A midlife crisis is typically played out through the purchase of a powerful road machine, a mechanical metaphor with enough surplus horsepower to provide its rider (or, for those with more prosaic aspirations, its driver) an opportunity to recapture how it felt to be twenty-five. But will a litre-plus road rocket truly recapture the boundless sense of possibility that coloured your youth? Perhaps what your inner punk truly longs for is a machine with agility, versatility, and plenty of old-fashioned moxy.

Enter the Suzuki TS 250.

This charmer harkens, far more than any modern muscle bike, to a time worth missing. A time when the world and its machines were simpler. A time of boundless possibility, of broadening freedoms. A time when having a single cylinder screamer would give you access to any place that could possibly be reached by forests, fields, or footpaths. And some of those beautiful little machines could also carry you—incredibly enough—on the road.

Honestly, who wouldn’t want to recapture that?

In 1968, Japan’s motorcycle manufacturers were fighting each other on multiple fronts; horsepower, handling, pricing, branding. It was in this year that Yamaha, hitherto a minor player in the market, introduced the DT1 Enduro. This 250cc single cylinder two-stroke coupled the long fork travel and snappy powerband of a dirt bike with a neutral riding position and sufficient top speed to make it viable for the roadways. Throw in a headlight, taillight, and turn indicators, and Bob’s your uncle. In one fell swoop, Yamaha had vaulted into a position that placed it head-to-head with Japan’s top motorcycle manufacturers, and had also created a new class of motorcycle: the dual-sport. These were capable trail machines that were also street legal. Naturally, the competitors were swift to develop their own versions.

Of these, none balanced form and function nearly so well as Suzuki’s TS 250. 

Written by: Buzz Nichols; a good friend of the shop. Thanks Buzz.