Motorcycle Classics

Writer Hamish Cooper takes us inside the Museo Scooter & Lambretta in Rodano, just outside Milan, Italy. The museum is part of the Province of Milan’s Network of Business Museums, which brings together museums of national importance. Check out the st

Gold Wings from the 1980s aren’t too hard to find, but finding a really nice one is getting to be a bit more of a challenge. Ten years ago they were everywhere, but as they’ve become more and more affordable, it seems they’ve been treated with less c

Retro classics are a part of the motorcycle industry we've kept a close eye on since the founding of this magazine in the summer of 2005. Over the years we've featured new model profiles of many of the big hitters like the myriad iterations of the Tr

Honda’s Gold Wing was flying high in the 1980s. The second-generation GL1100 model became the first factory full-fairing Japanese tourer in Interstate and luxurious Aspencade versions. Sales were booming; and the made-in-Marysville, Ohio, Wing avoide

Two very different engines powered the Voyager through the 1980s: adapting the KZ1300 six-pot motor allowed the Green Guys to dip their toes in the luxury touring marker without the development costs of a new engine. But in spite of digital fuel inje

Two motorcycle documentary films, above all others, are considered classics today. On Any Sunday probably registered first in your mind as one of those films, but if you weren’t part of the motorcycle scene during the early 1980s you may not be famil

Captivated by the MV Agusta 750S America in the late 1970s, Rick Fuhry wrote a letter to Hatboro, Philadelphia-based distributor Cosmopolitan Motors Ltd. Rick admits he was simply dreaming about the motorcycle but was curious about price and availabi

Australia’s Troy Corser marked the 20th anniversary staging of the UK’s Goodwood Revival in 2018 by thundering to his debut victory in the Barry Sheene Memorial Trophy event — the world’s most prestigious Historic road race, which that year catered f

Australian two-time World Superbike champion Troy Corser, 48, has been a regular contender for a rostrum finish at the Goodwood Revival ever since he first raced there eight years ago, after his final season in World Superbike with the BMW factory te

Launching a drag racing motorcycle down the quarter mile takes a tremendous amount of concentration. A competitor needs to focus solely on making it to the end of the run, everything else is just a distraction. But surely, back in the 1950s and 1960s

“Let the Midnight Special shine a light on meLet the Midnight Special shine a light on meLet the Midnight Special shine a light on meLet the Midnight Special shine a ever loving light on me.” Traditional prison work song, recorded by Leadbelly, Creed

Fifty years ago in the summer of 1970, a very strange motorcycle was increasingly often spotted in and around Bologna, Italy’s two-wheeled capital. It seemed an ingenious hybrid with a wide-angle V-twin engine set lengthways in the frame, with a dist

Maybe few people know that in 1966, the instrumental group The Sandals created The Endless Summer surf movie theme song and threw it into an album stuffed with more surf songs as well as several cool bike instrumentals entitled, TR-6, Out Front, Good

Ubiquitous is a word that has become … well, ubiquitous. Defined as “seeming to be found everywhere,” the word is frequently misused. But it would be true to say that, in the British motorcycle industry, Villiers 2-strokes really were ubiquitous. Doz

It was to be the motorcycle race to top all motorcycle races in America. The 1971 Champion Spark Plug Classic 250 was, according to sources at the time, the longest road race in AMA history, boasting the largest prize purse ever. It also was the 1971

While most of the race action takes place on the track itself, there’s drama, of sorts, to be found when talking with the riders and crew members in the pits and garages after the racing ceases for the day. Cycle magazine’s editor Cook Neilson unders

9/5 Visit the Owls Head Transportation Museum in Owls Head, Maine, for the Vintage Motorcycle Festival and Antique Aeroplane Show. Entry fee is $18. The featured marque this year is all Japanese-manufactured motorcycles. On the web at owlshead.org 9/

Q: Hello, Keith, maybe you can help me. I bought an all original 1975 Norton 850 Commando from a woman whose husband had passed away. The bike has 2,750 miles and is a one-owner machine. It appears to be 100% original and was last inspected in 1995.

Situated atop the Santa Lucia Mountains on the central California coast, Hearst Castle is one of the world’s great destinations on one of the world’s premier roads. Midway between Los Angeles and San Francisco on the Pacific Coast Highway, a visit to

For cleanup, repair, and detailing needs we went with Pro Honda products all the way. Our first step was hooking up the OptiMate 3 Automatic 5 Stage Battery Charger to maintain the scrambler’s battery during the down weeks of repair. It’s true, Pro H

Fitted neatly together in a roll-up portable pouch, CruzTOOLS’ RoadTech M3 Metric Tool Kit packs many tools that Japanese motorcycles, old and new, may require on the road. And it’s more complete than a typical stock tool kit, with combination wrench

What: Hearst Castle, 750 Hearst Castle Road, San Simeon, California, 93452, (800) 444-4445. Tickets start at $25 per adult, and they’re worth every penny. How to Get There: Find your way to the Pacific Coast Highway, head north from Los Angeles or so

How and why, exactly, did Ontario Motor Speedway — aka The Big O — fail? Several factors contributed to its demise, but in the end the fickle finger of fate primarily points to the root of all evil — money. In particular it was real estate money that