There have been so many memorable magazine covers from the likes of BMX Plus and BMX Action, but there was always one from BMX Plus that stood out to me. And remembering the first time seeing this as a twelve-year-old at my friend Adam's house. WOW! Bob Haro, playing peek-a-boo on that chrome Haro Master, riding in some futuristic world, this cover was it! And at the time when Star Wars Return of The Jedi were coming out with other 1983 classics like War Games and Krull, this was the perfect cover for the time. And forget about all of us needing those Graphite Skyway Tuff Wheels after seeing those gold hubs!
It was always nice to see a little more freestyle making it to the pages of magazines during this time. I can still remember trying these bar hops in our gravel driveway out in the country. Hahaha! And I'm still looking through a few old boxes of stuff hoping to find my copy of Bob Haro's Freestyle Moves book. But it looks like that might be lost along with all of those copies of that Atari Video games.
Now, there is so much to unpack here. When I was doing these post regularly, I would not normally do a post of three pictures from a "bike test", but this one was too good to pass up. And as a huge bike and automotive nerd, the history of the Steyr-Daimler-Puch brand is something that is an all-day research fest and a possible call to one James May from The Grand Tour.
Now mixed into all of the "rich" Daimler-Puch" history, there was an agreement with a New Jersey frame builder named Speed Unlimited. These American produced frames to the naked eye look to be just a normal run of frames from this era of BMX, but upon closer look, they have a list of amazing frame building features. Ovalized top and down tubes, gussets at the seat and chain stays, plate gussets with logo embossed into them, and tubular brake mounts. Nicely produced frames, and I would love to see one of these in person.
