Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128120
Boxer VB 1 Sport The French-made Boxer Wi Sport first _ n at the 1999 Parts motorcycle show, but our European corresponden1 Alan Cathcart was the first journalist In the worfd to ride It. _ / By ALAN CATHCART PHOTOS BY KEL EDGE B imota is dead - long live Boxer! After almost two decades as one of France's largest and most successful motorcycle retailers, and the creator of a phalanx of dreambikes 40 SEPTEMBER 5, 2001 • cue I powered by engines ranging from an Aprilia 650 single through to a Triumph 1000cc four, from Ducati desmoquattro to Kawasaki ZXRII00, all of which brought the names of stylists like Sacha Lakic, Glynn Kerr and Alain Carre, and chassis constructor Claude Fior, to public notice, n e _ s e Boxer Bikes boss and French stylebike supremo Thierry Henriette has finally taken the plunge and sold up all his bike dealerships, to become a limited-edition, high-end sportbike manufacturer in his own right, constructing leading-edge motorcycles clothed in dramatic styling. Just like Bimota used to do, in fact. "All the time I was in business as a dealer, I dreamed of becoming a manufacturer myself, to bring the bikes I enjoyed so much creating to a wider public," says 45-year-old Henriette. "Only, I didn't want to do this with anything except a French engine, to create a motorcycle 100 percent made in France. That's not being chauvinistic, only a recognition of the fact that the Japanese build very fine motorcycles today at an attractive price, making anything I could create using the same engine seem overpriced, without necessarily being any better. With European manufacturers, the problem was actually getting hold of engines at all: I couldn't trust the Italians to deliver, and though I tried very hard to persuade Triumph to sell me engines to put the Gladiateur [his Daytona-powered Lakic-designed sportbike] into production, they wouldn't do so. So it wasn't until Jacques Gardette created Voxan that I saw a way to achieve my dream, working with a man I admire who's become a good friend, and whom I will support in any way that I can. My aim has been to create a limited-edition, high-performance product using Voxan components, just like AMG do with Mercedes, or Motorsport with BMW, or even Magni with Guzzi, adding an extra dimension to their range which they couldn't achieve profitably themselves as a volume manufacturer - but without detracting from the rest of their products, only complimenting them.« Voxan boss Gardette has evidently been reading from the same songsheet, inking a long-term agreement to supply his company's fuel-injected 72-degree V-twin 1000cc 8-valve engines to the newly established Boxer Motors (nothing to do with BMW flat-twins: Thierry was an admirer of the Ferrari Berlinetta Boxer at the time he founded his first dealership!) and, in the short term at