David Knight MBE rides the new Ducati DesertX

Although Five-time Enduro World Champion David Knight MBE has plenty of saddle time with the DesertX Rally and Desmo450 MX, he was yet ride the new Ducati DesertX. So, we sent him off to Spain to try out the new bike at its international press launch…

David Knight MBE
“We were in Spain for the new Ducati DesertX launch. We spent all day, doing about 150 miles, on this bike, and it's been an amazing day.

It started off with a bit of motorway. Then we got into some nice little gravel tracks, some sand washes, just different things like that.

And having my own DesertX Rally at home I was eager to compare it to this new model. The DesertX has got a linkage on this now, a different dash, and a different engine.

It pretty much looks quite similar, but pretty much ground up is a new model.

What I noticed is straight away is it’s just refined a little bit more. It was it was great. I've not ridden the old model DesertX, only the Rally version which has obviously got upgraded stiffer suspension, but it’s an absolutely brilliant bike.

What surprised me the most is how good and versatile it was, especially on the road. I’ve spent all my life racing off-road. So, I can ride anything off-road and this was fun. Like one of the journalists on the launch said, the smile that I had on my face when we had a bit of a free ride around a little like three- or four-kilometre loop, and I was just laughing my head off. It was so much fun.

And for anyone that that thinks they buy one and straight away they need to upgrade the suspension you don't. I was hitting things, like I hit a sand wash today coming down a hill that should have snapped the bike in half, but it took it so well. I came over this crest, and we hadn't ridden down this hill, and I was probably going a little bit fast, and I was like, oh no, this is not going to end well. And I hit it. And to my surprise, it took it, it really took it so well. And I was surprised that I didn't wreck a wheel or wreck something because I absolutely hit it. I didn't even get a puncture! And so that that was a good test for the bike.

The between parts of the ride has been lovely mountain roads here, and the bike is just so lovely to ride on the road, so comfortable.

We were out for about seven hours, and it just felt so easy. Definitely, definitely a bike that I would go and buy. Even quite snotty hard stuff it feels very capable.

These new adventure bikes blow my mind because you can you can still ride at a really fast pace off-road and do pretty much anything that you would ever want to do off-road on them. But then you go on the road and it's like riding a superbike. It amazes me how far a bike like this has come on. It's been brilliant, a great job by Ducati and everyone involved in building this bike.”

Learn more about the new DesertX here.