Front End Chatter

Front End Chatter #188

Front End Chatter

Show Notes

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, the motorcycling podcast presented by Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons, a pair of bike journalists who've been riding and writing about dem motorbikes they have these days for bleedin' ages.

The pod is, as ever, supported and enabled and ennobled by Bennetts, the bike insurance gods, and BikeSocial.co.uk – the brightest and best biking website and YouTube channel rammed with motorcycling goodness content. Including lots of new bike reviews. Oh yes.

So on this long-awaited return to pod action, Martin and Simon talk about: • the new bikes they've been riding, such as: BMW's R1300 GS Honda's Africa Twin Adventure Sports Triumph's Speed & Scrambler 400s Suzuki's GSX-8R Yamaha's MT-09 Moto Guzzi's Stelvio Harley's Road and Street Glides Kawasaki's Eliminator 500

Phew! No wonder there's not been a pod for over a month!

Plus the lads natter about Yamaha's defunct-or-is-it R1, what is Euro5+ and why World Superbike might be making a comeback to a podcast near you soon.

Please like and subscribe, no, hang on, that's videos innit, getting me content mixed up... please download and tell your mates about the pod, what do you mean you haven't got any mates, tell you mum then, I dunno.

Compose questions, queries, ideas, perverted thoughts and musings, offers of free stuff, recreational and/or procreational pharmaceuticals, and send them electronically to: [email protected]

Bless ya, we're all in it together x @SimonHbikes @Mufga

More from Front End Chatter

Aug 3, 2026

Hello, welcome everyone and eyes down for The Big FEC Quiz Of The Year! For the first time in 224 episodes of semi-popular pontification, rarely informed speculation and increasingly elaborate two-wheeled tangents, him Simon Hargreaves and him Martin Fitz-Gibbons finally stop pretending to know all the answers… and start asking the questions instead.

Jul 9, 2026

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, Britain's most celebratory biking podcast, currently marking the historic 223rd anniversary of the moment Simon Hargreaves and Martin Fitz-Gibbons opened up a small family firm manufacturing essential podcast components. After the original Chatter Manors was flattened by an implausibly large quantity of pancakes falling from the sky, the burgeoning business was brought under state control by the good folk at Bennetts, Britain's best motorcycle insurance brokers. If your bike insurance is due soon get yourself a quote direct at bennetts.co.uk - and if it isn't, then head instead to bikesocial.co.uk for all manner of two-wheeled news and reviews. Oh, and don't forget to check out Bennetts BikeSocial on The YouTubes, where a brand new season of The Great Escape To The Country - sorry, What Bike Next? - will be dropping soon. Anyhow. In this episode Si & Mufga chatter all about: Downsizing, and whether small bikes are the next big thing Why Langen's Lightspeed is the polar inverse of BMW's R1300GS Silently sneaking around the countryside on Stark's Varg EX Screen (extenders) if you want to go faster Whether bike security is a total waste of time More grey import goodness Endurance racing glory and probably some other stuff too! It's a (relatively) tight one this, clocking in at just over an hour [Thank goodness - All]. Thank you, as always, for listening - and for the lucky few, we'll see you on FEC's 2026 The Moors The Merrier tour very soon! Until then, keep on sending your thoughts, wonderings and ponderings to [email protected] Mwah

Jun 15, 2026

Hello and sorry and welcome to Front End Chatter, and episode 222 of the motorcycling podcast that may (or may not) owe you an apology. That grovelling worm is Martin Fitz-Gibbons, and that recalcitrant rascal is Simon Hargreaves. Having spent several months avoiding facing up to the monster they unwittingly (in both senses) created, they're back with two hours of unrehearsed waffle about all things biking. As always they'd like to atone for their two-wheeled transgressions to Bennetts, Britain's best motorcycle insurers, represented on the interwebs by both BikeSocial (bikesocial.co.uk) and BikeClub (bikeclub.bennetts.co.uk) – between them a bewilderingly big bonanza of motorcycling news, product reviews, used bike buying guides, industry expert advice and so much more.

Mar 11, 2026

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, the motorcycling podcast, and none other than Episode 221 – they said we couldn't do it, but we've naysayed the naysayers. His name is Martin Fitz-Gibbons, editor of Bike magazine, and my name isn't but that's not important right now – what's important is we thank Bennetts, Britain's best motorcycle insurers who put more back into biking than insurance companies who put less back into biking, and some of whom put nothing back but merely take take take. Good people one and all. And also uber-thanks to the bikesocial.co.uk, the world of wokecycling on the web and on the YouTubes, with loads of news, views, new bike launches and road tests – all the good stuff.

Jan 19, 2026

Hello and welcome to Front End Chatter, the podcast home of all things motorcycle-related, albeit tangentially sometimes, which, let's be honest, it's a slow news decade and we have to talk about something so why not just gossip? He's Martin Fitz-Gibbons and he's Simon Hargreaves, a pair of motorcycle content creators. And they're Bennetts, Britain's Best Bike Insurers, to whom we are all indebted, sometimes quite literally. And they're bikesocial.co.uk, where the web meets the world of bikes.

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