The why is simple. In 1985 I was in my mid-20's and first saw the K100RS in person in the parking lot of an upscale restaurant. It drew a bigger crowd than the Porsches in the lot. This bike was radically different and uber-cool.
For years I thought I'd buy a K100RS but there were all those other things to take care of like attending grad school, paying off tuition, buying a house etc. Plus I was living in a cooler climate where the riding season was pretty short. Eventually, I ended up moving to a much warmer part of the country but by then I had reached a point in my careeer where, well, owning a motorcycle might be seen as some sort of mid-life crisis.
Recently I was reliving those old days and how much I had wanted a K-bike when I was younger. The funny thing is that I could now afford to walk into the BMW dealer and drop cash on any sexy new bike in the dealership, but my preference was to find an old K100. In "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" the author reminds us that when we are working on a motorcycle we're really working on restoring ourselves. Like so many insights in the book, that line stuck with me. I think I wanted to buy a K100 to restore something that I had lost in myself. Or maybe just to see how much I had changed since 1985. Either way, it became a compelling thought.
From time to time I would check Ebay or Craigslist for a BMW, but the listings never seemed right. It would be either a major project , or a restored bike, or a salvage title. Until one day I came across the right bike and I snagged it for slightly over trade in value. I could see it needed some work, but was driveable.
What follows is the genesis of this blog.
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