I'm very proud of any Englishman winning motorbike world titles whoever they're and especially on different brands. For me i don't remember much about that year as i only saw the odd race from time to time, but i do agree with you and others on here that's a ridiculous price tag.
Absolutely, it's just not colin edwards honda (like phil said) though is it or one of foggys bikes (or tb21). I genuinely dont know what they would go for as a comparison but 150k plus ???
Just like to add I hope this isn’t the case. As much as we like to “pass comment” on his comms and big white shiny teeth I wouldn’t want this to be the case. Hopefully just trading it in for a new piano, or something.
Nothing too intricate, just wondered what race bikes you’d sold tbh or are we just talking kitted out track bikes?
Proper race bikes mate, though some have beloged to friends that I've help sell for them. John mcguinnes sp1 Ruben xuas 748 Toesland cbr 600 Phil Reid tz 250 To name a few
Its on the same level as a Colin Edwards holds to the right cognescenti, you can't get bogged down to the fact one is the golden era of SBK's and one is a decade older. It's the bike that won that year's SBK, and it's a full factory built HRC race bike, not some customer race bike or hand me down or bit part bike. This bike is no B list celeb. On top of this you have the provenance from the rider himself who will be handing it over personally to attest to the fact IT IS that very bike in unadulterated form - don't ever underestimate the power of that. That's like buying a fogarty bike and having him and slick bass confirming it's provenance and willing to put it in writing and have a photo taken with you and it. When it comes to this sort of thing provenance is everything and its the difference between a collection of HRC bits and a 150k championship winner. The buyer for this bike won't be running it and tossing it off on track days, this is investment and private collection territory probably making a brief appearance at festival of speed and the like. In a former life we restored one of a pair of a LeMans winning GTR. We hadn't seen that car in quarter of a century. We had it's sister car in the firms collection. It was bought for 18m and a could you just give it a once over turned into a "while you've got it...we might as well/ could we just". Long astory short, by the time we finished it was worth half as much again. At the end of the restoration the owner invited the original team boss, crew chief and No1 mechanic and winning driver to come and view the car, and give their thoughts and insight and relive their memories. With some small videos of them looking over the car and talking anecdotally about this and that and pointing to things, the magic phrase was said "It's just as we built it and this is the exact car that crossed the line even down to the position and colour of the tie wraps". that one afternoon all expenses paid visit doubled the value of the car. It gave it all the provenance he needed. However, we had literally gone down the road of looking at archive images of things like the lockwire and made sure it was done the same way, looped and flowed the same way and also cut off and splayed in the same way. Small if you know you know details like the colour of the anodised hardware and fairing (bodywork) fasteners (yes there was a proper reason before the likes of probolt turned it all into anodised tat), our lines were goodrich lines hand assembled with anodised fittings because that was correct for the time - I even raided my stash as we noticed that even the design of the banjo's had changed slightly, and ensuring small details like the incongruous foam pad positioned by the RR wheel guy so he could jam his knee against it as he was gunning the wheel off and rolling clear during a change (he held the gun in his left hand, and he wasn't a small guy) before rolling back to gun the wheel back on. Like that car, this bike, although there are its sister bikes, there's only one of it. And if this is THE bike that rolled over the line to finish the title, and the man who took the title on this very bike in this very spec on that very day will sign to that effect - to a serious collector that's your 150k justified right there.
And like the toseland bike, don't be in a rush to start it unless it comes with a comprehensive spares package.
If it goes for the bottom end of that estimate that's still £100 grand over toselands so i'm think they're both priced about right in the end, whether you can ride them or not.
With the current way of things, the longer it sits there the less it will be worth I think. “Investors” buy stuff that will grow in value and have now moved on to something else to boost their net worth. “Collectors” tend to act like investors when the value of their collection is high enough, and shed certain bikes they can bear to lose as they can’t stand to see the value of their collections fall through depreciation. Current buyers, unless they are just looking to move wealth out of the bank or have not realised what is happening to values, either has to have a real link to that particular bike, or realise it’s likely to be a 10 year plus cycle before it’s again worth what they paid.
I was going to ask why Toseland didnt stick it in an auction like the owner of Loris Capirossi's has, but i think i already know the answer to that.
