The Wild One: American rebel (Marlon Brando), Britishmachine (Triumph). The Great Escape: American rebel (Steve McQueen), British machine (Triumph, painted Nazi gray). Lawrence of Arabia: British hero (Peter O’Toole), British machine (Brough Superior). The Motorcycle Diaries: South American rebel (Gael García Bernal as Che Guevara), British machine (Norton). In Hunter S. Thompson’s Hell’s Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs, the gonzo journalist covers murderous Harley hordes while riding a British machine (a BSA 650 Lightning)—“400 pounds ofchrome and deep red noise.”
British motorcycles flicker through pop culture, igniting the imagination and firing a thirst for adventure, for mileage. You take a no-nonsense bike and push it to the limit. The café racer subculture—the bikes, the fashion, the attitude, all of it so much in vogue today—came out of London with the Rockers movement in the 1950s. At the height of the 1960s, the British Invasion consisted of motorcycles and musicians.
And then the Japanese reinvented the motorcycle. By the mid-1970s the British companies were on the endangered-species list. By the early 1980s they were extinct. Just like that.
In recent years, however, they have made a dramatic comeback. This is not about nostalgia—it’s about purity. We’ve accumulated stories that map out the history of some of Britain’s legendary two-wheeled marques, plus the new bikes that these relaunched companies are offering today.
After the gallery of the best of the new British imports, check out our picks for the best new bikes of 2010—the "Fast and the Furious."
Can't wait till the day that I pick up my Thruxton.
