Triumph Flat Track Blog

70's Triumph Flattrack Bike

I just found this blog dedicated to Triumph flattrack racing. A lot of cool pics, but hate to report that the most recent posts are from 2010. Nonetheless, if you are a Triumph fan, check it out for a lot of pics of vintage and modern Triumph flatttrack racers and racing photos.

Gorgeous Ron Wood Rotax Flattracker

Ron Wood 600cc Rotax Flattracker

What a gorgeous bike... clean, simple lines and bright red paint. Here's a Kneeslider blog post about it from way back in 2006. Still beautiful eight years later.

Ohmori Masatoshi, Stylish Japanese Flattrack Star

Some really stylish moves here by Japanese dirttrack and Supermotard star, Ohmori Masatoshi...


 

Ron Wood BMW F800 Dirttracker

Ron Wood BMW F800 Dirttracker

This one is from about six years back, but it's just so beautiful I had to put it up here for flat track fans... the Ron Wood designed and built BMW F800 dirttrack machine.

See more pics and learn more about the genesis of this gorgeous machine at Cycle World online.

Check out this post we did last year about a classic Ron Wood Norton Grand National dirttracker.

BikeCraft on the New Generation of Custom Motorcycle Builders

Cafe Racer Dreams Ossa

If you are wondering what is happening in the world of custom bike building now, I highly recommend an informative and thoughtful article in the new, first edition BikeCraft magazine, titled "The State We're In." This lengthy piece features interviews with outstanding members of the new generation of bike builders from shops around the world. Of course the article is also embellished with a dozen great shots of their bikes. I'd recommend hustling down to your local newstand to pick up a copy for just this one article alone.

The folks at BikeCraft see that we are at the end of the era of "billet and bling," which is being replaced by a new aesthetic that favors a simple, clean look for low-cost, daily riders. What I find very cool is all the creative work that is in many cases being done with the most unlikely bikes, such as the Kawasaki WS650 or the Yamaha XS750... we're going way outside the old parameters of the world of Harley-Davidson V-twin based customs:

Wrenchmonkees Honda CB750 Cafe Racer

"Over the past five years, a new wave of custom builders has come through, swapping glitz and glamor for matte powdercoat, dark paint and slick retro graphics. Custom frames and raked-out forks are notable by their absence. These guys are rebuilding Japanese and European bikes from the '80s and '90s, and turning them into stripped-back fun machines."

We've blogged here already about some of the featured builders, such as Shaw Speed & Custom and Spirit of the Seventies, both of the UK, and Classified Moto and Falcon Motorcycles, both in the US.   

At the end of the article, author Chris Hunter conveniently gives a list of websites for all of the builders interviewed, plus a few more, under the heading, "Leaders of the Pack: New-Gen Bike Shops." For your convenience, I've included all of those links below.

Deus Kawi WS650 Streettracker

Cafe Racer Dreams, Spain
Hammarhead Industries, Philadelphia
Blitz Motorcycles, France
Classified Moto, Richmond, VA
Deus Customs, Australia, Bali, & Venice Beach, CA
Wrench Monkees, Copenhagen
Officine Rossopuro, Italy
Roland Sands Design, SoCal
Spirit of the Seventies, UK
Shaw Speed & Custom, UK
Falcon Motorcycles, SoCal

Sportster Street Tracker Conversion Kit from Phil Little

Phil Little Racing's Sportster Street Tracker

A lot of people have been in here to see our recent post about the Steve Storz Sportster cafe racer conversion kit. So, I though I'd take a look around and see if anyone else was doing one, but  found instead this Phil Little Racing "SXR" Sportster kit. It is designed for year models 1986 and up.

They've got a good slideshow gallery of customer builds based on this kit... follow the link and scroll down to the bottom of the page.

While you're at it, take a look at our Mert Lawwill Sportster street tracker post from awhile back.

         

Classic Ron Wood Norton Dirt Tracker

Just because it's beautiful... and a little piece of racing history: It's the only Norton to ever win an AMA mile.

This bike was piloted by two AMA greats, Dave Aldana and Alex Jorgenson. See it sideways at speed here.

Many more Norton racing machines here.