{"id":2971,"date":"2025-02-26T16:49:25","date_gmt":"2025-02-26T15:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/?p=2971"},"modified":"2025-02-26T16:49:25","modified_gmt":"2025-02-26T15:49:25","slug":"swing-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/swing-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Swing time"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"intro wp-block-paragraph\">We take a look back at an unusual motorcycle sport, which was growing in international popularity 100 years ago but has since fallen out of the limelight<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Words by Wendy Brooking<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The colder months are often a time for packing away Harleys, keeping them out of the snow, away from the salt on the roads and snug inside garages. However, 100 years ago it would appear that plenty of people kept them running, whatever the weather. In fact, one sport in particular was coming to the fore in <em>The Enthusiast<\/em><sup>\u00ae<\/sup> as an increasingly popular winter pastime: motorcycle polo (or motoball, as it is now more commonly known).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-gallery aligncenter has-nested-images columns-default is-cropped wp-block-gallery-1 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"325\" height=\"247\" data-id=\"2968\" src=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-January.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2968\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-January.jpg 325w, https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-January-300x228.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 325px) 100vw, 325px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"633\" height=\"381\" data-id=\"2969\" src=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-March.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2969\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-March.jpg 633w, https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-March-300x181.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 633px) 100vw, 633px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Motoball first began as an officially organised sport in the mid-1920s in Europe and is now played across the continent and beyond. The modern sport looks a lot more like football, with players on motorcycles kicking a large spherical ball with the aim of scoring goals. Motorcycles are capped at 250cc and many players have a background in motorcross<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">However, the early Harley-Davidson version of motorcycle polo was rather different and very literal. Players are pictured tackling the snow to play in Canada, with one rider piloting the motorcycle and another in the adjoining sidecar, brandishing a polo mallet for whacking the ball. Similar scenes were caught of players in Australia \u2013 albeit under sunnier conditions \u2013 trying their hands at the recently introduced sport on a grass pitch.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"630\" height=\"268\" src=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2967\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February.jpg 630w, https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February-300x128.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Motorcycle polo was even featured multiple times in the regular Nobby Ned comic strip in <em>The Enthusiast<\/em>, showing how suitable Harley-Davidson<sup>\u00ae<\/sup> motorcycles were for the game. And while modern-day motoball seems to have taken over, the original sport did enjoy a short resurgence in the 21<sup>st<\/sup> century in Rwanda, albeit without sidecars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Fancy seeing some other crazy sports being played with Harley-Davidsons in 1925? <a href=\"https:\/\/edition.pagesuite.com\/html5\/reader\/production\/default.aspx?pubname=&amp;edid=230b94c4-fdbe-4c85-93ed-25e49d072e68\">Click here<\/a> to see the January 1925 edition and turn to page 12 for some snowy shenanigans<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"623\" height=\"945\" src=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February-Nobby-Ned.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2966\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February-Nobby-Ned.jpg 623w, https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-February-Nobby-Ned-198x300.jpg 198w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 623px) 100vw, 623px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"646\" height=\"957\" src=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-November.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2970\" srcset=\"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-November.jpg 646w, https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/1925-November-203x300.jpg 203w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 646px) 100vw, 646px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We take a look back at an unusual motorcycle sport, which was growing in international popularity 100 years ago but has since fallen out of the limelight<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":2976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[4],"class_list":["post-2971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-company"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2971"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3047,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971\/revisions\/3047"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hog.thecreativeplot.com\/en-eu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}