First Look: 2022 Yamaha YZF-R7

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While it was perhaps the worst-kept secret in the sportbike world, Yamaha is releasing a new YZF sportbike based on its MT-07. Essentially the melding of (semi-)high-performance chassis and (fully) high-performance brakes with the engine and some of the running gear of its budget-minded MT-07 sportster, the 2022 YZF-R7 joins the ranks of twin-cylinder middleweight supersport bikes replacing the four-cylinder superbikes — like Yamaha’s own R6 — whose sales have fallen on hard times.

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Essentially, the R6s and CBRs that dominated the segment for the last 30 years have priced themselves out of the market. Powered by screaming, high-tech four-cylinder engines, they were priced only negligibly below the 1,000-cc monsters that dominate the superbike segment.

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First Look: 2022 Yamaha YZF-R7 Back to video

Enter the YZF-R7. Priced at $10,799, it undercuts the last R6 by some $3,500. For that comparatively bargain basement pricing, one gets the attitude of a YZF supersport machine — the R7 having some serious styling bona fides — and a substantially reworked chassis. Although the basic frame remains identical, rake and trail have been altered for more agility and the budget-bike suspension of the MT-07 has been upgraded to a fully-adjustable set of 41-mm inverted forks — rebound as well compression and rebound damping all being variable — and a superior KYB rear single shock. Radially-disposed front brake calipers as well as a Brembo-sourced radial master cylinder ensure that anyone venturing onto a racetrack with the new YZF won’t be left wanting.

What hasn’t changed is the MT-07’s basic powertrain. Oh, you can get a quickshifter (as an option) and a slipper clutch now prevents rear wheel lockup under heavy braking, but the 689-cc twin is largely unchanged. That’s not such a bad thing, as it’s garnered rave reviews in the MT-07, its 270-degree “cross-plane” crankshaft adding a certain V-twin allure to an otherwise pedestrian parallel twin.

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That said, it only produces a little over 70 horsepower, a far cry 115-plus horses the R6 used to claim. And it spins to but 10,000 rpm, a far cry from the 16,000 rpm the short-stroke four-cylinder R6 used to attain with regularity.

But the market has determined such outlandish performance is simply no longer necessary. Indeed, whereas the old R6 was very much a junior superbike for dedicated enthusiasts who valued its middleweight agility over the 1,000-cc power, Yamaha Canada sees the YZF-R7 as a move-up bike from the current 321-cc R3, and its clientele more concerned with looks and price than outright performance. The R7 certainly looks the part, with little outwardly to suggest it isn’t a bona fide superbike, and it’s quite fetching in its Team Yamaha Blue livery. The price ain’t bad either.