THE REAL DEAL
"Flyin' Market"
Most race replicas are little more than a visual nod to their inspiration. But not this. Dripping in pukka HRC parts and beautifully engineered one-off components, this Honda RC24 is so close in spec to Fred Merkel’s 1986 AMA championship-winning VFR750F Interceptor it could pass for the real thing In late 2016, DB Customs’ Darren Begg received a request he simply couldn’t refuse. A message landed in his inbox from American AMA fanatic Michael Peterson asking if Darren could build him a replica of Fred Merkel’s 1986 championship-winning AMA Honda VFR750F Interceptor.
Michael had grown up watching Merkel and Honda teammate Wayne Rainey racing in the ’80s, so he’d always harboured the dream to own a replica of their AMA bikes. It quickly became apparent that Michael wasn’t interested in something offering a mere passing resemblance to Fred’s RC24 racer. He wanted the real deal, built from a vast inventory of genuine HRC parts he’d accumulated from around the world – a bike so close
