Deus Swank Milano Rumble

Bikes Culture

Within hours of hearing about the Deus Swank Rally, Tom Bing had booked his flights...

One quiet day in the studio, still coming down from the high of the Sideburn/Deus Ex Machina ‘Snow Quake’ event in Italy in January, I found my mouse hovering over the ‘buy now’ button on the flights I had just priced up back to Milan.

Within hours of the Deus Swank Rally promo video coming out, I know I had to be there so the credit card came out and the flights were booked.

Two months later, the day was upon us. Set on the ex-Falck Steelworks site on the outskirts of the city, a friendly endurance series organised by Deus saw the descent of Milan’s finest vintage dirt bikes and riders in the shadow of the huge, imposing skeleton of 1930’s industrial architecture.

 Deus Swank

With a course of tight turns, banks, a tabletop, rubble piles and technical high speed sections taped off in the abandoned grounds, riders queued to race against the clock. Three riders on the track at a time, racing a stopwatch they stopped themselves. The energy in the paddock was amazing, the rain that had soaked the track through for the last 48 hours had paused for a while and the huge crowd of riders were gaining confidence with every lap.

 

The track saw all sorts of machines battling the loose dirt and rubble, from Moto GP rider Luca Scassa on his Buell to Sandro Tramelli on a Honda CR250R Elsinore, ME Electric scooters, BMW GS80’s – Harley XR1000’s. Basically anything suitable and totally unsuitable for the event was there and they all had two things in common, knobbly tires and a rider with a huge smile on their face.



The novelty of a race like this, just a stone’s throw from downtown Milan, set in such an imposing and dramatic setting, failed to wear off. Even when the break in the rain came to an abrupt end and the drying track started to to saturate again, the event still failed to come to a halt with a handful of riders desperate to beat their posted times. Looping from the finish to the start non-stop until the mud finally got too bad and lure of red wine back at the Deus Cafe grew too strong and it was time to leave.

Deus Swank bike closeup

A huge thanks to Phillippo Bassoli and the guys at The Deus Portal of Possibilities for navigating the political hurdles and bringing together such a great crowd for the Milano Rumble.

1st Roberto Ungaro (Yamaha Xt)

2nd Sandro Tramelli (Honda CR250R Elsinore)

3rd Adelio Lorenzin ( Honda Cr)

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