The Vegas is American made, but unlike a Harley it has a much more modern level of performance, while still looking stylish. It might be missing the Harley Davidson badge, but it has everything else, including an affordable and appealing price tag.

The Vegas isn’t just quick for a cruiser, but the acceleration is proper, stomach churning, ‘laugh out loud’ quick. With 106ftlb of torque exploding to the rear tyre and relatively little weight to push along (for a cruiser) it hits so much harder than you’d imagine. It has a smooth five-speed gearbox, but you barely need to trouble it as there’s big dollops of grunt whenever you twist the throttle, at any revs and in any gear.

It can handle spirited riding through the bends, has decent ground clearance and won’t wobble or weave too, much, impressive for this type of bike. Although there’s only one brake upfront it does a decent job of stopping you, although you need to supplement the front brake with a foot-ful of rear if you really want to stop quickly. It’s more a Sunday morning machine on the comfort stakes as you’re exposed to the wind and the cruiser ‘hanging off the bars’ riding position isn’t that comfy.

There’s not much in the way of bells and whistles here, the Vegas is minimalist at best, but there’s a whole industry dedicated to aftermarket bolt-on accessories

Overall the Victory is very well built and overall better than an equivalent Harley, but it’s built down to a price so there’s a few cheap looking bits lurking like the Japanese-style plastic indicator housings. We haven’t heard of any major problems with reliability.

http://www.victorymotorcycles.com/en-us/home.aspx

http://www.victorymotorcycles.com/en-us/cruiser/vegas-8-ball/motorcycle

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Motorcycles