The machines have come from all over Europe to Biarritz as part of France’s leading custom motorbike show. Inspiration for the machines has come from far and wide, including endurance racing, the Paris-Dakar and even the humble monkey bike. These are just a few that caught our eye.
Our personal favourite was the madcap Africa Twin-styled CB1000R. The ultimate dune-blaster has a CRF450 front end, with a massive single front brake disc and an anodised four-piston caliper.
The Swiss-built machine also has a funky four-into-one exhaust with a stubby carbon-fibre end can. The bike is littered with stylish touches such as a custom rear seat cowl, new headlight and super-high mudguard, aluminium handlebars and tiny LED indicators.
The ‘CB1000R-adical’ from Fuhrer Moto, Switzerland, was also a huge crowd-pleaser, thanks to its innovate and excessive use of carbon fibre.
The expensive, but stylish black stuff has been used to create a new bellypan, bespoke Rotobox carbon wheels and of course the CeraCarbon Ultralight forks – entirely made of carbon with a ceramic coating on the stanchions. Then there’s the carbon Akrapovic exhaust.
The ‘Dirt Endurance’ custom was inspired by the classic Bol D’Or racers. It’s been built with a radical custom fairing that was created just for this bike, etched with nods to the history of the brand including a ‘48’ to honour the foundation of Honda in 1948 as well as a quote from found Soichiro Honda. The exhaust is now a split level affair while the air filter mount has been 3D-printed! That said we’re not so sure about those knobblies.
A special mention should go to the Alfredo machine built by Hakuba Motos from Spain, as part of Honda’s dealer customising concept. Built as a tribute to the great ‘Fast Freddie’ Spencer, the machine has been designed to go that little bit quicker, with relocated controls and a bespoke handmade exhaust system with an SC-Project race can.
It’s also sporting a set of numberboards, but this time for practical reasons, as Honda entered it into the Punk’s Pike hillclimb at the event, where it made the knockout stages of the post-75 drag race.
