Triumph Champion 500

Triumph Champion 500

‘Greaser’ Mike Kramer has an excellent taste in bikes. His ’73 T140 has even been used in an ad campaign for Hassleblad cameras. But my favorite ‘Mike Bike’ is this flat tracker built at Sixth Street Specials in NYC. According to Mike, “The bike is a Triumph 500 with pretty much everything you can think of done to the motor—Megacycle cams, balanced and lightened crank and rods, valves, ARD magneto and so on. The engine has been crammed into a Champion frame that originally held a Yamaha 250.” The motor was built by Hugh Mackie, and all the welding and frame modification was by Fumihisa Matsueda. Right now, Mike is getting a set of reverse cone flat track pipes custom made to fit the bike, “as the TT pipes are not giving me the low end power I need to come out of the corners.” The paintwork was done by Fritz Schenck who did most of chopper builder Indian Larry’s paint, as well as a lot of the Ed Roth restorations. (He’s just finished a ground up rebuild of Ed Roth’s Mega Cycle.) “I reminded him the bike was essentially a dirt bike,” says Mike, “but that didn’t stop him from going nuts on the gold leaf. That being said I have no problem racing the bike—although I’m prepared to throw myself under it to protect the paint should I go down on the track.” Despite the stunning looks, this is one bike that is definitely not a trailer queen.

PS: Mike Kramer was the winner of our Schott jacket competition. Which reminds me: until 11 September 2010, Schott will give Bike EXIF readers 15% off any purchase of $50 or more. Just type in the coupon code EXIF15 when you check out. So if you’ve always hankered after the ultimate leather jacket, now’s the best time to buy—just check out the Schott range here.