The garage tools and techniques might be the same, but there?s not a lot of overlap between race and custom bike building. At the simplest level, it?s a Venn diagram, with ?function? in one circle and ?form? in the other.
Occasionally a bike falls into that tiny overlap though, and the results can be incredible. This outlandish WR450F rally raid bike comes from the French outfit Le Motographe, and ramps up the style without sacrificing an iota of performance.

The two founders of Le Motographe are product designer Jérôme Mawois and metallurgist Yvan Bertona. Their workshop is in the small town of Castries in southern France, and the influence of their day jobs is clear to see in this beautifully crafted build.
Le Motographe have two WRF customs under their belts already, called ?Skeleton.? Those bikes were based on the 2004 WRF450, and handmade in stainless steel and aluminum.
Today, one spends its time in the Californian desert, and the other lives in Europe. The client for this new build spotted the Skeleton EVO2 at Wheels & Waves, and commissioned a rally raid version. ?We decided to start this time with a brand new bike, a Yamaha WRF450 with an aluminum frame and fuel injection,? says Jérôme. ?It?s used as a base by current rally riders.??
Le Motographe?s first port of call was Drag’on Distribution, the Calais-based importer and fabricator of specialist rally parts. An eighteen-month build journey was about to start.

Apart from the original alum...