2020 · Supersport · Buyer's Guide
Supercharged Exotica With Hub-Center Soul
Bimota builds the Tesi H2 around an idea nobody else commits to at this level. The front wheel steers through a leading-link, hub-center front end instead of a conventional fork, and the entire motorcycle is shaped around that geometry. Behind it sits a supercharged 998 cc inline-four making 231 hp and 104 lb-ft at 11,000 rpm. Öhlins TTX36 damping and Brembo Stylema calipers are standard, as are cornering ABS, traction control, and a quickshifter that works up and down. This is a limited-run machine, built as much for a collector's floor as for a fast road.
It ages the way exotica ages. The value sits in rarity and in the quality of the parts you can see, not in what it costs to run. This is a bike for a rider who already owns something sensible and wants a second machine that stands outside every norm, in the garage and on a Sunday road. The honest part: 472 lb wet, a 33.1 in seat, and a 4.5 gal tank at 36 mpg add up to short legs on a long day, and there is no luggage, no navigation, no heated grips. You buy the identity and you accept the terms.
Spec sheets don't ride bikes, but they set the baseline.
| Power | 231 hp (170 kW) |
|---|---|
| Torque | 104 lb-ft (141 Nm) @ 11,000 rpm |
| Displacement | 998 cc |
| Engine | Inline-four |
| Cooling | Liquid-cooled |
| Gearbox | 6-speed |
| Fork | Leading-link |
| Front tire | 120/70-17 |
| Rear tire | 200/55-17 |
| Seat height | 33.1 in (841 mm) |
| Wet weight | 472 lb (214 kg) |
| Fuel capacity | 4.5 gal (17 L) |
| Fuel economy | 36 mpg (US) |
Equipment check
Chassis
Drivetrain
Safety
The named systems that set this bike apart — and what each one does for you.
Braking
Sit on it and the first thing you register is how low and far forward your hands sit, and how tall 33.1 in feels once 472 lb settles under you at walking pace. Fire it up and the noise is the event, hard and metallic with the induction layered underneath, loud enough to reach your chest before you have moved an inch. Roll away and the mass vanishes almost immediately. Through the bars the feedback arrives differently than a fork delivers it, quieter and further away, and it takes a few miles before your hands stop asking questions and start trusting it. At real road pace the bike sits flat and still and asks very little of you physically. Shifts go through cleanly in both directions without the clutch. Half a tank in, you are already thinking about where the next fuel stop is.
This section isn't my riding. It's what has reached me over the years: talk at events, owners keen to tell you about their bike, club-night conversation, and the messages riders send me directly. Very few people have real time on one, so I weigh every account carefully. What comes back is consistent anyway: the enthusiasm is all about how it goes, the doubts are all about owning it.
The supercharged four dominates almost every conversation. Riders talk about a shove that arrives instantly and never lets up, and a top-end rush they raise unprompted. The front brakes come up after that, credited with real stopping power and feel still in the lever. The chassis draws fewer mentions but the reports agree: rock steady when the road opens up, and more agile in corners than most riders assume.
The critical notes are fewer, and they attach to ownership, not performance. The suspension that rewards smooth, quick roads gets described as punishing once the pace drops into town traffic. Some point out that homologation stops at Euro 4, with what that means for cities that police emissions. And two things come up every time: the price, and how few were ever built.
No widely-reported issues on record.
Where this Bimota Tesi H2 pulls ahead of — or falls behind — its rivals on the numbers, and the typical bike in its class on character.
Power
Torque
Displacement
Wet weight
Seat height
Forget spec-sheet bragging. Here's who the Tesi H2 is actually built for.
You will have the pace, the lean clearance, and the suspension quality for any session you enter. Just be honest that you are taking a rare, expensive machine somewhere things get crashed.
Made for Barber Motorsports Park · WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca · Circuit of the Americas
This is the road it was built for. Strong drive off slow corners, real suspension, and a machine nobody else at the turnout will have. The traffic on the way up is the toll you pay.
Made for Angeles Crest Highway · Coronado Trail / US 191 · Highway 1 / Big Sur
Tight, repeatable corner work suits it, and the low-rpm pull matches the rhythm of those roads. Plan your fuel: 4.5 gallons disappears quickly when you are riding hard.
Made for Back of the Dragon · Blue Ridge Parkway · Cherohala Skyway
If this one isn't quite the fit, these are the bikes worth riding back-to-back against it.
Any price note compares both bikes at the same age — the youngest age both have on the used market — against this Bimota Tesi H2. “cheaper/pricier” is what that bike costs second-hand, not how worn it is.
