Ten Reasons to visit the Irish Bike Show
Added on Sunday, February 13th, 2011 by Carole Nash Editor | No Comments
Ten Reasons to visit the Irish Bike Show
Relief of the sharp variety is much needed amidst the political and economic gloom that’s enveloped Ireland. Step forward, quick pace, the Carole Nash Irish Motorbike & Scooter Show, an action and attraction packed festival of biking. The nation’s biggest and best bike show offers a welcome escape as we gather to gawp, gossip, admire, adore, banter and buy. It’s also admirably affordable which means a trip to the biggest date in the Irish show calendar is irresistible. Just in case you need a little tempting we present just ten of so many reasons to head for RDS Dublin next month.
Giacomo Is Go
When it comes to the GP victory league table despite retiring in 1977 Italian racer Giacomo Agostini remains leader of the pack. With an astonishing 122 Grand Prix victories and 15 world titles nestling on the mantelpiece the chap’s a true biking legend and inspiration to an up and coming rider we think you’ll hear more of – a young pretender called Valentino Rossi. We think that lad’s got a future. Agostini will also be leading the pack as bikers join a “ride in” to the RDS on Saturday March 5th, having done the show’s opening honours the day before.
Stock of the New
Bikes. That’s what it’s all about isn’t it. Course it is. Thank crikey then that the Irish show has attracted key manufacturers keen to display their wares, including BMW Motorrad, Ducati, Honda, Suzuki, Triumph, Vectrix and Yamaha. Triumph is launching its all-new Tiger 800 and off-road sibling, the 800XC, which has been endorsed by Kevin Ash as a “serious contender” among its adventurous compatriots. Watch out too for the much admired Street Triple. Ducati will have you dribbling and drooling over its delightfully devilish Diavel sports cruiser . Among BMW ‘s line up of newbies will be the K1600 GT tourer, a six-cylinder in-line perhaps best described as a very grand tourer if you accept BMW Ireland’s marketing boss Steve Pitt’s labelling of “genre defining luxury.”
Oh Me, Oh Mai-Lin
Hailing from Hamburg Mai-Lin Senf is Europe’s top female stunt-rider, a much in demand performer who catches the eye not just through her lurid pink, flame-spewing machine. Some might be chauvinistically blunt and say she’s a real looker, a blonde bombshell, or a biking beauty. Or they may simply grunt “phwoar!” We at Insidebikes are of course more sophisticated than that and marvel only at her mastery of the motorcycle, her balance, her control and how well she fills those leathers. Oh darn, we were doing so well.
Babe Watch
Ok, we hold our hands up. Sometimes, just sometimes, the art of motorcycle marketing is less than sophisticated. Then again the old adage dictates what we must do if something remains in working order. So we’re not going to fix it. Yes, for what the Babe of the Year competition lacks in sophistication, in metropolitan, metrosexual modernity it makes up for in sheer practicality. But we’ll still pretend it’s all just post-modern irony, albeit post-modern irony handily clad in figure-hugging lycra. Indeed so committed are we to such post-modernity we’ve decided we should lay on the irony ourselves by inviting along our very own Carole Nash Babes.
Twin Win Situation
A quick Maths lesson for you. 4 + 2 = 6 right? Well yes, but in our fantabulous world it also adds up to a rather enticing €21,000 package of Honda loveliness. Need the formula explaining? OK, it’s easy. Visit the Carole Nash stand E6 and get a quote from Ireland’s biggest motorcycle insurance specialist and we’ll put you in to win a fantastic prize package. What’s up for grabs? Well not just a shiny new, freshly restyled Honda CBF600N but also one of the Japanese manufacture’s groovy little Jazz hatchbacks. It’s a bike and car package we think you’ll find adds up. Of course popping in to see Carole Nash, is in any event, a good plan, not least for the aforementioned babes but also two stunning customs being brought over from the workshops of custom kings Destiny Cycles.
Irish Customs
No we’re not talking stereotypical Blarney kissing stuff fresh out of the Borde Failte Book of Tourism Quaintness. We’re talking twisted chrome and imaginations to match as Ireland’s best custom bike builders go head-to head. At stake in the AMD Custom Bike Building Competition are places at the high church of bespoke bikery, the renowned AMD World Finals at Sturgis in the US of A. This year two such places are up for grabs as both the Top Irish Built Bike and Best International Custom Bike Entry will take a €5,000 prize to head over the pond. If last show’s contest is anything to go by, expect fierce competition. Then Don Cronin’s stunning Harley softailed Moto-Morini V-twin wonder took Best of Show and AMD Champion Custom Bike Builder in Ireland before coming 4th in class at Sturgis.
Wheels of Recycled Steel
The RoboSteel Super Bike Sculpture is a futuristic flight of artistic fancy, conceived and created in Ireland by the geniuses behind the Alien Supercar built for Top Gear and the Biker Man created for the Carole Nash International Motorcycle & Scooter Show in 2010. Robosteel head honcho Piyanuch Chanphet is enthused about the company’s latest artistic endeavour, saying: “We are an Irish company and we wanted the Irish Superbike Concept Sculpture to be on a par with the Top Gear Concept Car.And so it became a labour of love and we are proud that this prize bike is what I regard as one of our greatest ever works of art.” The true value of art is not measured by money, but given you can be in to win this magnificent monster, it might be rude not to mention that it’s valued at over €10,000. After all, you may not have room on your mantelpiece for yet another life size bike sculpture. To enter just click here.
The Axle of Evel
Visit the show and, in fact you’ll see not just the axle but the whole of the great stunt man’s shark-jumping Harley. That’s not all. Also on display will be the X-2 Sky Cycle, the steam-powered rocket which Knievel rode when – almost successfully – jumping the Snake River Canyon. These, his Wheelie Drag Car and various other bits of daredevilish memorabilia are coming to Dublin as the True Evil tour makes its only stop in Ireland. It’s a fitting tribute to the late and legendary bus jumping superstar who undertook no fewer than 75 ramp-to-ramp jumps in a long and bone-breaking career.
What a Drag
In these austere times life can indeed be a drag. But at the Carole Nash Irish Motorbike & Scooter Show a drag , or several, is just what’s needed to lift the spirits and get the old adrenaline pumping again. The sight, smell not to mention awesome sound of Top Fuel Drag Bikes will fill the air of the RDS. Visiting the show from the famous Santa Pod Raceway these monster machines will be performing rolling burn-outs. In the hall. It’s going to be awesome, a high energy thrill in more than one way.
Value Judgement
Sorry to keep wittering on about all this austerity stuff. It’s tiresome we know. But by golly we also know people are keeping a much closer eye on their bank balances than they were one or two years ago. It’s a modern malaise. Heartening to see then that the Carole Nash Irish Motorbike & Scooter Show is embracing that old fashioned concept of value. Tickets are priced at an eminently reasonable €15 (circa £12.80) with students and seniors gaining entry for a mere €12 (10.20)and kids under 12 going free (£0.00!). Better still there’s a strictly limited early bird discount which means if you book two tickets now they’ll cost just €10 each (£8.50). Tickets can be purchased in advance simply by clicking here and shelling out those few measly euros. We’d say to you that, with all these beautiful bikes, babes and bountiful attractions, it’s got to be worth a punt but that kind of talk is no longer currency.
The Carole Nash Irish Motorbike & Scooter Show opens at 3pm on Friday 4th March and runs to Sunday 6th March at the RDS Main Hall Complex, Dublin 4. There will be a free bike park in front of the venue and an on-site helmet crèche priced at €2 . If you want to stop over and enjoy Dublin’s varied charms click here to view local accommodation. For travel and venue information click here.
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