At EICMA 2019, Aprilia gave us the ol’ razzle-dazzle with the introduction of the shiny new RS 660 middleweight sportbike and its naked counterpart’s prototype, the Tuono 660 Concept. While everyone was checking out the two striking bikes, we almost missed a massive clue about Aprilia’s next model—and perhaps the most exciting of the lot. It’s likely that most attendees apart from the eagle-eyed once at EIMCA 2019 missed catching a glimpse of the Aprilia Tuareg 660 concept. Yes, Aprilia is bringing back the Tuareg name for its adventure motorcycle series. Nearly a year since EICMA, the Italian middleweight ADV has been spotted testing in Europe.

Although details remain pretty scarce, the spy shot showcases a very purposeful design, pretty much like a Yamaha Tenere 700 or even a Honda Africa Twin. It looks like a large enduro motorcycle with wire spoke rims at both ends, a high rise handlebar, a short windshield and an extremely high upswept exhaust.After all, the model was Aprilia’s famous adventurer produced until the mid-90s. Combined with that shiny new 660cc powertrain and a booming mid-size adventure segment and the math wasn’t hard to do. 

The end-can seems rather large, a bit too large for an ADV. Still, it will be powered by the same 660cc parallel-twin engine built from the forward bank of cylinders of the RSV4. The engine dishes out 101.4PS on the RS 660 but we guess it will be detuned a bit for the Tuareg. However, we expect Aprilia to tune this motor for better adventure capability. Hence, peak output might see a dip from 100PS to something that’s a bit more manageable on- as well as off-road. More details regarding both the Tuono 660 Concept and the new Tuareg 660 are expected to be revealed in upcoming months.

Since it is the season of big bike announcements, let’s see if Aprilia takes the cover off the bike, at least in concept guise. More importantly for the Noale firm, will we see the naked Tuono 660 in production-spec soon. Almost a year later and we have yet to see a production-ready Tuono 660, let alone a Tuareg 660. At least, that was until a keen-eyed observer spotted what looks like the rumored Tuareg out for a ride. We can hope that sometime in October or November, 2020, around the time the big motorcycles shows would normally happen, Aprilia is going to have a little something adventurous to share with us in the Nepalese market. Stay tuned with us for more auto news in Nepal.