EACH MONTH WE GIVE AWAY A CABERG DUKE II HELMET AND A YEAR’S SUBSCRIPTION TO BIKE FOR THE MONTH’S STAR LETTER. ON YOUR MARKS
50 not out: what next?
I started buying Bike every month from 1980 after I got myself a brand new white/red/blue striped Yamaha DT100. I was 16.
I could own it as we had just moved to the arse end of South West Ireland from London and at 16 you could ride up to 125cc (no restrictions).
At 18 I followed the DT with a second hand silver/blue Honda CB900F (what a jump). I was infatuated with the brand new Yamaha RD350LC and RD250LC (I couldn’t afford one in Ireland what with excise tax, VAT, import tax, duty, insurance etc etc) My brother in law at the time and five of his mates all bought brand new (and all the same colour blue) Suzuki GT250 X7s and they used to be lined up outside his house every evening in Queen’s Park when not pulling wheelies up and down the street. Your ‘50 years of Bike’ issue is without doubt great, but what next for motorcycling? Our generation is in acute senescence. Just what is the average age of the UK motorcyclist now? 66? Is there another two wheeled generation behind us, with their version of look at me, loud, fast, shiny, oily, tribal behaviour? I suspect not. Alan Rogers, email 50 not out: 49 bikes
I have just bought the 50th anniversary edition of the mag and it’s great.
I am retired now and I started riding on a field bike Enfield we were given and my first road bike was a Mk1 SS50 four-speed Honda. I was the first generation of sixteener and did 11,000miles in ten months before I wrote it off in the snow. My regular commute was daily to Nottingham from Mansfield, 20 miles each way, and once a month to a training centre at Birmingham, 65 miles each way. I am now on my 49th bike.
Martin Bond, email
50 not out: the 1970s
I much enjoyed your 1971 vs 2021 feature in the Bike 50th anniversary issue. As a biker in the 1970s I too may have Mark Williams’ selective memory. However, there were 20 million fewer cars on the road back then, no speed cameras, well maintained roads and no