First ride: 2004 Yamaha FZ6

Good brakes are good news because the FZ6 has motor--likely more motor than anything else in the middleweight standard class. The little Fizzer's powerplant is built around the world-beater R6 mill, retuned here for better power at lower, more street-specific revs. The bore-and-stroke dimensions, combustion-chamber shape, forged pistons, valves, crank and linerless, direct-plated cylinders are all identical to the R6, though it does diverge internally in a few significant areas: reshaped camshafts, reconfigured inlet and exhaust ports, and a slightly lower (down 0.2) compression ratio.