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'Cajun' from Kiwibiker crams in a mixture of rides in just 2,000km on his Suzuki GSXR600 K4 (2004)

At the time of writing this review I had owned my 2004 Suzuki GSXR600 K4 for just over 2 months and done 2000km on it. Despite the relatively short time owned I've tested it in all kinds of rides, from weekend thrashes to daily commuting and touring.

Very yellow... and very good with it This bike is such great fun to ride no matter what you do with it. Around town it is small and light, and provides plenty of power low down. On the open road, it sits great on the road and handles like a dream, laying down enough power, even when you are sitting top gear at 100km/h, but that's not often. If you are in a position to up the pace a touch, I have found it likes sitting at 120kms-ish on the open road, but then I have found this with most 600 sports bikes.

The bike expects - no, wants - you to rev it all the way to the red line (do this and experience the amazing ram air growl) and crack it over as far as you dare. It inspires confidence in all aspects of your riding.

Over all build quality is Suzuki, not Honda, but good, apart from some of the paint cover on the some of the edges is a little thin, which seams to be a problem the world over. I have had no problems with parts, apart from a faulty Suzuki oil filter on its first service that blew the O-ring.

The seat height is tall 825mm but it doesn't over all feel that tall. Peg positions feel fine and I am 6'2, and my wife at 5'6 feels fine on it as well. I have ridden this bike non-stop for 3 hours, and I still felt perfectly fine, with no sore legs/arms/ass (Delete as appropriate). I couldn't ride my old GSXR 1100 this long with out being sore for the rest of the day.

The headlight is great at night - awesome on low beam, good high beam but really needs a little adjustment higher and maybe a brighter bulb, if you ride at night in rural/open road areas. The brakes? What more can you say than long live radial mounted. Two finger braking is wonderful even at well over twice the legal speed limit (all done on a track, Officer, honest).

It is shod with Bridgestone 014 as standard, which if you believe what the hype tells you were made for the GSXR 600/750 and CBR1000RR. I personally love Bridgestones, they are great tyres, in the dry and in the wet, are very controllable and let you know before they start to slide.

Fuel wise, it is pretty good, relatively speaking, but remember we're taking sports bike performance so fuel consumption is always going to be a little higher than your average bike.

The adjustable shift light, which comes as standard, is a good posing toy, but after a while you don't bother using it, due to you having to turn it on every time you start the motorcycle. In the end you don't use it, you just change gears like every other motorcycle by sound and feel.

I have only made a few simple modifications to this motorcycle, I installed frame slides and have had the standard exhaust changed, which releases a few more ponies and made it that bit more responsive.

One of the first things everyone has to do if they have one of these is great rid of that shovel of a rear guard/number plate holder! It isn't hard, and does not cost much to get a bracket made up.

It comes in three colours, Suzuki blue/white, black/orange, or the sexy yellow/black. For the price, given what you get the 2004 GSXR 600 is a bargain.

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