The world of custom motorcycles is full of beautiful machines, but many of them see little mileage. While that doesn’t stop us from admiring them, we’re suckers for bikes that are designed to be ridden in anger.

Right now, we’re hooked on this BMW R nineT flat track weapon, built by Dan Riley. Based in Burnsville, Minnesota, Dan’s a freelance graphic and product designer who operates as Gunn Design.

The project kicked off in April last year, when Ola Stenegärd himself (then BMW Motorrad’s Head of Vehicle Design, now at Indian) reached out to Dan about customizing an R nineT Pure. Dan’s been riding since age four, so building a show pony was never an option.

Since then, this hooligan racer-slash-street tracker—dubbed ‘Maxx Headroom’—has gone through multiple rounds of changes, and spent as much time on display as it has on the race track.

It’s been shown at Sturgis, Wheels & Waves California, The One Show, The Handbuilt Show and Glemseck 101, and raced at almost all of them.

Most of Dan’s changes have been focused on shedding weight, adding performance, and improving ergonomics: all critical elements of flat track racing. He’s done most of the work himself, all from an area in his design studio where he can “build bikes and get messy.”

The R nineT’s stock bodywork has been replaced, and the new fuel tank is from a 1990 Honda CB400. It was a tricky job: Dan had to cut the bottom section off the OEM tank, and weld it to the Honda tank to get it to fit.

He also fitted a Vortex fuel cap, and modded the fuel pump slightly.

Out back, there’s a carbon fiber flat track tail, modeled on a Ron Wood design, but altered to suit Dan’s taste.

It’s clear coated for a gloss finish and topped off with a custom leather seat pad from Saddlemen, complete with an embroidered Gunn logo. Dan tells us he didn’t need to tweak the subframe much, apart from some tab edits.

Lower down, the R nineT now rolls on a set of typical 19” flat track wheels. Woody’s Wheel Works built the set for Dan, using custom orange anodized hubs laced to custom-drilled Sun rims, and shod with Dunlop rubber.

At first, Dan couldn’t get the rear wheel to fit the space available—but then he switched to a 3.5” wide rim, which flattened the tire out just enough to make it work.

The front suspension is stock, but there’s a custom Race Tech G3-S shock doing duty at the rear. Dan’s upgraded the front brake rotor, and added Magura HC3 master cylinders for both the brake and clutch.

Rocket Exhaust helped Dan out on the custom pipework, which consists of twin stainless steel headers running up into MX-style, carbon-tipped mufflers. Dan also removed the airbox and installed a pair of K&N filters—and then realized the BMW didn’t run as great.

So he installed a RapidBike Tuner, in a bid to squeeze more (and smoother) power from the boxer. “I haven’t had it on a dyno with the new setup,” he tells us, but seat-of-the-pants feel from the tune is noticeable.”

“I had to do something, given the totally changed-up intake and exhaust system. BMW people told me at Glemseck that the stock air box makes the most power…and that’s what Nate Kern was running when he beat me.”

Dan’s new cockpit setup is all about maximum control. He’s fitted ProTaper handlebars on adjustable Rox risers, and removed all the switches he doesn’t need. He’s also deleted the stock bike’s ABS system, and uninstalled the heated grips.

The overall wiring changes are minimal though. The speedo’s still in play, and Dan’s fitted a small LED taillight at the back. He’s also got an LED headlight that he can plug in quickly if he wants to take to the streets.

Maxx Headroom is a stellar case study for form following function. There’s nothing precious or fussy about it—it’s a raw machine, built to be thrashed.

Plus we’re pretty sure that if we give Dan enough time, he’ll find more ways to make his R nineT lighter, faster and better.

Gunn Design | Facebook | Instagram | With thanks to Marc Holstein for the static images

VIDEO

Written by Andrew Jones

Interested in building yourself a sprint racer? If your brain works anything like Germany‘s Jo Hecht, then here’s a handy set of instructions for you to follow. Take one 1978 BMW R100R RS. Add an aircraft’s propeller spinner, a Yamaha XT500 tank, a Porsche RS spoiler, a Harley fender, a bunch of handmade aluminium parts and then mix it all together with equal parts deft technical know-how and snarling Sid Vicious attitude. Then bake it in the heat of an eighth mile sprint race and hey presto! Here’s one he prepared earlier.

Based in the south of Germany, Jo was born in 1970 and went on to study a Masters of Industrial Design in Milan before taking over the family’s interior design business with brother Frank. “Then in 2016, I created ‘Gasoline Culture’ as an online retail idea to sell stickers, hats, t-shirts and the like. Embarrassingly, it’s still not online.” And with customs like this, we wonder if his time is better spent on bikes than bytes. “Since I was a small child, I was always into racing. Cars, motorbikes; pretty much anything with a cool design. So for the last few years, I’ve been building myself different custom bikes.”

After a chance encounter with Mr Seb ‘Sultans of Sprint’ Lorentz in Biarritz 4 years ago, he was immediately impressed by the performance of Seb’s old BMW-powered ‘Sprintbeemer’. So not wanting to reinvent the rad, he decided to use the very same litre engine as the base for his build. “Afterwards, I was looking for an old Beemer for about a year before I found a ‘78 R100RS close to my hometown in Stuttgart.’ It’s important to note that Jo comes from Porsche’s heartland; it explains one or two of his automotive obsessions rather well.

“I had my heart set on an impressive fairing made from aluminium, so I found an old airplane part which was perfect in its form and it would also do a great job of hiding all the instruments and cables inside. The tail on the back is inspired by the old Porsche Carrera RS ‘Entenbürzel’ or ‘Ducktail’ spoiler, so in a way it is a BMW ‘RS’. Another big inspiration was my long-term love of the Yamaha XT500, with its iconic aluminium tank and golden wheels.”

Pew pew

“The building time was around a year and a half, mostly because it was done as late night screwing around after a full day’s work. After receiving the BMW, Jo ripped pretty much everything away, so there was only the frame, the engine, the wheels and the forks left. “The idea was to build a street legal bike with the option to race it, like the Porsche RS.”

After collecting a bunch of parts including blinkers and lights and a raft of other eclectic paraphernalia, Jo tried to find a nice aerodynamic fairing for the bike that would also allow him to add a light in the front. Surfing the web, he somehow stumbled across an aeroplane’s ‘spinner’ – also known as ‘the pointy part in the middle of a propellor’ – which was perfect. “It was designed for a 3-bladed prop, so it had 3 cut-outs which matched exactly to the bike’s ’bars.”

Well, do ya?

“After the fairing was fitted, I added the light and used the rest of the internal space for the bike electrics and other tech. For more of an XT look, I put the exhaust on the bike’s right hand side and raised it up a little. At the back, I used an old Harley fender and a handmade aluminium tail for that typical Porsche RS spoiler look.” The engine is powered by another famous Stuttgart brand, namely Siebenrock. Jo says it has around 90hps when angry. “You can ride and shift it normally or by using the Pingel airshifter. The suspension is on the left side and I used a Harley progressive shock. The rear tyre is a special drag racing slick from Racemaster.”

“One of the tricky things was mounting and wiring of the fairing without drilling holes in it; notice that you can’t see how it’s fixed. Another difficult thing was the routing the exhaust system. To have it go up and to the right side without blocking other key parts of the bike was a real headache.”

“There’s not really one thing I like about the bike, it’s the whole bike: the spinner fairing, the Porsche tail, the golden wheels, the XT gas tank, the handmade aluminum parts and plenty of other cool little details. The bike is me, really. Stocked with my childhood memories of racing, performance and fun all reunited in a cool sprint racing bike. It’s awesome.”

[ Sultans Of Sprint | Photos by Marc Holstein ]

Lewis Hamilton's successful quest for a fifth world title, I suggest to him, can be distilled down to one simple phrase: Ferrari dropped the ball and he knocked it out of the park.

Hamilton chuckles a little at the suggestion, and then says: "The description is not too bad."

"It's been an incredible season - mentally and physically, for everyone in the team," he adds, as he reflects on the ups and downs of what will surely come to be remembered as his finest achievement yet - winning the title against four-time champion Sebastian Vettel in a car that was, for at least half the races, faster than his own.

"On the drivers' side," Hamilton says, "the mental side has been the key. Ferrari were so strong at certain points of the year - particularly in the first half of the season - we didn't know how it was going to end.

"But the best parts of the season have been when we've been on the back foot and it's not looked great - but we managed to claw our way back and collectively do a better job overall [than] their team and their driver.

"That's really what's made the difference this year, which is something the whole team can be really proud of."

Hamilton is in expansive and revelatory form as we discuss the year and cover among other topics:

• where his stand-out performances come from

• the psychology of the battle with Vettel

• his spirituality and how it impacts his racing

• his growth as a sportsman since his electrifying debut in 2007

• an insightful anecdote from inside a drivers' briefing

A battle of minds as well as talent

This year started as a contest between Hamilton and Vettel to see who would become the first man of his generation to win a fifth world title.

For much of the year, it was impossible to predict how it was going to end. The Ferrari has been a faster car than the Mercedes at least as often as it has been the other way around but at key moments Hamilton has excelled and Vettel and/or Ferrari have messed up.

Hamilton sees the three defining moments of the season as:

• The German Grand Prix, when Vettel crashed out of the lead as Hamilton closed in rapidly in a late-race rain shower and the Mercedes driver went on to win;
• The Italian Grand Prix, when Ferrari's failure to impose team orders on their front-row starting drivers allowed Hamilton to pass Vettel on the first lap, and take a brilliant victory chasing down the German's team-mate Kimi Raikkonen
• Singapore, where a lap for the ages from Hamilton put him on pole on a track where Mercedes have traditionally struggled

Hamilton believes Monza was "probably the biggest psychological blow" for Ferrari, to lose after they had locked out the front row.

But he adds: "They'd had a couple - Seb's psychologically difficult time when he made a personal mistake [in Germany]. As a driver, when the team makes a mistake, it's painful. But when it's you, when it's in your control, that's a horrible feeling. He would have taken that to heart.

"Then we had that fight at Monza. That would have been a team blow for them. But we didn't get complacent after that great result for us. We knew we still had to execute, going to places like Singapore where Ferrari usually destroy us. And what a weekend it was.

"None of us predicted that we would've won in Hockenheim or Monza or particularly Singapore. Collectively we've done an amazing job in this team."

Those 'Lewis Hamilton moments'

The championship should have been close to the end, so evenly matched have Mercedes and Ferrari been.

That it was not is partly down to the errors that have defined Vettel's season and at least as much to the remarkable performances Hamilton has produced, often when on the back foot.

His pole lap at Silverstone when Ferrari seemed to have the faster car; the race in Germany when he took seconds a lap out of Vettel's lead in the rain before his rival crashed; winning in Hungary when the Ferrari was much quicker; his exquisite demonstration of all the qualities that define a world-class driver in Monza; and that unbelievable qualifying lap in Singapore.

Hamilton has always produced moments like this, but he agrees there have been more of them this year.

"Definitely," he says. "What you don't get to see is I have this large group of people to utilise. They're my tools, my soldiers, whatever you want to call them.

"We all individually think we're operating at the highest but one of us can lean against another and pull more out of them.

"My job is to try to extract the most from every single person there. So, how you debrief, how you understand personally, how you engage with everyone when you have a bad weekend, how you lift everyone up. How you nurture that and build upon it has been key this year.

"If I didn't get those guys in the right positions, I wouldn't be able to extract what I have in me. I have always had what I have in the way I am driving but if they mess up or slip or didn't do something right, I can't unlock the potential in the car, and that's why it's a collective group."

Once out on his own in the car, he says: "It's all about seizing the moment. When it rains in Budapest, for example, I would imagine it is easy to look at it and think, 'Shoot, that makes it much harder for us all.' That is looking at the glass half-empty. I look at it the other way, like 'This is an opportunity for me. Great. They were actually quicker in the dry. Now I know I can make the difference in the wet if I put it together.'

"Now, knowing it initially and actually doing it is two different things. Then I go into the zone of how am I going to put this lap together to make sure I'm ahead."

It's a head space you get into?

"I think it's a head space, yeah."

Whatever it is, it has led to moments in which he has excelled himself. In Germany, he closed dramatically on Vettel as rain began to fall late in the race - and the Ferrari driver ended up crashing out, causing a 32-point swing in the championship.

"I didn't know it was going to rain," Hamilton says, "so you are progressing mentally in the race. But then when it started to rain, I'm like: 'OK, I'm gonna catch him.' And I also know that he's thinking I'm gonna catch him. I'm sure they're telling him where I am."

The day had started with Hamilton in 15th on the grid because of a hydraulics failure in qualifying - a disappointment he likens to missing out on pole at the 2015 British Grand Prix after erroneously bailing on his final lap in changeable conditions.

"The night before, recovering from the loss… a bit like at Silverstone in '15 when Nico [Rosberg] got pole. I was distraught but came back the next day and won.

"In that race [Germany], qualifying I was out, he was on pole. 'How do I minimise the loss?' It's how you recover from those. That psychological operation for me is the most powerful."

A sense of the otherworldly

Hamilton is religious; he has said he prays every day.

After the race in Germany he made a number of remarks that hinted at his faith. "My prayers were really answered," he said at the time. "It freaks me out a little bit more than normal."

Three months on, he reflects on what he meant.

"I don't pray to win," he says. "I don't pray for fortune. I always just ask - whether you're talking to yourself or someone's hearing you - but 'I want to be able to live to my potential today. Allow me to live to my potential today. I know I can be great but certain things get in the way and you're not always able to be great. Just allow me to run free.'"

Boos from the partisan crowd also played their part.

"Also in Hockenheim there was so much negativity. For me, that's like the devil. Let me shine on this and turn that darkness - that booing, which is all dark.

"For me, the sun was shining even though it was raining."

After the race, there was a torrential downpour.

"For me that felt biblical," he says, "if you knew the stuff that I'd said in my prayer - and it was not predictable. Those things I had asked to work against. I didn't ask for the rain at the end of the race. That was almost like… if you ever asked for a sign of something, that was a sign."

Then there was his Instagram description of his qualifying lap in Singapore as "heaven-sent".

He explains: "I'm not saying that's controlled from above or anything. When I say it's heaven-sent, it's just you're always searching for perfection. You never get close to it. But that was the closest I felt. The lap just went. It was awesome. For me, that was one of the best laps I've ever done."

Only "one of the best"? Why not "the best"?

"Because I've got a really bad memory and can't remember all my pole laps. I don't want to be absolute about it and then remember, 'Oh yeah there was another lap.'

"But from what I currently have stored in my mind, yeah, it was the best.

"But when I say it's heaven-sent, it's just about setting yourself goals and that feeling you have. Think of heaven - heaven's a perfect place and on that lap I felt I was in a perfect place. In a beautiful place, an amazing feeling, balanced and at my best."

The psychology of battle

Not only has Hamilton won the battle with Vettel over a year, he has, at crucial moments, beaten him in a straight fight on track, too.

Vettel passed Hamilton easily on the straight to win the Belgian Grand Prix, but Hamilton's moves on his rival on the first lap in Italy, and after losing a place at the pit stops in Russia, were more defining.

The impression is that Hamilton knows he can pass Vettel when he needs to, and it's not one he tries to diminish.

"I never ever think: 'I own you,'" he says. "I don't use that mentality. But if you imagine, erm, look at [Floyd] Mayweather as he goes into the ring. I don't think I've ever seen him not look like he knows he's going to win. Even if the opponent is taller or whatever.

"It's the same when I look at different athletes and I'm wondering what's the difference between them and how they are not nervous because they know what the other person may or may not do.

"But when I came out behind, I know where his strengths are, I know where his weaknesses are and I know where I'm better. So it's game on. I'm like, 'Let's dance. You might get the better of me [in] this bit but I know how to get by you."

Behind the scenes with the drivers

Although Hamilton won the battle with Vettel in Russia, he was not happy with the Ferrari man's driving, feeling he had made an illegal second move when defending before Hamilton passed two corners later.

Hamilton brought it up in the drivers' briefing with FIA F1 director Charlie Whiting at the next race in Japan. He takes up the story, which includes an amusing pop at Red Bull's Max Verstappen.

"It wasn't really an argument," he says. "It was a different opinion about how you see and interpret the rule book.

"You ask things to Charlie and he says one thing but it means another. Sometimes. So I said, 'Charlie, are you allowed two moves under braking? Is it one move or two moves? The rules say one but that was a two-move thing and you look at the footage and in my eyes that's two moves.'"

Hamilton is referring to the moment during the race when Hamilton was closing on Vettel on the straight down towards the de facto first corner. Vettel moves to his right to defend. He stops moving, and then moves again, squeezing Hamilton towards the wall on the inside, and forcing him to brake to back out of the overtake.

Hamilton continues: "Charlie said, 'Yeah but if you look from the front, it looks like he turns and then slows down and then keeps going, so it's still one move.'

"So I'm like, 'OK, in the future, if I move, as long as I keep a bit of angle on the car, it's still one move then I'm going to be fine? But it's actually two.' I'm saying, 'You're setting a precedent.'

"I asked all the drivers, 'What do you think?' And there was only one driver really that looked at it and saw two moves but said it was OK, and that was Max. Because he does two moves!"

Hamilton laughs out loud. "So, I was laughing and saying 'Max, you're the one that started this whole two-move thing. You're the king of the double move.' It's just trying to understand it."

Personal development

It's not been a perfect season and Hamilton admits he has had some bad races. China, early on, he calls "a shocking weekend," for example, adding: "The first half of the season wasn't great."

But, in contrast to Vettel, what has been striking is his lack of errors, which he says has "allowed me to enjoy the highs more". In achieving this, he says, "discipline is very much key, how you study and prepare for the race".

It is in this way, he says, that he has come on from the raw talent who shocked Fernando Alonso in his debut season, when they were McLaren team-mates.

"2007 me wouldn't have a chance [against 2018 Hamilton]," he says. "And he was still very quick."

Hamilton says he feels "people underestimate that season", adding: "Being in a top team straight away and having to try to deliver against a two-time world champion who has been through what I have been through to this point almost, is a huge demand and it was one of the toughest years of my life."

Now, he says, he is on "a much, much different level. Last year, I was trying to figure out this amazing year and how can I improve on that.

"When you have won the championship, it is easy to just ride the wave and think it's great. But I am always wanting to raise the bar."

Five titles and 71 wins and counting. Lewis Hamilton is a long way from finished yet.