Latest News about Hero Xtreme 2014

With Hero now discontinuing the Xtreme, the time has now come for our long term motorcycle to retire. Though the Xtreme wasn't exactly one of our favourites, it endured everything we threw at threw at it (sometimes with a pinch of salt). Nevertheless it's with a heavy heart that we bid adieu to our beloved workhorse. 

Unlike the previous month, the Hero Xtreme had been confined to the garage for the most part of September. Motorcycles like Hero Xtreme and Honda Unicorn don’t take this confinement very politely, as it took me a good part of 15 minutes of kicking and pulling the choke to get it back to life. Cold starts started to pose a problem after that, though the Xtreme came back to normal after two days of regular usage.

The odometer showed 3,100 kilometres when I took charge of the Hero Xtreme and as we speak, the number stands at 4,100 kilometres. Weirdly though, I accumulated a major chunk of these 1,000 kilometres in just two rides over two weekends. While one of these was the routine ride to my home in Raigad, the other was a very interesting trip to Bhandardhara, in Nashik. This ride turned out to be a revelation as it established the Xtreme’s capabilities as a multipurpose tool. But more on that later.

When the original Hero Honda CBZ reached the end of its production run, I’m pretty certain we all were apprehensive, having had the pleasure of owning one for several years, I know I was. The 150cc model was a revelation and unlike any other Indian motorcycle back in the day and as a result, it ended up winning over a chunk of new buyers everyday throughout its six-year production run that ended in late 2005.

Okay, so we are going to Goa 'to live our life off the edge' is what was told to me before we set off to the land of sun, sand and beaches. Pretty excited, we reached Goa only to find that the sun was nowhere to be seen, while the wet sand and the rough waters lashed at the beaches and in a way smirking at us. We were in Goa to review the Hero Xtreme and few other products from Hero's stable in stormy weather and torrential rains. Only the Almighty knew how we were going to fare, but a little reworking and our plans were back on track

Hero MotoCorp launched this refreshed model of the Xtreme, this year, in a bid to revive this 150cc offering, which is targeted at youth looking for a stylish and powerful motorcycle. So have they been successful in doing that? Does the Xtreme do justice to the fan following the original 150cc CBZ has? Does it carry forward the legacy? Let us find out.

Hero MotoCorp has silently launched the 2014 Xtreme at Rs 67,364 (ex-showroom Pune). Dealerships across India have started to take bookings for this bike at Rs 1,000. The company has also launched few other facelifted motorcycles, a way through which it wants to keep its portfolio fresh.