Garage Eleven

The 92 RM250 never misses. Ever. 🏁
This one came out cleaner than we could've hoped — a proper tribute to one of the best two-strokes ever made.
What's your favourite vintage MX build you've seen? Drop it below 👇
DirtBikeLife

The SR250 was one of those bikes that looked factory even when it was sitting still. Kawasaki’s SR program in the early 90s was completely unhinged in the best possible way — hand-built parts everywhere, magnesium everything, and trick components that most riders today will never get to touch, let alone ride with. And putting Jeff Matiasevich (Chicken) on one of these just made the whole package even more entertaining.

This bike wasn’t built for comfort or forgiveness. It was built to go fast and punish anyone who wasn’t ready to handle it. And Chicken was the perfect match. He didn’t have that smooth, polished riding style like some of the other top riders. He had a bit of chaos in him — elbows up, weight thrown around, always on the edge of something both brilliant and disastrous. But that’s the exact personality the SR250 demanded. You had to ride it with attitude, not caution.

Look closely at the details in this photo. Everything is custom. Everything is touched by someone who spent hours machining, welding, fabricating, and tuning. The SR bikes were “factory” in a way that doesn’t exist anymore. There weren’t data engineers or laptop-tuning sessions. There were guys with decades of experience and feel, building parts by hand and hoping the rider didn’t explode on the first lap.

This bike carries that whole energy. Aggressive, raw, unapologetically fast. You look at it and immediately remember an era where motocross felt dangerous — not because anyone wanted it to be, but because that’s just how the sport was built back then. Big power, stiff frames, unpredictable tracks, and riders like Chicken who made the whole thing look more fun than it had any right to be.

We only use the absolute best products of any of our bikes, and that product is

Jeff Stanton was never the flashy guy. He didn’t have the wild style, the big personality, or the off-track hype machine working for him. What he did have was grit — the kind that doesn’t fade, doesn’t crack, and doesn’t care who’s watching. And this photo captures exactly that. Everyone else in this era looked like they were dancing with the bike. Stanton looked like he was dragging it into battle.

There’s something raw about the way he rides here. Body low, elbows out, front wheel knifing in, back wheel stepping out just enough to show he’s pushing past the limit but still in control. This is technique that isn’t polished — it’s forged. Tracks back then weren’t predictable. They were rutted, choppy, inconsistent, full of square edges that tried to pull the bike out from under you. And yet Stanton handled all of it with this bulldog intensity that separated him from the smoother, more naturally gifted riders.

He was the kind of bloke who won because he refused to do anything else. You don’t get that many championships by accident. You get them by being the rider who never quits, never backs off, and never gets intimidated by anyone lined up next to you. That’s why his rivalry era is still remembered. He wasn’t the pretty rider — he was the problem. The guy who would run wide, hold the throttle on a second longer, or take a line that made everyone else question their own decisions.

Photos like this remind you why the early 90s were so special. Bikes were powerful but rough, tracks were brutal, and the riders who won had to earn it the hard way. No perfect suspension curves, no engine maps, no traction algorithms smoothing everything out. Just a steel frame, a handful of horsepower, and a rider with enough determination to hold it all together.

Mike Kiedrowski never gets talked about enough. Everyone remembers the flashier riders, the big personalities, the ones who threw whips before whips were even a thing — but Kiedrowski was the kind of bloke who just turned up, got the job done, and left everyone wondering how he managed to make it look so controlled. He wasn’t loud, he wasn’t wild, he wasn’t trying to put on a show. He was just brutally effective. And sometimes that’s even more impressive.

This photo captures exactly what made him so good. Look at the body position — calm, balanced, precise. Nothing wasted, nothing forced. He always looked like he had half a second extra to think compared to everyone else. And that’s why he won. The sport in the early 90s was rougher, the bikes were unpredictable, and the tracks didn’t have the perfectly shaped jumps you see today. To be fast back then, you had to flow with whatever the track threw at you. Kiedrowski was a master at that.

He didn’t need drama. He didn’t need attitude. His riding spoke for itself. You could watch him for one lap and know he had something that couldn’t be taught — timing. That instinct to make the right decision at the right moment, whether it was a line choice, a throttle input, or a way to save a moment that should’ve gone sideways. Some riders survive the track. Some riders fight it. Kiedrowski looked like he was reading it.

These old images remind you how raw the sport used to be. The gear, the helmets, the roost, the bikes… it all looks heavier, louder, more physical. And seeing a rider like Kiedrowski handle that era with this level of control says everything about how underrated he really was. A proper technician in one of the toughest periods of motocross.

There’s something special about the 500 USGP photos — they look chaotic, violent, and somehow calm all at once. And Jeff Matiasevich (Chicken) in this era was exactly that kind of rider. The 500s weren’t gentle machines. They didn’t reward hesitation, they didn’t tolerate sloppy technique, and they absolutely punished anyone who wasn’t fully committed. But Chicken made them look almost manageable… almost.

This shot from the ’91 USGP is pure attitude. You can feel the weight of the bike, the power, the roost, the speed — all captured in a single frame. This was the last era where riders had to fight the bike every second. No traction control, no mapping, no electronics smoothing out the edges. Just raw horsepower strapped to a steel frame and a rider doing everything he could to keep it on his side.

Chicken was unpredictable in the best way. One moto he’d be riding with surgical precision, the next he’d be absolutely hanging off the side of the bike trying to force it into submission. But that’s what made him exciting. He wasn’t polished like some riders, and he wasn’t trying to be. He rode with a bit of chaos in his style, and the fans loved it for exactly that reason.

The USGP tracks were brutal. Natural terrain, long ruts, hills that felt endless — nothing like the perfectly groomed layouts today. You needed strength, aggression, and a willingness to hold on when the bike tried to throw you offline. Chicken had that in spades.

Looking at this photo now, you can almost smell the premix and feel the vibration through your hands. The 500 class had a presence — a sound and a personality that we’ll never get again. And riders like Chicken were made for it. The way he rode suited the class perfectly: fast, loose, and with a bit of a “let’s see what happens” mentality. Pure entertainment.