BMW R80 G/S
Forty-three years ago, BMW took a gamble in struggling times. And it struck lucky. The quirky bike released would become the grandaddy of one third of all the motorcycles sold in the UK in 2023 – the Adventure Bike.
The BMW R80 G/S wasn’t called that at the time; the term had not been invented. The pundits didn’t know what to call it, and most thought that an 800cc shaft-driven bike designed for trips on and off-road was a bit too much, and might have been better left in the hands of ISDT experts. Was it a street/trail bike? An on/off-roader? Dual purpose? Even BMW didn’t have a name for it and apologised to the press that there wasn’t a buzzword to hang on the new machine. The Americans briefly flirted with calling it an ‘Explorer bike’.
Until the R80 G/S arrived, dual purpose bikes were a compromise – okay, on the dirt, okay on the road, but not really great at
