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That impact was to provide an environment in which non-traditional V-twin platforms could compete effectively against the custom industry’ s default‘ legacy’ look and concepts- a legacy that was shaping the custom market away from its primary‘ raison d’ etre’ of showcasing the new, the bold, the innovative and the daring. Instead, show classes were sealing custom design orthodoxy away in aspic and damning with stentorian righteous indignation anybody who dared even explore the edge of the box, never mind actually think outside it! Which was, and remains, excellent- excepting of course that while radical and innovative custom design and engineering excites and attracts consumers, nine of every ten riders have a stock or near stock bike in their garage, not a radical custom. The mission of the Freestyle concept is to advance design and engineering and the popularity of riding( on any kind of platform) in equal measure. That was why we teamed up with Harley-Davidson on our Lazelle Street, Sturgis lot in 2008, to provide impetus and profile to the creativity and individualism that consumers could still embrace working on a factory platform. Sadly, Motor Company apathy and bureaucracy made that a short lived, disappointing and ultimately dispiriting experience from our point of view- one that made us feel like we were rolling a stone uphill. Ultimately Harley’ s“ couldn’ t care less” attitude was one of the factors that made us decide to take the World Championship to Europe and reassert its independence. Fast forward some more years, and we all now find ourselves in a very different world- one where that explosion in platform diversity has now itself become the orthodoxy of a market in which the child really has eaten the parent- individuality truly is king and contemporary authenticity is as far removed from the cookie cutter customs of the factories as its possible to get. So, with that foundation of justification well and truly laid, this year’ s thirteenth AMD World Championship of Custom Bike Building( AMD XIII- Cologne, Germany, October 3-7) will be the last to feature a Modified Harley-Davidson class in its purist sense, and from the ashes of what has been will be born a new Modified Production class for 2020 and beyond, that sees all custom projects where the design and
2013 Modified Harley-Davidson World Champion‘ Stealth Bullet’ by Winston Yeh, Rough Crafts, Japan
2014 Modified Harley-Davidson World Champion‘ Brougham’ by Julian von Oheimb, One Way
Machine, Germany