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Wherefore art thou, Honda Africa Twin? For years now we have been lamenting Honda's inclusion of a true middleweight ADV offering in its lineup, to go up against bikes like the BMW F850GS, and newcomers like the Aprilia Tuareg 660 and Yamaha Ténéré 700. Today, that wish has been answered.

On paper, the Honda Transalp fits the bill, though I reserve some judgment until I see US pricing and availability.

My only serious gripe with the spec sheet is the bare-bones suspension pieces, but a cut-throat price tag could help me swallow that pill (along with some nice drop-in cartridges in the aftermarket).

Instead, most of my thoughts on the Transalp actually concern the Africa Twin.

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After much expectation and waiting, the Honda Transalp returns to Big Red’s lineup. Officially dubbed the 2023 Honda XL750 Transalp, the bike shares its 755cc parallel-twin engine with the new Honda CB750 Hornet.

This means power comes in at 90hp (67.5 kW), with torque at 56 lbs•ft (75 Nm). That should be plenty to appease those shopping in the middleweight ADV segment, and the 458 lbs (208 kg) wet weight means that the Honda Transalp competes nicely against even the latest crop of machines in this category.

The KTM 790 Duke is coming back as a 2022 model year machine, so says the Austrian brand. That might come as a bit of surprise, since the KTM 890 Duke R replaced its smaller sibling in late-2019.

This curious move seems to come for the benefit of the European market, where a 95hp version of the KTM 790 Duke will be made available for A2 license holders, with a price tag of €8,999.

The rest of the world’s markets will get the 2022 KTM 790 Duke with its full pop of 105hp, though it’s not clear if the 790 will come to North American soil.

I’m sitting in the airline lounge at JFK right now, waiting to hop across the pond to ride the new Aprilia Tuareg 660 in Italy, and I was thinking to myself how weird it is at this stage that we don’t have any proper photos of the Aprilia Tuareg 660.

Well, the minds in Noale must have been picking up what I was putting down, because there was a dump of high-resolution photos of the Tuareg 660 put on their press site today.

For $12,000, the 2022 Aprilia Tuareg 660 puts out 80hp from its parallel-twin engine, and tips the scales at 449 lbs at the curb.

It was just a handful of days ago that we got to see the Triumph Trident 660 motorcycle make its world debut – with the value-focused three-cylinder roadster looking like a very strong candidate for the middleweight category.

Now, news out of India sees the British brand is set to follow-up the Trident 660 with two adventure-styled models. One is a more off-road focused, while the other fits better in the adventure-sport category.

The bike we never thought would make it to the United States is getting closer to actually landing on American soil, and today we have even more good news about the Yamaha Ténéré 700.

This is because Yamaha Motor USA has just shared with us pricing for the 2021 Yamaha Ténéré 700, and the Japanese brand has nailed things on the head with their $9,999 MSRP for this middleweight adventure-tourer.

One of BMW Motorrad’s big reveals for the 2019 EICMA show in Milan, the BMW F900XR brings two big announcements with it.

First, there is the obvious middleweight addition to the XR “adventure-sport” lineup, and second that the German’s 270° parallel-twin will see a 895cc displacement for the Euro5 homologation.

Riffing on the BMW 9cento concept that we saw a year-and-a-half ago, the 2020 BMW F900XR keeps many of the concept’s lines, while infusing more of its bigger sibling into the design as well.

This is a story we broke a eight months ago finally coming true. The 790 engine platform from KTM has finally grown into the 890 platform that is ready for the Euro 5 emissions requirements.

And if you will allow us to toot our own horn just a little bit more, our predictions of an up-spec middleweight Duke have turned out true as well.

Now, while we may be patting ourselves on the back here, the real winners are all the sport bike enthusiasts out there, because the best middleweight naked on the market just got better, in just about every way. Say hello to the KTM 890 Duke R.

Debuting just before this year’s EICMA show in Milan, we see one of the Tuning Fork brand’s few exciting bikes for next year.

What will surely continue to be a European model only, the Yamaha Tracer 700 gets refreshed for the 2020 model year.

Based off the Yamaha MT-07 platform, this parallel-twin sports tourer boasts a new full-fairing design that is strangely eye-catching.

Beneath that fairing though is where the real changes reside, as the big highlight feature for 2020 is that the 689cc engine gets tweaked for Euro5 emission homologation.

One of the most anticipated motorcycles set to debut at this year’s EICMA show is the Aprilia RS 660.

A sport bike twins offering from the Noale brand, the 2020 Aprilia RS 660 is set to flip the middleweight twin-cylinder segment on its head, with rumors of a 100hp and sub-400 lbs weight measurements.

Now, we have our first glimpse of this potent bike, in its production form, thanks to the fact that Aprilia has begun teasing the launch of the RS 660 on social media.