22/04/2009 by info.

The second London International Custom show (L.I.C.S.), due to be held at Earls Court this May, has been cancelled.

Whilst the number of stands booked at the event was around 100, representing over a 100% increase on last year’s show, the organizers are pointing to cash-flow issues among the potential exhibitor community in the UK as being a primary factor in the decision.

The organizers are saying that all booth payments so far are being refunded and that whilst they regret having to take this decision, the project has simply become a victim of the times.

As a start-up event last year the London International Custom Show exceeded expectations and had proven that a London venue could generate a viable attendance in the context of the UK.

The UK market has long been in need of a professionally organized custom show in order to help consolidate the growth of the past decade, and to provide a foundation for dealers, builders and vendors to take the market forward.

The event was being staged at London’s famous Earl’s Court Arena, and this year’s 2nd annual would have seen it move within the facility to prestigious and primary space, providing an environment in which the industry would have been able to showcase itself to maximum benefit to a clearly enthusiastic public.

The event was being organized by a professional and reputable show organizer, Pioneer Global Media, and that firm’s decision not to pursue the project is regretted.

AMD Magazine had endorsed the two-prize (best domestic and ‘best international’) custom bike builder competition as an Affiliate event to its Official World Championship of Custom Bike Building program, and many UK and Continental European builders have voiced their disappointment that the project will not be proceeding at this time.

Whilst there appears to be no immediate prospect of the L.I.C.S. project as such being revived, it is to be hoped that it won’t be long before the market has an alternate to rally behind.

One proposal that is finding favor is that, after the summer, those with an interest in seeing such a show emerge in the UK market gather for a market ‘town hall meeting’ to see what ideas and options could be developed for a possible event in the UK in 2010, in the hope that economic conditions will be better by then.

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07/04/2009 by info.

BY KEYONNA SUMMERS
FLORIDA TODAY

Motorcycle builder Billy Lane is expected to enter a plea today in connection with his role in a fatal 2006 car crash.

If all goes as expected, the plea deal worked out between the prosecution and defense will end more than 2½ years of legal wrangling, which included a lengthy court battle over blood evidence that lead to a DUI manslaughter charge. He would be sentenced next month.

Police say Lane’s blood-alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit when he crossed a double yellow line to pass slow traffic on A1A and crashed head-on into 56-year-old Sebastian Park Inlet ranger Gerald Morelock’s motorcycle on Sept. 4, 2006.

Originally charged with DUI manslaughter in connection with the Labor Day crash, Lane’s lawyers at first fought the inclusion of testimony about blood drawn at a hospital after the crash, saying mishandling by police may have led to contamination and a skewed blood-alcohol reading.

But they said Lane, 39, became more amenable to the idea of a plea agreement after prosecutors in December filed an alternative charge of vehicular homicide. That requires the state to prove Lane was driving recklessly but does not include the drug or alcohol element needed to prove DUI manslaughter.

Both charges carry a maximum penalty of up to 15 years in prison.

It will be revealed today to which charge Lane will plead to, and whether he will plead guilty or no contest.

Attorneys earlier this year canceled his Feb. 9 trial, saying they were close to working out a plea agreement.

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01/04/2009 by info.

An Italian competitor has won AMD’s Official European Championship of Custom Bike Building; the first time an Italian competitor has done so in a year that saw three Italian builders in the top ten.

Gigi Esposito and Luca Pizzano of Big Twin Motors from near Naples in Southern Italy repeated their January win of the AMD Championship Affiliate event, the Verona International Custom Show at Motor Bike Expo, Verona, Italy with “Panster”.

Second place was taken by former World and European Champion Stellan Egeland (SE Service, Sweden) with his radical departure, radical BMW, radical technology demonstrator “Harrier”.

Third place went to Finland’s Andy Niemi/Flying Choppers whose much-admired and thoroughly convincing homage to early seventies choppers “Cloud 9″ has been winning or placing at most of the events he’s shown it at since it made its winning debut at Twin Club MC’s Custom Bike Show in Sweden last year.

As ever, the competitor-judged ‘Freestyle Class’ based AMD Official European Championship was generously staged on behalf of the market by Custom Chrome Europe at their popular annual Dealer Show, with Custom Chrome vendors putting up a whole slew of parts and parts credit prizes and Custom Chrome themselves underwriting the DHL bike freight vouchers worth some 5.000,00 euro each that the first three win for competing at this summer’s 6th annual Official World Championship of Custom Bike Building at Champions Park on Lazelle Street, Sturgis in August.

Our thanks to Custom Chrome, their hard working staff, to their vendors (which included a record number of new vendors for the firm at the show this year) and to our advertisers and Official Partners for helping make this event the annual institution it is.

The recession-defying second largest ever field of 116 outstanding custom bikes (from an all-time record 16 different countries) showed that the market is proving “robust” in the face of the negativity and concern that had worried it as the year started, and with Custom Chrome sources unofficially intimating that dealer parts and accessory sales for the weekend “may well turn out to be even better than last year” the central message from all the season’s trade shows so far, that “there is still good business to be done out there” has been yet again reinforced.

As has the general perception that in custom market terms at least, Europe is “The” market to be active in at this time.

Always a stunning showcase and hot-bed of cutting edge, best practice and radical new-thinking custom bike design and engineering, the common reaction to this year’s entry from competitors, vendors and dealers alike was that the standard in competition represented yet another new high.

Whether or not that was the case, the most significant and apparent impressions that the thousands who witnessed the weekend will take away with them is of a market that is changing, and changing for the better, right in front of our eyes.

A market that is embracing performance engineering as central to the meaning of customizing as the 21st Century’s first decade draws to a close, and of a market that is going to be characterized by a massive diversity of styling as we enter the second decade.

A market where all possible trends will work side-by-side to attract more customers than ever into the lifestyle, rather than one where any one trend is dominant at the cost of all others, or where only one style of riding is considered “cool”.

www.amdchampionship.com

2009 European Championship Results, Freestyle Class

Builder            Bike Name                                          Country

1st    Big Twin Motors        Panster                         Italy
2nd    SE Service        Harrier                                  Sweden
3rd    Flying Choppers        Cloud 9                        Finland
4th    Andreoli Motorcycles    Ventidue                 Italy
5th    Special Parts Supply    Speed-Demon            Holland
6th    Riverside Motocyclettes    Clearspeed            France
7th    Anders             Göth                                           Sweden
8th    Wildstyle        Don Scalfare                               Czech
9th    Bobber Cycles        Chenz’e Arrenda               Italy
10th    TGS Motorcycles        Seppster 3                 Germany
11th    Lamb Engineering    Cafe Rouge                   UK
12th    Destiny Cycles        High Roller                     UK
13th    Bonneville        Cashmir                                 Spain
14th    Classic Bikes        Lost Knuckles                   Germany
15th    USM GmbH        Foxy Lady                         Germany
16th    Nicolas Chauvin Design    Wild Night           France
17th    Lasse Sundberg        Indian XXL                 Sweden
18th    Garage65        5′ini                                         Italy
19th    Dub Performance        Protoslug                  France
20th    Hogtech Sweden AB    Chopper No 1962    Sweden

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