25 Years Ago August 1985
25 YEARS AGO AUGUST 1985
Wow! How apropos: This month, we're working on a comparo including the new 2010 Harley-
Davidson Iron 883. Twenty-five years ago, our cover story was "The Sportster Chronicles: 19571986, Evolution of an American Dream." I have to say, with a few mostly cosmetic differences, the new Sportster parked outside our back door right now looks almost exactly like the Evolution 883 on the August, 1985, cover. The new bike looks as cool as it did then—cooler, even—and it performs just as underwhelmingly as ever. In fact, '85 was the year the Sportster shrank back from 10OOcc to the 883 of the '57 original, supposedly to dance around higher insurance rates for bikes bigger than 900cc. Yours for $3995.
• Elsewhere in this issue, the new Suzuki Cavalcade was good but not good enough to unseat the Honda p,,u Aspencade. r****** **««»*« **«,*
The Husqvarna f , , A 400WRX smacked down the KTM / ^¡¡pk|4 350MXC and f > * \ v Honda XR350R ^ ($2198), and ^ * V we peered into a slightly fa murky crystal m ; j ball to learn m** Honda Elite fc* ' and Rebel 250 were going to revolutionize the motorcycle market—floundering then, too.
• Twenty-five years ago, Paul Dean eulogized the demise of the turbo motorcycle era. The problem with turbos? Too complex, bad timing, etc...
• Bruce Penhall speedway action led in Race Watch, followed by some hotshot kid named Kevin Schwantz riding Yoshimura Suzukis. —John Burns
