Handlebars

The assignment was simple: Pick your top five motorcycle goodies, no matter how big or small. But when you consider the limitless possibilities, the task suddenly gets difficult: Which moto obsessions should you feed? There can be so many. Nevertheless, our staff of contributors rose to the occasion with some interesting picks to consider this holiday season. Full story »

If you’ve been across Highway 129 to Deals Gap during daylight hours, you have seen these people before. They sit or stand on the side of the road, cameras glued to their faces, and they make you feel like Nicky Hayden when you come by. There’s something neat about somebody taking a picture of you and your bike in action, and it’s a picture every rider would like to own. That’s how these professionals make their living, supplying tens of thousands of riders with high-quality pictures that show them at their best (or worst), and making them smile months later when they look at that photo and remember that particular day. Full story »

Dale Walksler is a man on a mission. That mission is to get the regional and local tourism bureaucracies in western North Carolina to acknowledge and nurture the economic impact motorcycles riders have on the region. Dale’s Wheels Through Time Museum in Maggie Valley is world famous, both in and out of the motorcycling realm. Full story »

Every time you raise the kickstand, you are aware on some level that you are now at the mercy of forces greater than yourself and your motorcycle—the car and truck drivers who are texting, rocking out, coping with screaming kids, fishing in the bag for that last onion ring, maybe sobbing from a bad break-up, maybe under the influence of drugs or alcohol, or maybe just bored and selfish and from behind their airbags and steel-reinforced cockpit. They couldn’t care less about whether you make it home in one piece. Full story »

Every now and then, you need to do something for no particular reason other than you’ve never done it before and it may be fun. Sometimes you need to go to an event just because it may never happen again. As soon as I saw the advertisement for the auction of the S&G Cycles collection, I decided right away that it fit both of these descriptions and I wanted to be there. Full story »

Dan Paransky’s Blount County shop is rich in large boat motors, motorcycles, and European cars. Giving a tour, he is preceded by a lit cigar that he is not actively smoking, much as the priest follows his censer. Full story »

Landscape architect and Ducati rider Sara Hedstrom is indulging a stranger, trying to articulate some possible differences between male and female motorcyclists. Hedstrom began riding in 2002. On exactly what, she cannot recall. “Oh what was it?” she asks herself. Okay. There’s one difference. The typical dude would have the VIN memorized. Turns out it was a Suzuki Bandit 600. “It had an in-line four engine, and it was probably a bit big for a beginner,” says Hedstrom. Full story »

John Aylor lives in Rio Rancho, N.M. He’s headed to the Smokies for the 10th annual gathering of two-stroke fanatics that regularly descends on the Deals Gap Resort each spring. (This year, from May 4 through May 10.) He describes in great detail the 1975 Kawasaki H1 500 he’ll be bringing, along with particulars about mishaps and modifications made over the 14 years he’s been riding it. The usual multiple motors, crashes, cracked frames. Full story »

Given the increasingly grim economic news over the months leading up to February 19-21, I wasn’t expecting much from the 13th and final Cycle World International Motorcycle Show, moved from its long-term location of Atlanta to Greenville, S.C. True enough, some manufacturers didn’t show or left the big displays at home, but spectators showed up in droves. None of the “whistling past the graveyard” feel I expected was apparent among these marketers of luxury goods or their potential customers. Full story »

The Great Recession of 2009 didn’t kill the Dealer Expo in Indianapolis as many had predicted after all. In fact, there seemed to be tremendous growth in the budget, small displacement, and entry-level categories. Despite the fact that there were cutbacks and missing manufacturers, there were still several buzz-worthy new models introduced at this year’s show. Interestingly enough, most of the booths related to high-end sport bikes and cruisers seemed to be dormant and the majority of the exciting new models introduced were in the small displacement categories by lesser-known manufacturers, many from China. Full story »

It’s a cold and crappy January day in West Knoxville; too cold and crappy to think much about motorcycles. Unless you happen to be in a particular heated shop, where two evil geniuses are examining the skeleton of what may be their magnum opus. Even without paint or motor or rear wheel, this thing looks scary fast. Long and low with an Indian-style leaf spring front end, it’s a custom bike in the style of the dread 1920s boardtrack racers. Cycle Stop owner Tim Miles and technician Chad Busby have been working on it all winter, and check welds and angles and grinds for the thousandth time. They are justifiably pleased with what they see. Full story »

The 555. You may have heard about them. Although, if you’re not plugged in to one of Knoxville’s myriad motorcycle networks, it’s probably just as likely that you actually heard The 555. Seven small, old Honda motorcycles in various states of dubious repair ridden from Knoxville to Portland, Ore. this past summer. They pulled away from the Time Warp Tea Room, on Central Avenue, on the morning of May 16. Repair number one took place at mile zero. Full story »