First Bike?

Unlike my mates, I didn't bother with a moped. My 1st bike at 17 was a Honda CB250K4. I bought it off a mate who lived int middle of Sheffield. I'd never ridden ont road before. My 2 mates who went with me to pick it up were on Yamaha 250's, one an RD and one a YDS7. On the way home, they were shooting off, and I was vainly (stoooopidly!) trying to keep up. I very nearly ran into t'back of a car, then an hour and a half later, went too fast into a corner, and fell off. I dented t'tank, and smashed t'headlight. Mi parents were well impressed, especially when having had it two whole weeks, decided to ride back to my naval training base near Portsmouth. Took mi 8 hours!

 

Mate on mine bought an RD350 & fitted 250 side panels on it. 17 years old, nutter. And yes he still with us

 

I had one of these a Garelli Rekord. This was followed by a few used and abused old British bikes then a string of Ducatis, after about 10 years I bought a Kawasaki Z1100 and discovered that you could actually get bikes that didn't self destruct or have regular electrical isses!

 

You really don’t want to see what he looks like !
He was the model for the back end of the old routemasters.
A fizzog only his mother could love.

 

First on road bike was a Kawasaki KH100 22 brake horse power.
First bike I bought was a Honda H100S now that was JPOS , never bought a Honda since if that’s an example of Honda reliability.
Off road I rode 250/500 cc scramblers which belonged to a school mate. Can’t remember which ones but it was good fun running away from the land warden on Salisbury Plain on them
Along with using the tank assault course

 

We need a PMSL smiley none of them do that justice

 

At 16yr old a vespa 50, flip over backrest lights mirrors did about 22mph flat out down hill

 

FSIE DX Same as Arnie`s pic. Loved it. I quickly learned all about spanners! Used to cost a quid to fill up & 20p for 2 oil shots out of a fire extinguisher looking thing lol. Then at 17 a met green KH250. What a weapon that was lol. I quickly learned all about all about spark plugs & gave me my first flying lesson after hitting a stationary mint Hillman Hunter (sorry mate) at 85ish mph!!! Soooo lucky to walk away from that one! Mates had RD`s GT`s we had a ball. Then the LC came out & it was game over for the old school!!!!

 

Sadly I could never afford to own and run any kind of motorbike as a teenager, but spent plenty of time on mates' Lambrettas, Vespas, an early Tiger Cub and even an early Bonnie. Leaving Uni I went to work for Ford and bought a D reg Triumph Herald, as you do. Then marriage and kids so motorbikes, though in the blood from my dad (died when I was a sprog) and Uncle (Norton Dominators) I never got round to getting my licence till divorce and taking up with a biker chick.

So first bike was a 1992 Yamaha XJ600 ex demo bought from Fllitwick Motorcycles. A proper novice friendly bike, totally uninspiring, but excellent work horse for daily commutes filtering down the M1 and across the other side of Heathrow, or up the M1/M45 and A45 past Coventry, and over to Cambridge. Soon I added a Yamaha TDM 850, a cracking good and largely over looked bike (in the UK at least) - a Multistrada ahead of its time.

Then I lost my frigging left eye and was virtually blind for the next five years - well fucked up enough to make riding too risky. So didn't get back to riding till I bought a second hand low(ish) mileage 2010 Bonnie SE, and haven't look back since, or left.

 

Wind the clock back to 4th August 1966 my 16th birthday and on the road riding a Tiger Cub which turned out to be a pile of crap
Never been without a bike of some sort since

 

You should be totally ashamed to admit you rode those!
Next you will be admitting you were into Ska and Mod music !
Go hang your head in shame Rich .........

 

Mod? Wot, me?

 

... in my Levis Staprest and Ben Sherman shirts.

 

Nowt wrong with a bit of mod and ska

 

Although I'm a rock music fan, I am partial to a bit of ska.