There?s a definite trend to stripping the bodywork off modern Ducatis. And we?re all for it. The superbike engines may not have the retro elegance of a Triumph parallel twin or a BMW boxer, but there?s an intricate, H.R. Giger-esque mechanical quality to them.
This 2014 899 Panigale comes from Mr Motorcycles of Montréal, in Canada?s Québec province. Mathieu Renaud started the shop as a part-time venture in 2012: ?I was looking for something to do during the winter,? he says, ?because I?d sold my snowmobile due to the lack of snow in Quebec. In two years I built three custom Hondas for myself, and was invited to exhibit one of them?a 1979 CX500?at the Montréal motorcycle show.?

The customer orders started to roll in. At a race meet in 2014, Mathieu met Frenchman Hervé Remetter, a former mechanic for a European endurance racing team. Hervé joined the company, and his mechanical skills complemented Mathieu?s aerospace background. The goal for the 899 Panigale was to transform it into a modern cafe racer while maintaining its performance and giving it an aggressive look. But the job almost didn?t happen.

?When the client contacted me, it was to build him a BMW R100,? says Mathieu. ?But when he met me at the garage, he saw the Panigale up on the worktable and fell in love with that project.? The Ducati actually belonged to Hervé, who sold the bike to the client.
Mathieu and Hervé usually restrict themselves to one or two projects a year, because the most important thi...