PURPLE PROSE

Are you or have you ever been a fan of motorcycle display teams? Perhaps you have admired the noble skills of the White Helmets, the Royal Signals military motorcycle display team from back in the day? Or the Indian Army Tornadoes skilfully stacking 500 people on a motorcycle to break the world record – ok hold that thought. Now imagine the Brighton Naked Bike Ride (yes I’m afraid it really does exist) and a gang of old Benny Hills, dressed as Ernie in dirty brown raincoats and perhaps with minds to match? OK now mix all those images together...yes there you have it, that’s it and it really exists...The Isle of Man Purple Helmets Motorcycle Display team!

Somehow uniquely British or perhaps uniquely Isle of Man, this is a truly original and somehow endearingly old fashioned motorcycle display team with a difference.

If you are lucky they will be clad in dirty brown macs with tattered hems from many encounters with the chains of their modified Honda C90s. If you are not so lucky they will be wearing nothing. Yes nudity doesn’t seem to be an issue as one stunt involves a naked pianist with a piano attached to a bike riding past you playing a ditty, a motorcycle ripping almost all of the clothes off one of the team who then runs around in a g-string having water thrown over him, to name but a few. They roll a bike in a roll cage, they jump their motorcycles over team members lying on the ground holding a ramp and they do unspeakable things with a giant can of baked beans and a giant rear trumpet –I will leave that to your imagination until you see them - and yes it’s all on motorcycles.

Schoolboy humour aside, those boys have skills in the motorcycle display department and it is really something you won’t see the like of anywhere else, honestly! So if you get a chance to catch them in action on the Isle of Man, they are truly not to be missed for a really one-off experience!

08/08/19: Ahh the Purple Helmets. I was there when they first made an appearance. We wondered what the hell was going on. Brilliant bunch of nutters.

08/08/19: Ah so the Purps wore out their C90s out eventually