By: Séan Hendley and Garth Taylor
There’s nothing quite like the thrill of collecting a brand-new motorcycle with zero clicks on the clock. Fresh out the crate, plastic still on the seat, not a scuff in sight, that’s how my five-day odyssey with Suzuki’s all-new GSX-S 1000 GX began.
Over the next 2,500km, I’d travel from Cape Town to Johannesburg the long way, through mountain passes, the hamlets of the Swartberge, and over the wide Karoo, testing every aspect of this high-tech sport-tourer, (that’s a misnomer, you’ll see why – read on). What I found was a bike with plenty to love… and a few things that had me scratching my helmet.
I spent the first two days around Cape Town, putting mileage on the fresh engine and visiting the local bike dealers. From Bloubergstrand’s postcard-perfect views to the corners of Franschhoek Pass, the GX felt immediately at home. It’s more sportsbike than tourer in feel, flickable, taut, and loaded with grunt.
The engine, derived from Suzuki’s GSX-R platform, is a beaut. Smooth delivery, sharp throttle response, and that classic four-cylinder wail when you wind it up. It’s refined, yet raw when you want it to be.
The new electronic suspension is also impressive. It’s quick to adjust, soaks up bumps effortlessly, and gives the bike a beautifully connected feel through twisty sections. A real highlight of the package.
From Cape Town I took the long road up through Robertson, Montagu and Barrydale, with the usual photo stop at Ronnie’s Sex Shop. Then a turn south for a few more dealer visits in George.
This is where I started noticing a few niggles. In the interest of fairness, at two metres tall, I’m not exactly “average height,” and the GSX-S isn’t exactly built for orangutans. The footpegs are quite high, the stepped seat limited my movement somewhat, and the windscreen directed all the airflow straight to my visor. After a few hours, it became a bit of a battle of endurance to be honest, but hey – I was on a bike and riding some of the best roads in South Africa.
The screen is technically adjustable… but only with tools and aftermarket well-nuts. Not exactly touring-friendly in my humble opinion. I ended up buying earplugs in Robertson because the wind noise really was nuking my brain.
Day four was a big one, from George up the N9, through Uniondale, Aberdeen, and Graaff-Reinet to Colesberg. I was actually aiming to overnight in Bloem, but left George way too late to cover that kind of distance safely. With the engine now nicely broken in, I finally opened the taps.
Top-end performance is strong, and the bike devours long roads effortlessly in sixth. But… Suzuki, why is top speed electronically limited to 225km/h? This is a GSX-S, not a V-Strom. A litre-class bike with this kind of pedigree should be good for more.
Also, around 80–100km/h, a strange vibration kicks in through the footpegs. Not dangerous, but annoying enough to be quite noticeable. Not ideal for a continent-crossing machine.
Leaving Colesberg early on the morning of my fifth day on the road, I made a detour to !Xhariep Dam, then headed through Bloemfontein for a few more dealer visits before aiming the front wheel at Jozi. It was cold, it was dry, and it was fast.
This is right when I would have liked to have had heated grips, eventually locking into cruise control and burying my fingers into the back of the handguards did help a bit.. This is a minor niggle, but when competitors throw them in as standard at a similar price point, Suzuki’s omission do seem a bit strange. Your hands take a beating in Karoo winter wind and I hadn’t procured my “FIVE WFX Prime Evo GTX” gloves yet.
And speaking of “touring-ready,” strapping on luggage without Suzuki’s OEM panniers is a bit of a puzzle. Tie-down points are at a bit of a premium, but with a couple of straps, a cargo net and a bit of ingenuity I figured it out well enough to get home. The OEM luggage is definitely something to consider if you’re planning long hauls.
The GX comes with Suzuki’s new MySpin app integration, and once Jannie Jordaan from Bikeshop Boksburg-Suzuki East showed me the ropes, it worked a treat. Full-screen navigation, music control, and call integration plus lots more all from your phone to the TFT dash. Easy, clean, modern. Admittedly it did take me a bit longer to come to terms with the nav keys on the left switchgear and learning the standard menus, so I made sure I had everything set just right before setting off for the day.
So, in a nutshell here are some of the hi’s and lo’s from my 5 days in the saddle of the Suzuki GSX-S 1000 GX. Starting with what I really liked of course, The engine is strong, responsive in the bottom end and really great in the midrange, in any gear you can quickly yank on the gas and you go from dawdling around to whipping past anything that happens to get in your way, with no need to kick down through the box, proper GSX-R roots….. and that top-end howl is pure addiction.
The electronic suspension does its thing quietly in the background at lower speeds without any noticeable intrusions. However, when I started cranking it through the corners on some of the more bumpy sections and realised the GX isn’t getting out of shape, when quite honestly it should have been, then I started to understand what an important feature it really is, absolutely brilliant, confidence-inspiring and plush.
I am also quite a fan of the styling with its aggressive and modern sharp lines and distinctive LED lights up front giving it proper road presence. I do like the ‘MySpin’ App, once I got it set up, it’s intuitive and adds real value.The cockpit layout is also what I have come to expect from Suzuki, everything is where it should be and exactly where I looked for it and that TFT screen is also very lekker with a logical layout and easy to read in most light conditions.
Now, in the interest of a fair and balanced review, there were a few things I didn’t enjoy. Some of them are more to do with my 2 metre chassis, versus the GX’s more, let me say ‘normal’ dimensions. Running around Cape Town I barely noticed, however once on the open road and a couple of hours in the saddle the ergonomics started feeling quite tight, not really suited to my tall frame. I found the pegs a bit too high, and the seat too tight to get into a comfortable long distance rider triangle. The buzz through the pegs really started becoming quite amplified towards the end of each 8 hour day in the saddle.
Fuel anxiety is a real thing travelling long distances solo through the ververlaatevlaktes, especially with patchy cell phone reception and not knowing anybody within 300km’s, and an average of a 100km’s between little dorpies with little to no traffic on the road, so when I filled up each time, the 263 km indicated range raised an eyebrow when I was wandering civilisation, but became really concerning when when the GPS indicated 257km’s to my next overnight stop or major town. Some of these little Karoo Dorpies only stock diesel for the farmers’ bakkies and tractors and generally only at the Co-Op if at all. Yeah I made it each time, but on one long section I chickened out and wandered into Aberdeen about 40 odd kays before Graaff Reinette, the remaining range and distance were just a little bit too close for comfort.
After 2,500km of everything from twisty passes to wide-open nothingness, I climbed off the GX with mixed feelings. It’s fast, refined, and full of performance tech. It looks amazing, sounds fantastic, and rides beautifully, especially with that trick suspension.
But it’s also not as “touring-ready” as I initially believed or expected, I had the “Sports Tourer”, (the misnomer I referred to earlier) monika in my head, but it isn’t and Suzuki doesn’t market it that way either, they use the term “Sports Crossover”, which is a slightly less aggressive Sports Bike, once I understood that little bit of semantics, then it started. The GSX-S 1000 GX started making more sense to me. Tall riders will struggle, practicalities like heated grips, self cancelling indicators and a quick and easily adjustable windshield were missed on this trip.
Would I do it all again? Heck yes but I’d have the screen moved to its highest position before leaving, pack my FIVE gloves, and get better suited luggage.
In my humble opinion the GX is for riders who want more sport than tourer, more twisties than highways, and aren’t afraid to compromise a little comfort for a whole lot of character.
We let Garth Taylor loose on it for a few weeks, and to be fair, he is of more normal stature than our resident Sasquatch Séan, and had this to say about the Suzuki GSX-S 1000 GX:
The sport-tourer I didn’t expect to love this much…
When I first jumped on the Suzuki GSX-S1000GX, it took me a bit of time to get reacquainted with it, as it had been quite awhile since I rode a 1000 GX. Was it a sportbike, a tourer, a transformer? It looked big, sleek and kind of angry, but familiar at the same time.
Heading out on it almost a year later was… interesting. The handling felt a bit strange at first, like my body and the bike hadn’t agreed on how we were going to move through the world. The upright riding position and wide bars made it feel a bit top-heavy at low speeds. And the foot pegs? Planted exactly where my feet naturally go when I stop. Cue a few awkward toe-taps trying to find the ground.
But after a day, I got used to it, and something shifted. Suddenly, it all started to make sense. The seating position, the stability, the comfort, it just clicked. And after that? Pure joy.
This bike is fast. At low revs, it’s chill and manageable, perfectly happy to potter around town or sit in traffic without complaining. But open it up, and it roars to life. It’s sneaky quick. Look down for a second and you’re way over the limit. It’s that kind of bike.
What really stood out to me was how easy it was to ride. I’m not a bike tech guy, but switching between ride modes and adjusting settings was simple. The screen is bright and clear, and nothing feels confusing or overcomplicated. I even managed to figure out the cruise control without having to Google anything, which is saying something.
One of my favourite features was the quick shifter. You don’t need to use the clutch to change gears, just tap up or down. It makes you feel like a total boss, and the sound of the engine on the downshifts? Pure music
Comfort-wise, it surprised me. I took it on a few longer rides and my body didn’t complain once. The seat is great, the windscreen does a decent job (even though it’s not huge), and the ride is smooth. My wife came along for one of the rides and said the pillion seat was comfy, although the slope of it kept pushing her into me. I didn’t mind.
Fuel-wise, I found it about average, somewhere in the region of 16 or so km per litre . For a big bike with serious power, it actually sips fuel at a reasonable rate. That made it feel like something I could ride every day, not just on weekends.
At first, I wasn’t sure if this bike was for me. But the more I rode it, the more I fell for it. I found myself making excuses to go out again, “Oh, we’re out of milk? Be back in an hour!”
The GX is fun, fast, and way more practical than I expected. If you’re looking for something that can do it all, and do it with a grin, this might just be the one
Final Verdict:
We put two very different riders in every way on the Suzuki GSX-S 1000 GX and got two very different reviews back. And what can we deduce from that? The GX would appear to be a focused machine, front row rugby players like Séan, (2 metres tall and 115kg), may not be the riders that the designers focused on, but rather the more standard sized riders like Garth (1,80m and a shade under 75kg’s). That being said, both came back with very positive reviews overall. Our best advice is to wander down to your local Suzuki Dealer and go ride one for yourself.
