Gentlemen, may we have your votes please?
In 2021 the BikeBrewers team got invited by the Café Racer Club Bulgaria to act as judges for the 2nd edition of the Caféracerfest in Kyustendil – Bulgaria. We didn’t know what to expect, since this was the first time we were asked to perform this serious duty, and all we had seen so far were (lovely) pictures of the first edition. Now, we may not know much about the Eurovision Song contest, however, we do know a thing or two about caféracers, so we grabbed our motorcycle gear and headed East.

Throwback 2021
As you may recall, we were blown away by the quality of the event, which we clearly communicated in our September 24th report. A major factor in the success of the first two editions is the undaunted organizer of the event, Ivan Mushev. That name may ring a bell, and it should; we’ve featured some of Ivan’s masterpieces under the name of his outfit Bull Moto custom. But that’s not what we are here for now.

We must have done something right as we have been invited to judge again at the 2022 edition of the Caféracerfest which is coming up on June 11th, and we couldn’t be more excited! Looking back at last year’s event did raise the question if this year’s contenders have any idea of the high level of last year’s participants? If we go by what we saw last year, we have some pretty high expectations.

…and the winner is..!
This story is about Borislav Aleksov and his dream to build the ultimate café racer. Before the Bulgarian builder got his hands on this 1992 Yamaha XV1100, he had already built a Honda CX500 café racer. Borislav was fascinated by the air-cooled Yamaha v-twin, so when one of his friends was selling his, Borislav knew that it was now or never. We’re glad he took that chance.

It’s safe to say that we have yet to see a boring Yamaha XV caféracer here at BikeBrewers. This one seems to be the latest addition to that list, keeping the standard yet again, very high. It’s hard to imagine that Borislav had a budget of a mere 7500 euro; that kind of money you’d expect a shed-built bike to cost, definitely not a show-winning unit like this.

Torches out
Borislav started with chopping the rear sub-frame, and building a new one from scratch. At the front a set of Suzuki GSX-R1000 forks were adopted, held firmly in place by a set of Aprilia RSV4 triple clamps. The forks allow for radial brake callipers to be mounted, which is exactly what the master craftsman did, courtesy of Tokico. At the rear, a Yamaha FZ6 mono-shock keeps the bike on track. The new forks brought a new dilemma; the ground clearance was now compromised. The solution: raising the engine up in the frame. That’s not an easy task, so countless hours were spent trying to get it right.

The engine didn’t go back in the frame before being completely overhauled and got covered with a fresh coat of paint. The carbs were cleaned and rebuild, so that took care of the intake side of things. On the exhaust side, a new custom-made exhaust system was build from the ground up. We really liked the lines and angles of the exhaust system, and it’s one of the key features that attracted us to this bike on the day of the event. When we asked Borislav what his intentions were when he built this bike, he said that, at first he wanted to build a classic looking café racer, but that he changed his mind half-way through the project after being inspired by some builds he saw on Facebook.

Wheels
A friend of Borislav took care of lacing the hubs to a new set of aluminium rims, which were also in black. Yes, black is the theme with this build, and we like it! Do you know what’s also black? The modified Benelli fuel tank, the epitome of café racer fuel tanks. Everything was painted in-house by Borislav himself. A custom leather seat keeps the rider firmly in place, and a Daytona Velona 80 gives all the necessary rider info whilst maintaining a contemporary look.

It is clear to see why this particular café racer took the 1st prize during the 2021 Caferacerfest.
This is what Borislav had to say about his build:
“I like the paint scheme and the general profile of the motorcycle that is the exact opposite of a chopper. The riding experience is unexplainable after 3 years of working on this project to be able to finally ride it is a dream come true. Thanks also for the Felix helmet that I received as a prize. It really enhances the look of the ride” he smiles.

Previous life
Below are some shots of the bike before Borislave opened his toolbox and the build in progress.

The post Winner 2021 Café Racer Fest Bulgaria – Yamaha XV by Borislav Aleksov appeared first on BikeBrewers.com.

Another XV!
So when our friend Jeremy Duchamp of JeremMotorcycles shared his modified Yamaha XV1000 TR-1 with us last year, we were over the moon! The Frenchman can’t seem to get enough of the Yamaha XV, so he spent over 240 hours in his shed brewing on another Yamaha XV project, this time is a XV750. We have to say that we were blown away by how this café racer turned out!

It goes without saying that the XV didn’t start of its life like this. Jeremie bought the 1983 XV750 about 1 year ago and it was not in a good shape, according to the craftsman. Each and every bolt was removed and replaced where necessary. The subframe and swingarm had sever corrosion and were removed and decluttered, after which they got sandblasted and powder coated in a gloss black finish.

Serious components
The front end of the XV received a serious upgrade. The front fork has been adopted from a Ducati Monster and was mated to a  Ducati Diavel front wheel. To make it all work , a custom triple clamp was made by USV Racing. Integrated into the top yoke is a KOSO speedo. The radial brakes are courtesy of Brembo and offer tremendous stopping power. The brake lines are of aviation grade quality too. On the clip-ons we find CNC’ed micro switches. All the switches and electrics have been connected to an M-Unit by MotoGadget. Talking about electrics, the café racer received an LED headlight, mini front indicators, and a tail light that appears to be floating, pretty neat! All of this is powered by a Solise lightweight Lithium battery which has been placed underneath the tank.

Moving towards the back of the Yamaha, we can see some serious eye-candy. The rear wheel is an absolute stunner, with the closed rim giving it an old-school racer look. A custom rear-set ensures the rider maintains full control. The rear shock comes off an MV Agusta 800 and has a custom mounting system. The single seat has been built to spec by “Point Sellier 34”, in a beautiful black leather finish with a colour matching piping.

Engine Refreshment
The engine wasn’t up to snuff to begin with, so Jeremie decided to replace it completely by a unit with a lower mileage. With less than 10.000 km on the clock it definitely was a lot fresher. From there it was simple. Replace the original carburettors with a pair of Dellorto PHF32’s, open air-filters, and get the lot tuned by “Les Belled d’Oc” in Béziers, France. To let all the gases out in an efficient way, a custom exhaust was made in the JeremMotorcycles workshop.

Green by AUDI
To finish this custom project off, the engine received a fresh coat of paint, and the fuel tank got painted in a lush AUDI green paint. The fuel tank also received a protective KEVLAR layer underneath to protect against any unwanted influences. There are little easter eggs hidden all over this build; JM logo’s are engraved or painted in countless places, most notably on those Metzeler tires.

Putting all things together, we can’t imagine how Jeremie completed this build in only 240 hours. It is truly impressive, and we hope that someday we can see and hear this beautiful café racer rip the streets of France, in real-life.

Photo Credits: Jonathan Silene

Builder details:
Jerem Motorcycles
Instagram
Facebook

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Back in 2020, BikeBrewers were invited to join the first edition of the Café Racer Fest in Kyustendil, Bulgaria. Unfortunately COVID had paralyzed the world and travel restrictions caused us to miss out on that event.

We followed the happening on social media while the enthusiasm of participants, visitors and bike builders vibrated through our screens. We knew we missed out on something special! We made a promise there and then, that we would do everything to make it to the 2021 edition. As we are always true to our word, there was no reason not to make the trip this time.

To team members Ron and Adnane it felt nearly as good as going on a road trip even though two flights, three cars but no bikes were involved in getting from Amsterdam to Kyustendil.

Arriving close to midnight, the organizer of the Café Racer Fest and spiritual father of the event, Ivan Mushev of Bull Moto Custom, had kindly arranged transportation from Sofia airport to the ski resort up in the mountains about half an hour up from town up a dark and twisty country road with al sort of wildlife crossing our headlights.

Early start
In order to make the most of the day breakfast was served early and we took off to the centre of town. The empty square would soon be the stage of an extraordinary event, attracting an sizable crowd of both participants and spectators. On the plaza of this nearly 40.000 inhabitant’s rich city, volunteers were busy setting the stage for things to come.

The Café Racer Fest harbours not only custom bikes but also offers a stage for vintage motorcycles and cars from all makes and years. There was quite a collection of incredibly beautiful Pre-Perestroika MZ’s, Jawa’s and Ural sidecars. Truly as if time stood still.

Talking about time, it is funny what the years do with your sense of beauty. Bikes that were considered hideous in the 60’s and 70’s Western Europeans are now considered attractive by the same crowd. Thanks to younger demographics, discovering the fun in riding, Eastern Bloc classic icons such as the 60’s MZ have now grown from being more hideous than the word itself to ultra-cool! We bet there will be quite some young urban riders who would not mind to be spotted on one of those former ‘monstrosities’, were it not that in most large European cities, those two-strokes will never be seen spewing their distinguishable blue exhaust plumes again.

Ride out
Prior to the start of the event, a number of bikers and bike builders met at the local gas station for a ride out to the venue. Little over 150 bikers, nearly of which were modified in one way or another, joined in this brotherly gathering. The atmosphere was incredible; there is something quite special about seeing cafe racers being used for they were built.

Choices, choices
There were three contemporary categories; Modern Classics, Scrambler & Brat, and Café Racers. BikeBrewers were given the task of selecting the Top 3 in the “Café Racer” category. We were given about twenty projects to choose from and had about an hour to finalize our task.

As we always do when judging bikes, we put together a matrix awarding points on a scale of 1-10 for elements such as the ‘Wow!’ factor, originality, quality of work & amp; paint, and craftsmanship and set out separately to do our first independent judging.

You’d expect this to be easy and give clear comparable results. No such thing! We had quite a hefty discussion and with the clock ticking away it required a final walk around to re-evaluate our choices. At the ‘strike of twelve’ we managed to come up with a Top 3 we could both fully subscribe to.

And the winner is…
A 1994 Yamaha XV1100 had scored high points on both our lists and was chosen ‘Best of show’ in this year’s Café Racer category. Its owner, Borislav Alexsov, has put quite a lot of hours in building this machine and is rightfully proud of the result. 2nd place went to Vencislav Angelov with his stunning 1984 Honda CBX 750, and 3rd place went to Kaloian Ivanchev Chekelev with his very cool BMW R75 which saw daylight in 1982.

All top 3 finalists were showered with gifts from local sponsors. To top it off BikeBrewers’ came bearing gifts from our partners Felix Auto Moto and SA1NT! adding a helmet and a sought after twill trucker cap to the basket of each of the category winners!

Come rain come shine
Bulgarians have been spoiled with loads of sunshine over the past couple of months. Unfortunately, rain was predicted during the hours of the event. The start of the award ceremony for the café racer category was launched with a clap of thunder followed by a slight drizzle. That made us feel like home instantly.

Luckily the audience was not scared away that easily, and there was quite a cheer from the several hundred people on the square. According to the organizers, the total attendance during this year’s edition the audience grew with 20% to around 2.500 visitors who meandered amongst all the beauty displayed on the town square this morning.

The next edition
Writing this post just before the party organized by the Cafe Racer Club Bulgaria, we are already spoiled by the kindness of the Bulgarians we met on the way, especially by the members of the café racer community.

As much as we love attending established events in Western European countries, we are always on the lookout for new, exciting and more grass roots experiences. This scene is way bigger and vibrant than you would ever dare to imagine. Everyone we met was proud of the results of their labour and insights are shared freely among this close-knit society.

We will be back for sure and hope the organizers can look forward to an even bigger crowd in 2022. Being the only international visitors this year, we share our experience with the knowledge that this is likely to be the last time we enjoyed this exclusivity.

Given the fact that there is a very lively local scene and magnificent twisty country roads and awesome virgin off road tracks to be travelled freely, it is likely many adventurous bikers from the West will be heading East next year.

Photos by:
Georgi Georgiev Photography
Kalina Kalcheva
BikeBrewers

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I can’t help it, but we got a submission of another awesome Yamaha Virago. And just like Bal Deo’s Virago I’ve posted last week, it’s an XV750. It’s not on purpose, it’s just how they roll in.

This bike is built by Oran, owner of Buriam Siammotor, a motorcycle dealer in Buriram. This mid-sized town which located in north-east of Thailand was selected to held Moto GP at Chang International Circuit for the first time in 2018. Oran’s family has a long history of selling motorcycles and he’s involved in the business as a youngster. A couple of years ago he bought a 1982 Yamaha XV750 without a clear idea behind it. “Simply because I love the unique sound of the V-twin and that the bike was from my year of birth.” He decided to turn this Virago into a sleek looking cafe racer.

With the help of Mee Classic Shop, a custom bike shop in the same region, Oran managed to create his very own version of the Virago cafe racer. Oan: “Many people told me to stop wasting my time with this project, but the harder they told me, the harder I pushed to get the bike ready”. Most of the parts saw the hands of the builder and he brought the machine back in shape. All parts have been painted, polished or powder coated to bring back the “shine”. Unlike many others, he did not go for the standard Mojave gas tank, but he used a complete hand-built aluminum tank. Combined with the custom subframe and seat, the bike got a beautiful classic line.

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Found a great Yamaha XV750 Virago Café Racer by VTR Customs. This is one of the builds they’ve displayed at Swiss Moto 2016. I really like what these guys are doing, remember the awesome BMW R NineT we’ve featured earlier.

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The Yamaha Virago is a great platform for building a café racer. It’s massive V-twin and great proportions makes it a love for the eye when stripped down to it’s bare essentials. I had to share this great peace of work By Diogo Oliveira. I couldn’t find any specs of it, so you’ll have to deal with eye-candy alone…

Looks even better with her…:

Found this ride on RocketGarage. You know this ride and have some specs? Please let me know!

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Front fork is from a 2008 Yamaha R1.

Öhlin shocks on the rear, and as you can see, the big v-twin caches all the attention:

The fuel tank is from a 1973 Yamaha RD350, to give it a more classic and smaller look.

Image credits: Bike Exif

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