When scooter news breaks, we put it under a tarp in the garage.
Everyone’s been talking about Genuine’s retro-styled touring scooter for months, but Genuine (amazingly) has kept images and details under wraps. So I was surprised as hell when, after an already-surprising Blur 220 ride, Genuine president Philip McCaleb and designer Eric Carl offered me a peek at a series of computer renderings last Monday.
Of course, I’m sworn to secrecy about the details, but I can reveal a few things:
Continue reading “Genuine’s new “cruiser” due in 2010″
Blurristas, rejoice, your favorite bike may be back!
Genuine’s Blur 150 was a great scooter that never sold well. Its fans will gladly extoll its virtues, especially its sublime braking, handling, and suspension. Unfortunately, Genuine discontinued the Blur after two years on the market (the 2007 model was orange and charcoal, the 2008 model was black and charcoal) and many bikes sat on dealer floors until lucky riders snapped them up at a discount in the big scooter rush of 2009.
Meanwhile, PGO in Taiwan has been making several versions over the past few years (it’s called the G-Max in most of the world) and it’s become popular in other markets. Why didn’t it succeed here? Was the modern styling ahead of its time for the U.S. market? Was it too orange? Was it the fact that a Buddy 125 was hundreds of bucks cheaper and offered roughly the same top speed? Whatever the reason, American scooterists missed out on a really well-engineered bike that was leagues ahead of most 150s in everything but speed.
Continue reading “Genuine Blur 220: test ride”
One of our favorite shops, Motorsport Scooters (aka Scooterwest) in San Diego, CA, has a spiffy new site and a big “NC-17” anniversary party scheduled for Saturday. If you’re not in town, take advantage of 30% off all items this weekend when you order from the new site.
And here in Chicago, don’t forget about Logan’s Run on Saturday and Scooterworks Chicago’s Sunday Ride.
The Scooter Scoop reports that the MadAss 125 is finally available at dealers. We first reported on the MadAss more than six years ago, and a 125 version was announced shortly later. The Xkeleton Trickster, a knockoff version, beat the MadAss 50 to the U.S. market, and original MadAss importer Tomberlin (who now runs Schwinn’s scooter business) apparently never got the MadAss 50 off the ground here. Since then, Pierspeed became Sachs’ U.S. importer, and displayed the 50cc and 125cc versions at DealerExpo in early 2008. The 50cc finally became widely available in spring 2008, but supply problems held back the 125 for another year and a half. A sweet-looking MadAss 500 prototype was the darling of the internet last summer, hopefully that becomes reality, and the seemingly-forgotten X-Road 125 (and a rumored 250 version) would also be nice additions to the lineup.
Aprilia, an arm of the Piaggio group, has released a pair of two stroke race replicas to honor their re-entry into World Superbike competition and the rider that brought them glory in Grand Prix racing in the 1990s, Max Biaggi. The RS125 motorcycle and the SR50 scooter have been decked out in race replica bodywork. The Italian factory has produced replicas in the past to honor Tetsuya Harada, Valentino Rossi, Marco Melandri, Manuel Poggiali and Jorge Lorenzo. The best part is just that this shows they are continuing to make the two stroke one-two-five. Thanks, again, to Motoblog.it.
This Saturday (August 6, 2009), join the Chicago Scooter Club for Logan’s Run, a tour of Logan Square.
Ryan, hold off on the TMax, it’s going to have 2010cc and a flux capacitor. Oh, wait, 2010 is the model year. It can’t possibly be almost 2010, can it? Surely Oberdan is behind this, right?
Vespa Video Vednesday is back, on an actual Vednesday! Here’s a good one that I think ten people sent me two years ago when it was new and I never even watched until I saw it on David Smith’s master list that inspired this enterprise:
Artist: JDiggz
Song: “Make It Hot”
Album: Memoirs of a Playbwoy (2007)
Scooter(s): Series 1 Lambretta, Vespa P-series
Scooter content: about 30 seconds
Jump to the good parts: 1:11, 1:42, 4:08
Canadian rapper JDiggz’ tune doesn’t do much for me, but it’s at least innocuous. The fact that the video is so totally incongruous to the song kinda makes it better, and the fact that they steered clear of the obvious gang-war motif buys them some points, too. It’s very nicely shot, and fun. JDiggz looks totally slick, and his posse of mods and hot-pantsed bootie chicks is somehow funny and believable.
The La Dolce Vita-esque intro is funny, but doesn’t really fit with the Quadrophenia thing. Though it appears to be a TV175, the Series-1 Lambretta predates the mods-and-rockers era, and the P-series Vespa is even more out of place. Of course JDiggz fans could care less about that. It’s obviously shot in Toronto on a leftover Jackie Chan movie set, which doesn’t really evoke London or Brighton, but JDiggz looks just about as wobbly and uncomfortable on a scooter as Phil Daniels.
Remember that time we had an idea for a regular feature and only kept it up for three weeks? Check back next week and see if we can break our record!
Oberdan, just stop it already, I can’t read Italian and Google translations never make it clear if the insane vehicle I’m looking at is a real manufacturer-endorsed concept sketch, or just random nuttiness that popped into your head.
Update: he’s got a new Gilera sketch, too.
And a million more on his Motosketches site, which is a joy to visit. We love you Oberdan, we just can’t tell the difference between fantasia i realtà.
Yep, we were gone for a week or so, checking out the scooter scene in Sturgis, Michigan. (I posted a similar photo on my Facebook page and apparently my friends actually think I’d waste valuable vacation time at a Harley rally.)
In any case, we’re back and there’s some some good stuff on deck, including a Vespa Vednesday Video and some good news from Genuine.