The Birth of The Little Hooligan

The first time I saw my Triumph, little more than a shadow in the corner of a friend's garage, I fell in love with it. It was not for the hulking motor hanging out of it, nor was it the incredible shine of show chrome-this bike had character. It is parked in my garage at this moment-it is a1968 TR6C. When I bought it, it had been retired from a history of abuse, desert racing in Death Valley.

When I looked into the possibilities of fixing up the bike, I was faced with one avenue of refurbishment-a complete restoration. The impossibility of this task was daunting, since holes had been stripped and re-tapped to a standard or metric size (depending on the hole), broken parts had been replaced with non original pieces, and I didn't have the money or enthusiasm to restore this bike back to showroom condition. Yet one truth remained, this bike had character.

The first incarnation of my 68 TR6 was a naked cafe bike. I stripped the fenders and put clubman handlebars on, and replaced the sloppy headers with the original twin high pipes. A patron of the shop we used to frequent heard my bike fire up one time and affectionately dubbed it "The Little Hooligan." The Little Hooligan draws attention wherever it goes-it's loud, it's cool, and I believe it represents well the legacy of the Triumph name; a motorcycle that refused to follow the pack.