Category: Blog

When it comes to living with classic AJS and Matchless motorcycles, a wise man might learn from his mistakes. Frank Westworth is plainly no wise man… I’ve been trying to work out how many AMC twins I’ve owned over the years. And no, before you collapse in horror at the sheer self-indulgent time-wasting nonsense of such an exercise, it’s because…

What did lads get up to, back when BSA Bantams were the motorcycle of choice for youthful despatch riders in the City of London? Daniel Hicks spins a story which might have a sniff of the truth in it… The old man paused and craned his neck as he approached the ancient Egyptian monument. For so many years he had…

In the heyday of the British bike industry, everyone had heard of (or bought a bike from) Pride and Clarke in London’s Stockwell Road. Our readers remember them… In the late 1950s you might have been browsing at Pride and Clarke’s showroom, considering the purchase of a BSA Golden Flash for £265.14.5d, or perhaps a BSA C12 for £165.5.11, or…

Always up for a debate about café cuisine, Frank Westworth ponders the subject of bobbers, baggers and café racers… One of my favourite concoctions is the cult of the café racer. Also the bobber. Bobbers look good to some chaps, and although their riders do indeed typically bob up and down on the fat rear tyres which masquerade as suspension,…

“These large corporate companies won’t force their vision of motorcycles for the masses on me”. Anarchy goes to test ride a new Honda…. On any Sunday, well actually this last one, I rode over to my local Honda emporium to do the deed. To test ride a new Honda. It was sunny and bright but bitterly cold, however, the BMW…

Numbed by the current obsession for producing shiny fake motorcycles where there was previously rust and ruin, Frank Westworth reveals a talent in the opposite direction… I was sat pondering the other evening. Don’t worry, there’s no law against a little gentle pondering – not yet, at any rate, although that could easily change, of course. Earlier in the day,…