Most of us always complain about how much our bikes are costing us. Well, not the person who bought a Brough Superior 50 years ago for £150, and recently sold it for a staggering £281,750 - far exceeding its pre-sale top estimate of £180,000 at the Bonhams Motorcycles’ Spring Stafford Sale on Sunday 23 April.
Featuring an enhanced finish of chromium plated fuel tank, mudguards and wheels with a gold-lined black centre, the 1931 Brough Superior 1,000cc SS100 motorcycle started life as the marque’s display bike at that year’s Olympia Motor Cycle Show.
Acquired by the vendor for £150 in 1973, the highly original machine had retained this special finish, underneath a protective layer of black paint. Following a four-way bidding battle between the saleroom, telephone and internet bidders, the SS100 found a new home with a private Europe-based collector.
Other bikes selling for big bucks included a 1960 Ducati 125cc Desmodromic 'Barcone' Grand Prix Racing Motorcycle, campaigned by future nine-times motorcycling World Champion Mike Hailwood, who won nine 125 races with the bike. The Hailwood Ducati, sold in ‘as found’ condition, went for £138,000.
In the Ducati’s slipstream was an incredibly rare Works Honda Racing Motorcycle, a 1963 Honda 250cc CR72, ridden throughout Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia) in the 1960s by six-times world Champion Jim Redman, sold for £126,500.
The FHO Racing 2022 BMW M1000RR Superbike, ridden to Isle of Man TT victory by Peter Hickman in last year’s Superbike and Senior TT Race was offered exactly as it had crossed the finish line of the blue riband Senior TT and achieved its top estimate, selling for £112,700.
