Browsing the web the other day, I stumbled upon a repost of the beautiful Old Empire Pup we revealed to the world on these very pages. But unlike you pack of freaks, the guys reading this article were obviously not died-in-the-wool custom bike freaks, but more of your regular ridin’ Joes. Reading through the comments, I found one that went something along the lines of, “Aesthetically pleasing but I wouldn’t want to travel any distance on it. To me, any bike has to be ridden first, looked at second.” Now this really got me thinking. What kind of mad man would value how a bike rides over and above how it looks. Especially after seeing the the bike in question? The answer is, of course, heaps of people. I mean, how many BMW R1200GS do you see on the roads? And if there’s any bike that perfectly represents form following function, that old German mule would have to be it. But are they onto something? Are we all fashion victims just like that ape hanger maniac above? Are we all insane to judge a bike on looks alone and ignore how it actually rides?