When Ducati invited me to join them at the British MotoGP round to hear more about the MotoE, their new electric competition motorbike and homonymous race series, I expected to watch some exciting racing, have a lovely Italian meal at their hospitality and then spend 20 minutes being indoctrinated on why electric motorbikes are now the best thing since sliced garlic bread. Yet, I was wrong.
Before all that, a quick fleet update, at least its two-wheeled components, as I have now had to find space not only for one, but two motorbikes. In my defence, this was not something I intended to do. I’d been looking for something slow, old and characterful that I could take back to the Malle events without feeling too precious about dropping it or caking it in sand. So when a slightly tatty, very orange US-import 1972 Honda CL175 scrambler came up for sale via a friend, I quickly took it in. Which was fine.
But where it then went terribly off-piste was that I made that most basic of petrolhead mistakes. I was so adamant that I’d satiated my cravings for acquisitions for the year, I figured there’d be no harm having a quick wander through the classifieds. And we all know how that can end. Which it rather inevitably did, with me finding another bike for which I’d been yearning for years. Previously, it had been not the right time, or not quite the right bike, or it was nowhere near the right place. This time it ticked every box. It was even for sale at a dealer just nine miles away.
