Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 75 Summer 2025 i Classic Dirt Bike

Without doubt being able to proclaim your machine as a championship winner does no harm at all to the potential sales, but if the motorcycle is too specialised and the club rider can’t ride it then sales will be poor. In the MkIII Cota, Montesa fulfilled the brief admirably by not only having Gordon Farley take the British championship in 1970 on their Cota, but probably more importantly doing it on a Cota which could be bought from the dealer. When MotorCycle’s Peter Fraser got his hands on the then latest production Cota, he found it a delight to ride with no vices, and it carried him to the awards in a local trial. Peter, while being a handy rider, was perhaps not quite in the ‘Farley’ class so the…

Without wanting to upset enthusiasts of the many fine Japanese off-road motorcycles there are in the dirt bike world, the Japanese manufacturers didn’t really ‘get’ trials in the beginning. Perhaps it was economies of scale as the feet-up world was never a vast market; for a long time it was a peculiarly British thing and Japan’s industry was geared around large production runs. This isn’t to say the Japanese industry didn’t produce some good machines – it did - but rather they were basic, easy-to-ride bikes which introduced lots of riders to the sport rather than something to win world championships on. On the other hand, when they needed to be seen to be winning at a high level the Japanese industry competition departments produced spectacular machines full of innovation…

There are many trials and tribulations in the life of a trial organiser and the Pre’65 Scottish Two Day Trial committee could have well done without the announcement their big parking area at the Aluminium Works wouldn’t be available. With only nine weeks’ notice the panic was on to accommodate riders and officials vehicles in Kinlochleven. Not an easy task but they managed it, in part because the riders realised it wasn’t the club’s choice and partly because spectators played fair too, in the end this unknown quantity proved less problematical than first thought. As riders made their way to the Highlands there were thermometer boiling temperatures recorded and brilliant sunshine. Luckily Friday morning dawned colder and wet so riders could relax with familiar Scottish trials weather. First riders away…

Write to us at: ClassicDIRTbike, PO Box 99, Horncastle, Lincolnshire LN9 6LZ. CDBeditor@mortons.co.uk Red Marley reference Just found a reference to an article on the prototype B40 BSA scrambler, having spent a few days going through boxes of old pics and magazines from the Fifties and Sixties. The pics and magazines belonged to my Dad Brian Martin, who at the time was BSA’s competition department boss. I’ve got some great photos of the 1961 Red Marley hill climb on the BSA you refer to in your article and some old press cuttings from the day, too. I would love to see your article if it’s still available. Tried to get it through ‘press reader’ but it only seemed to have part of the article. Can you help? Let us know…

Sidecar Celebration Now in its 8th year is the annual Wasp Trophy which brings together the best in sidecar MX racing will be hosted by Narberth Classic MCC during their two-day Classic Scramble on June 14/15, 2025. The venue will be West Atherton Farm, near Narberth in Wales, there’s a postcode of SA67 8BT to find the place though many scrambles fans will know it already. As well as the Wasp Trophy the event will also be the third and fourth rounds of the Welsh championship and include the Stuart Davies Memorial races. Camping will be available too. For last minute details go to NarberthClassicMCC Facebook page Two Top Two-day Trials Kinlochleven MCC are building on the success of their popular Leven Valley Two Day Trial – which will be…

In an article to launch the 1975 MX world championship, Martin Christie looked at the main contenders for success in the months ahead and made his predictions based on past successes. In the 500cc class he felt there would be a factory battle between Husqvarna and Suzuki, with Heikki Mikkola and Roger De Coster starting as favourites. Both riders had already won the title previously – Mikkola was reigning champion, having relieved De Coster of his three-year grip on the trophy. By the time the contest reached Hawkstone Park in the UK county of Shropshire, De Coster was leaving the world in little doubt he intended to be world champion, yet the fickle hand of fate reminded the top runners that nothing was certain until the end of the series.…

The last knockings of a project are always the most frustrating as little jobs take forever to arrange; this is generally because some part of the process needs someone with more skill in a particular area. In my case it is welding. No one would want me to do any welding. I stay well away from it and, in fact, the closest I come is soldering cables. It isn’t because I’ve not tried welding, I have, and when first being involved with fixing motorcycles an uncle of mine, who could weld and weld very well, tried to show me how to go on… cue electric shocks, holes blown in metal and strange gas smells. So, when welding is needed it is done by someone else, which means waiting… and waiting……

Just such a thing happened to Adrian Thompson, whose American Eagle we featured last issue. Having a hankering for a Triumph Metisse, he’d spotted one coming up for auction and decided he’d like it. “I headed down to West Sussex where the auction was being held, overnighted in the van and checked the bike over at the viewing,” he says. “I was happy the bike was as it should be, so was looking forward to the sale starting. It was a bit disappointing, as the first bid was way above what I was prepared to pay for the bike.” Adrian headed home and thought no more about it until speaking with a neighbour. Whilst relating the tale, the neighbour said: “I’ve got one of those in the garage.” Adrian couldn’t…

What with one thing and another, many events conspired to prevent us catching up with Bob Motley to feature his ex-Malcolm Rathmell 1970 Bultaco Pursang. Photoshoots need many things to fall into place to be successful. but a good start is a great bike. Then we have to fit in with an owner’s work schedule which is easier to do – we simply go when the owner is free and the weather is nice… which isn’t always so easy to arrange. Then, of course, we can do without a global pandemic. Still, finally we managed to catch up with Bob early in 2025 when the magazine gods smiled, all was right with the world and a bigger jacket keeps the cold out... It is no great revelation to point out…

People thought Alan Whitehead was off his trolley in the early Eighties when he booked the halls at Belle Vue in Manchester and put on a display of classic British motorcycles. Yes, there were laughs all round… yet here we are in 2025 still visiting the descendent of the show Alan started. There’ve been some changes over those years, the biggest being the move to Stafford County Showground when Belle Vue was redeveloped. The displays of bikes, too, have changed as the classic scene has developed to incorporate a wide variety of machines under its umbrella. This is all to the good, of course, and who is to say one bike is classic while another is not, certainly not magazine editors who often have an Honours Degree in Fence Sitting.…

This report of the 2025 Classic Dirt Bike Show could easily have been titled ‘Not enough time’ as there was so much to see and not enough time to see it all. It wasn’t just me saying this either, as lots of people made the same comment. Often it was after a friend had said: “Have you seen…?” and back would come the reply: “No, not yet, where is it?” In the whole two days of the show, I didn’t even manage to get to the outside autojumble which is normally one of my earliest destinations. Lots of you did, though, as there were many people loaded up with bits for all sorts of bikes. Nor did I manage to see in all the halls… What I did see, however,…

To be fair, when speaking about motorcycles on the Isle of Man, off-road and mud aren’t generally the first things that spring to mind as the small island in the Irish Sea is more connected with racing on real roads. However, it played host to another international event which, in our world, is as prestigious as the road stuff. Yes, we’re talking about the International Six Days Trial. Actually, it played host to the event three times over 10 years, and it is 60 years since the ISDT descended on the island for the first time when top road racer Geoff Duke – a more-than-capable off-road competitor – was charged with creating a six-day enduro course on the 227 square mile island. This was no easy task given the island…