‘THERE ARE PLACES I REMEMBER, ALL MY LIFE, though some have changed…’ John Lennon was plainly familiar with the A488, running south-west of Shrewsbury. It’s a place I’ll never forget, either; nor indeed, one particular ride along it, firstly north as half of my then regular 100-mile commute to Manchester, and then again south, on the way home. A fine road, and a fine route for someone who was working on a magazine devoted to brand-new machines, because it offered all manner of challenging sections, which helped sort out the usually well-developed machinery on offer in the mid-1990s.
Two machines stand out in this: BMW’s early oil-head R1100R, a true bruiser of a bike; and the subject of this month’s somewhat epic ride down memory lane, the Moto Guzzi Centauro,…