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Brad Pitt (The Sideburn Connection)

Sep 19, 2019

Brad Pitt (The Sideburn Connection)

This month's US edition of GQ magazine has a cover story interview with actor Brad Pitt. The leading men's style magazine yet again reanimated the corpse of Steve McQueen by having Pitt dressed like McQueen once did, sat on a motorcycle. GQ needed a bike as a prop, and rather than going the easy route and using a modern Triumph Scrambler, they tracked down Hayden Roberts of Hello Engine, who is one of the leading authorities on 1960s desert racers, and borrowed the TR6/B Hayd

For Sale: FTH Survivor Rotax

Aug 20, 2019

For Sale: FTH Survivor Rotax

Our mate Chris Hatton is selling his Rotax Thunderbike. This is a quick racebike and flew at the Greenfield TT this year. The sale is nothing to do with us, we're just sharing. This is what Chris says... CCM 600 motor in original frame modified by Mike Hill of Survivor Customs in 2016. Aluminium fuel tank with fibreglass cover, seat unit and fork guards. R6 front end and rear shock. 19in wheels with Dunlop tyres. Ready to be raced in DTRA. This bike won the 2016 DTRA Thunderb

D*Face x Indian FTR 1200

Jul 18, 2019

D*Face x Indian FTR 1200

Indian Motorcycle are chucking the kitchen sink at their new FTR 1200. On top of the three versions - FTR 1200, 1200S and Race replica, there is a container load of accessories and now five artist series 'tank' cover paint options. The artists chosen to design the tank covers are Steve Caballero, ThankYouX, Risk, Adam Turman and UK-based mate of the mag, D*Face. D*Face owns Rebels Alliance in London, who built the Sideburn 35 Yamaha SR500 cover bike. In the video below D*Fac

The Pits

Jul 12, 2019

The Pits

Greenfield Dirt Track, a Saturday afternoon in June, even though, from the number of woolie hats, it doesn't look like it. The Saturday race has just been rained off. It's not a surprise. The forecast was terrible and it's rained all day. Still racers and families had driven from all over the country, and beyond, with optimism fighting realism all the way there. It was ok for me. I live in the UK's flat track heartland, Lincolnshire. Greenfield is only an hour's drive for me.

Sons of Speed

Jul 3, 2019

Sons of Speed

We featured the Sons of Speed, in Sideburn 34, when Ed Subias covered a race in Florida for us. The Sons of Speed are a group of American racers committed to restoring, preserving and thrashing the spuds off 100-year-old board track racers. The boardtracks, aka murderdromes, are all gone but the group use banked tarmac ovals, like New Smyrna in Florida, and also race dirt ovals. The film below gives insight into the group and the founding members. BUY SIDEBURN 34 #Boardtrack

Preston Burroughs vs Daytona

Jun 28, 2019

Preston Burroughs vs Daytona

‘I’ve been to enough American Flat Track races at the Daytona International Speedway to know my way around the place pretty well, but I’ve never felt comfortable there. It’s NASCAR’s premiere venue. A billionaire’s four-wheel thunder palace that just got a $400m makeover to increase spectator capacity to 110,000. The last Daytona 500 purse was $19m. They don’t give two shits about two wheels. When you have that kind of money, what’s to give a shit about? Probably getting more

Dave x Dave

May 29, 2019

Dave x Dave

Around this time last year regular Sideburn contributor Dave Bevan was dropping 'a tab of genuine SF junkie acid' in preparation to research a report about El Rollo and Wheels and Waves for Sideburn 34. For the new issue, SB37, we sent him to interview our hero, inspirational guru, entertainments officer and de facto spirit animal, Dave Skooter Farm. If you don't know much, or anything, about Dave Skooter Farm you are missing out, but Dave Bevan's feature in a great primer to

Rotax Sandwich

May 20, 2019

Rotax Sandwich

This Tom Bing photo, from yesterday's DTRA Thunderbike race at Peterborough, features three, count them, three Survivor Rotax racers. James O'Hara slid out of the final, went into the airfence, and was soon followed by James 'Leftie' Smith and Ross 'The King' Herrod. They all walked away and, I think, even restarted the same race. Tough cookies. Read about Survivor Customs Rotax (many of which are piled up here, coincidentally) in SB34. #TomBing #SurvivorCustoms #RossHerrod #

DSC Doom Tomb

Survivor Customs Honda CFR450 Framer

Mar 17, 2019

Survivor Customs Honda CFR450 Framer

A unicorn, a minotaur, the Loch Ness Monster, Sasquatch. In recent years, UK dirt track fans have been as likely to see one of those mythical creatures in the pits as a 450 framer, but one man has decided to change that. After back-to-back DTRA Thunderbike championships on Rotax-powered bikes he has modified and fabricated himself, Mike Hill of Survivor Customs has gone one step further and created this Honda CRF-powered creation. The frame is a brand new, one-off that was de

Daytona TT News

Feb 28, 2019

Daytona TT News

It's just two weeks until the Daytona TT, the opener for the 2019 AFT season. So, here's the round-up some news. DIRT + TARMAC + JUMPS The track is going to take in a section of famous Daytona banking, meaning it's going to be on both dirt and asphalt. It's be interesting to see how the twin suspension, that must be relatively plush for the jumps, copes with the banking, but I'm guessing they're not going to be on it for long. AFT say: 'To allow AFT to fine tune the transitio

Biltwell Frijole

Dec 13, 2018

Biltwell Frijole

You will have already read about Biltwell Inc's dumb-idea-come-good to race a Sportster in the NORRA Mexican 1000 in SB34, and we're happy to share there short film of the race. They built the bike, and they're own, mainly middle-aged staff, raced it. I'd love to ride those trails. We thought we couldn't love this Californian company any more than we already did, then they made our dream come true by making some limited edition Sideburn x Biltwell Moto 2.0 goggles. These are

Death Spray Custom - Important

Oct 10, 2018

Death Spray Custom - Important

About time. It turns out GQ magazine has decided Death Spray Custom is one of the '10 best artists working today'. It's the cherry on the cake of a significant few weeks for Mr DSC as he has just had his inaugural Inspiration Archive Deep Dive regular column published in Sideburn 34. Order yours to discover what flips his switch. #DeathSprayCustom #Sideburn34

The $230,000 Husqvarna

Oct 7, 2018

The $230,000 Husqvarna

The former Steve McQueen Huskie Cross 400, featured in Sideburn 34 and survivor of two SnowQuakes, sold at Bonham's Barber Museum auction for $230,500 (£176,621) including buyer's premium (the auction house's cut, see below). Read the story of the bike in the (now former) owner's own word s in Sideburn 34. From Bonham's website. BUYERS' PREMIUM AND CHARGES PLEASE NOTE: THE BUYER'S PREMIUM FOR THIS AUCTION IS AS FOLLOWS: For MOTOR VEHICLE property the premium is 15% on the fir

Owned & Ridden By Steve McQueen in the Film On Any Sunday...

Sep 21, 2018

Owned & Ridden By Steve McQueen in the Film On Any Sunday...

Our friend Jason returns to the pages of Sideburn, cementing his position as the person with more bikes featured in Sideburn than any other. This time Jason describes how he ended up owning one of the most famous bikes in cinematic history - Steve McQueen's On any Sunday beach bike. The machine, that was raced at two Snow Quakes, is one of the star lots of Bonham's Barber Museum auction, taking place in Alabama next month. The guide price is $75,000-£100,000 (plus fees). I wo

Sideburn 34 DIGITAL EDITION

Sep 4, 2018

Sideburn 34 DIGITAL EDITION

Big news in Sideburn Town - we've created a digital version of the new issue to sell to all the far-flung tracker fiends, flat track race fans and lovers of good moto magazines who are either: a) paperphobic b) not willing or able to pay for the shipping of our supremely beautiful, but surprisingly heavy magazine. Above is a taster, that shows some of the openers, to hook the browsers. Click the circle in the middle to see it full screen size and you can zoom in further. You

El Rollo - MEGAPOST

Sep 2, 2018

El Rollo - MEGAPOST

The desire to rush to get reports onto the blog has left me, but the want to share photos and a few details is still there, so for instant gratification, there is the @sideburnmag instagram feed (which also runs along the bottom of this very website's homepage for those without the app or a smartphone, there are some out there). Wait a little longer and posts arrive on the blog, from me and our contributors all over the world, and for the real quality, there is the magazine,

Sideburn 34: Out Now

Aug 31, 2018

Sideburn 34: Out Now

We venture into the deserts of California, Mexico and South Africa to test the mettle of our contributors. Old bikes are ridden not hidden, and inappropriate machinery is raced through 1000 miles of wilderness proving the adage that it's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog. SB34 also features McQueen's very own Huskie; a new regular column from Death Spray Custom, an interview with the toughest woman in flat track; follow a group of fe

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