Hubert & the Husqvarna Shirt

In the post below Hubert Bastie mentioned the very few items that his racing father kept after he stopped competing. One of the items was a Husqvarna race shirt. Hubert wore the shirt to race in the the DTRA and in French motocross on his own vintage Husqvarna two-stroke. Lad above, Dad below, same shirt over 30 years apart. G

Bastie Racing Heritage

Sideburn's French ambassador, Hubert Bastie sent tells this great story about his family background...

Many of us, DTRA riders, are from a family of racers. The same for me.

My dad was born in 1950 in Paris. He rode Husqvarna, Ossa and Bultacos from 1973 to 1983. But I never saw him riding, not e even once (but last year he competed in a Super veteran race, after 33 years of not racing). Why? Because he just stopped everything when my brother came to the world.

What did he leave us from his racing years? Tons of bikes? Cool riding gear? Did he take us ride as youngsters? NO! Nothing!

He was just ok to help me to buy a trials bike, a Gas Gas 125, at 16, but I'd been focussed on a 1985 YZ since I was 12! For him motocross is baaaad and dangerous. That's so strange for a man who finished the seventh at first edition of Le Touquet, who won races in the French Enduro Championship.

Here is what he left:
3 helmets in the Garage, that became nice bird's nest.
One single Husqvarna Jersey.
Some trophies And a used Trelleborg tyre and tooooons of pictures...

 1981 Husqvarna 250

  1981 Husqvarna 250

 1982 Husqvarna

                                                                    1982 Husqvarna

 The one on the left became my mum 

 Ossa Trials

 The shirt I wore in DTRA

 Broken shock at Le Touquet in 1981

 The helmet cemetery today

With his road bike a Z1, one of the first in France

Scramble Me

Ernie and Nick, Icon's go to stunt fellas, have been recruited by Triumph North America to put a couple of the new generation Scramblers through their paces.
It looks like the forks have twice as much travel as a stock Scrambler, and Progressive are named check at the end, so I'd guess the shocks were uprated too, but it's still a great advert for this new bike.
And a brave move on Triumph's part to put out such a full-on video, that could easily pass for one of Icon's.
Good work fellas! G

One-Off Wednesday

Gore Rider Pocket T-shirt.
SMALL. 43cm/17in armpit-to-armpit
One only

£12 plus post

Small print on the pocket, big print on the back.
Artwork by Ryan Quickfall.

NO RETURNS WITH ONE-OFF WEDNESDAY ITEMS.

Sorry (not sorry)

Off-topic on a Wednesday? You betcha.

When Sideburn goes to a show with a booth the first rule is to entertain ourselves, and the best way is to have a great soundtrack. Luckily we have friends with incredible taste in music that are often happy to come to a launch or a bike show and hang out. Dave Taylor, Katie B, Johnny Alpha and jack of all trades, Dave Skooter Farm all man the decks from time to time.

I know Dave Skooter Farm's show selection records back to front and this one by The Easybeats stuck in my mind after our recent outing to the Revival Show in Rotherham. I always thought The Easybeats were one of the Liverpool explosion, but they are cited as being the 'greatest pop band to hail from Australia' (talk about damning with faint praise...).

The band formed in 1964 and had some great hits, including Friday On My Mind, and were all first generation immigrants. Three of the band were born in the UK, the other two were born in the Netherlands.

Enjoy lead singer Stevie Wright's chimp-like posturing, while not entirely mastering miming, and the chainsaw strum of the twin Gretsches while the studio dancers frug wildly. Yeah! G

Sideburn 9 Shirts

 

Evoking the spirit of the motor company factory racer's leathers, the new 9 long-sleeve shirt is available in black or white, both with front and back prints, and they are already flying out Sideburn's international distribution hub.

The shirts are made from 100% combed organic cotton, and printed in the UK.

Sizes M - XXL

Get your Sideburn 9 long-sleeve shirt for £22 plus post while stocks last.

Please check the size chart before ordering. If you have to exchange your shirt you will be charged return postage.

Sonic Weld Gold Star

Beautiful Sonic Weld BSA Gold Star built by Goldstarfreddie from New Jersey. I lifted the photos from the forum on britbike.com. Reminds me of the stance of the Sideburn Enfield 500. 

Sonic Weld style frames are still being offered, brand new, by Cheney Engineering in the USA. 

The builder of this bikes says...

This is one of those new Sonic Weld frames using up a lot of my old flat track parts. The cases are B33 with an early GS crank and with the quill timing cover and top breather. It handles like a 250 Bultaco but costs 5 times as much I thought this would be of interest to someone with only a motor as he makes these frames for various motors.

See See Motorcycles: Empire Building

The See See Motorcycles family has been busy over the last few months. The hard riding makers of the wonderfully inclusive, beautifully decorated moto-coffee shop in Portland, Oregon not only organise the annual One Motorcycle Show, the annual (and oft-copied) 21 Helmets show, they are a huge help in organising Dirt Quake USA and also promote a winter series of indoor flat track at Salem plus they sponsor a variety of racers and riders. So how the hell they have found time to open See See KTM, a dealer in all things orange, just 100 yards from their coffee and clothing/moto parts store is beyond me.

If that wasn't enough, they're about to open their second See See coffee shop, this one in Reno, Nevada. They're launching the Nevada branch with a 21 Helmets show. See the details above.

Good luck See See! GI

SEE SEE NINJAS - QUEST FOR THE GOLDEN SPROCKET from Neil DaCosta on Vimeo.

American Flat Track 2017 Schedule

American Flat Track (formerly AMA Pro Racing) has announced its official schedule for 2017.
What is interesting?

1. The first round is a TT at Daytona, within the enormous speedway on a Chris Carr designed track. Remember, the GNC1 (Pro, Experts, call them what you will depending on your age) will all be on TWINS!

2. The next round is a short track in Georgia, meaning there is no short track in Daytona.

3. Peoria is on. I'm most surprised about this. There must be some changes happening at the track because riders weren't happy about the safety there (Dominic Colindres was paralysed after a crash there this year). Brad Baker had a lucky escape. Now they're doing it on twins.

4. The Buffalo Chip TT. To appeal to the massive biker crowds at Sturgis, this race borders on exhibition. Again, it's going to be on twins. That makes three TT rounds in one season. The most there's been since I've been following GNC, I think (used to be Peoria and Castle Rock).

5. Perris is the final round. Not the tiny track, but the adjacent Auto Speedway. It's still regarded as a short track, so that's two short track races for the twins too.

6. There are 18 rounds. Santa Rosa dropped itself, after being on the preliminary list announced in September. California still gets three rounds, equal with Illinois.

March 16: DAYTONA TT – Daytona International Speedway, Daytona Beach, Fla.
March 25: Georgia Short Track – Dixie Speedway, Woodstock, Ga.
April 1: Charlotte Half-Mile – Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, N.C.
May 13: Arizona Mile – Turf Paradise, Phoenix, Ariz.
May 20: Sacramento Mile – Cal Expo Fairgrounds, Sacramento, Calif.
May 27-28: Springfield Mile I* – Illinois State Fairgrounds, Springfield, Ill.
June 3: Red Mile – The Red Mile, Lexington, Ky.
June 17: OKC Mile – Remington Park, Oklahoma City
June 24: Lima Half-Mile – Allen County Fairgrounds, Lima, Ohio
July 8: Rolling Wheels Half-Mile – Rolling Wheels Raceway Park, Elbridge, N.Y.
July 29: Calistoga Half-Mile – Calistoga Speedway, Calistoga, Calif.
Aug. 6: Buffalo Chip TT presented by Indian Motorcycle – Buffalo Chip Campgrounds, Sturgis, S.D. Aug. 8: Black Hills Half-Mile – Black Hills Speedway, Rapid City, S.D.
Aug. 13: Peoria TT – Peoria Motorcycle Club, Peoria, Ill.
Sept. 2-3: Springfield Mile II** – Illinois State Fairgrounds, Springfield, Ill.
Sept. 9: Williams Grove Half-Mile – Williams Gove Speedway, Mechanicsburg, Pa.
Sept. 23: Lone Star Half-Mile – Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas
Oct. 7: Perris Short Track – Perris Auto Speedway, Perris, Calif.

* AFT Singles will race a TT on May 27
** AFT Singles will race a Short Track on Sept. 2

Photo: Brian J Nelson

NEW: Subs deals, neck tubes and restocks

Loads of new stuff and restocks of popular items that haven't been available for a while.

First up, is a Sideburn x Holy Freedom neck tube made for us in Italy by Holy Freedom. Versatile, 50cm/20in long, polyester impregnated with odour-free particles (it reckons...). 

£18.50 plus post. 

OR you can get Sideburn neck tube for free by subscribing to Sideburn for 4-issues/One year. 

UK £26

EU £36

Rest of World £42
While stocks last...

The wonderful and bizarre Union magazine, issue 3. 

High quality, British magazine that travels the globe to feature the bizarre and unusual. In issue 3, there’s a visit to meet the Raelians, a UFO religion that has been long derided as little more than a sex cult, an expedition to the wilds of the Ohio River to try and find America’s greatest lost treasure hoard and experience the unlikely two wheel transport taking the city of Detroit by storm— the, er, moped.
There’s also a look at sex worker fashion in America’s biggest legal brothel and we explore the mysterious modern day megaliths of Brittany and an in-depth interview with accountant turned photographer, Lee Jeffries and his long-term project on the world’s homeless.
UNION is lucky enough to be the first publication ever to showcase the work of Australian photographer Olivia Alexander and her documentary series on nightclub transvestites down under Add in features on haunted Indian hotels, the illegal street racers of Tokyo, band of the moment Highly Suspect, a chat with a Berkeley professor who is the world’s foremost expert on disaster prevention and much much more and there should be more than enough to keep you out of trouble for the next few days or so.

We have a handful of Sideburn 18, the Guy Martin Pikes Peak issue. 

We also found a stash of the Velocitas Sinistro patch that I was sure we'd sold out of. 

Finally, from the USA, we have the ever popular (unfortunate by-product of riding motorcycles) Broke Bone Patch.

What are you waiting for? Head to the Sideburn shop...