MORTON MAKES HIS MARK: THE BENELLI TORNADO 900

The motorcycle that brought Morton to the motorcycling world’s attention was the Tornado 900, his first big project for Benelli. Its creation was even more of an accomplishment than it seemed at the time. Having been impressed by the way that Ducati’s Pierre Terblanche had recently created the show-stopping MH900e at AK Design in Hitchin, Morton had convinced Benelli boss Andrea Merloni to let him shape the Tornado at the same Hertfordshire studio.

‘Andrea gave me so much trust. I’d just come out of university and hadn’t really demonstrated anything to anyone. And I said to him, “I haven’t really got any resources here at Benelli, so I want to do it in England with the same companies Pierre used, because it’s really technological — you can model it, then machine it and scan it back in, and re-model it by computer; it’s really innovative and quick.” And he trusted me to do it and spend a lot of money on it.’

Not that things always ran smoothly at Benelli, even with the Tornado’s introduction. ‘Andrea was a difficult man to please but there was a lot of respect between us and I was very sad to hear he passed away recently. I was always completely honest with him and said what I felt and that mentality doesn’t really work in Italy. But I think he realised afterwards that a lot of people were just kissing arse and didn’t care about what they were doing.’

Morton’s own commitment was never in doubt, as he proved by creating the Tornado prototype from scratch in less than three months. ‘That first Tornado was 11 weeks’ work — from nothing to the Milan Show concept bike. I’d just come out of MV where they’d already spent a year and a half doing just a rough model. It was amazing that Andrea gave me that opportunity.’