Yesterday, work gave me a perfect excuse to take California Bay Area's famous "Skyline" ("highways" 9-35 92). It was my first time taking the MP3 500 that way, typically I'd leave it for the sportier bike.
That said, the MP3 was a ton of fun. The Skyline ride is fraught with deer and moisture patches and poor road surface sectors... which the MP3 gives one a lot of confidence on. While the Skyline has a big reputation in the California Bay Area among sports motorcycles and sports car drivers (tons of zillionaires around here, so there always is a contingent of Porsches and Ferraris and what not there), in all honesty I think 80% of it could be done at over 100mph flat provided you flaunt speed limits and you ride like it's a video game and you have extra lives - there is zero run off and often 200ft drop offs right off the road...
But I LOVED how planted the MP3 is. I did touch the center stand three or four times, and never felt I was pushing it.
The funniest part was: as I was headed north, I stopped at what we call "4 corners" to hydrate (non alcoholic of course). As I went back onto 35, a Ferrari drove by, then I entered 35. I swear I wasn't trying to catch it or in any way race it (in the hands of a competent driver I hold no illusions whatsoever about the fact it'd leave me in the dust), but it was absolutely funny: I caught up with it on a very twisty and shady bit. Every time there was a straight, the Ferrari would launch off. Every time it got twisty, I'd catch up. I am not naive: I know a Ferrari can hold much higher corner speed than any motorcycle, and trust me, I hold a big safety margin. In a nutshell, the MP3 had me smiling the whole ride.
The Ferrari driver didn't seem pleased though. Towards the end it was clear *he* thought I was trying to race. And as we got onto the real highway at the end of the ride, he blasted off into the distance on a straight at very illegal speeds.
The mileage I got during that ride was pretty awful though, I wish I'd reset things so I could accurately tell, but it was definitely around 40mpg, tops. And I don't think I touched the brakes often, it was all very smooth and zen, I wasn't wringing the throttle at all.
The only thing I think an MP3 doesn't like are surface irregularities at a certain "frequency" especially on a straight line. It can try to stubbornly follow such irregularities o the road.