To the right, a Ducati light weight and me having an ice-cream 1968 at 17 years of age and after a trip to see the start of Skagen Rally in Copenhagen with one of my still very close friends.
The Ducati chassis road holding capability was superior to most other light weight motorcycles by that time. The design was inspired and more or less a miniature of bigger road racing machines. The major drawback was that the original engine only produced a beautiful sound, but no power to be attractive to me and many others of my age. (The brakes where though still the same designed for the 80cc version.)
Having been brought up and learnt to gas weld by the age 12 or 13 and with excessive workshop resources all around me I made several conversions to friends and their friends by lifting in a Husquarna Silverpil - Silver Arrow 175cc, 9,5hp engines into the Ducati chassis.
That was not enough for me.
I converted and rode my own bike with registration plate M351. The Ducati modified by me from 125cc four stroke and 4,5hp to a Lindstrom 250 cc, 20-25hp two stroke motocross engine with the bike still not exceeding the total weight of 75 kg, being the upper limit for a light weight motorcycle for under 18 to ride.
(The brakes where though still the same designed for the 80cc version.)
The Lindström engine was based on the Husquarna 175cc, but converted to 250cc by the moto cross motorcycle developer / maker Lindström with their workshop just a few blocks away from where I was brought up.
An incident that was very scary had happened just a few moments before the photo was taken:
When we rode along one of the major streets in Copenhagen I was forced to ride under a very big truck in the space in front of the rear wheels and the fuel tank in front of me.
This was due to that the road narrowed and the truck driver did not notice me on my bike being very low, though extremely noisy. My friend who rode just after the truck could hear, but not see me. There is someone guarding us.
Rally Skagen is still one of the most prestigious rallies for old - pre 1932 motorcycles.
