
Words by Boris Mihailovic