A mid-1980s BMW advertisement.

BMW can lay claim today as one of the true leaders in motorcycle technology – one need to look no further than the new BMW 100RR to understand that proposition. However there’s something comforting about the fact that the company’s venerable Boxer horizontally opposed twin was the powerplant that saw BMW through over 60 years of motorcycle building.

Similar in a way to Harley-Davidson and its V-Twin, the difference is BMW has been able to expand to include motorcycles designs of totally modern technology, while Harley (with the exception of the V-Rod) has simply refined the same engine it’s had for nearly a century.

This is a famous BMW ad from the mid-1980s featuring some of the milestones of BMW Motorcycle racing accomplishments. I like it for showing the beautiful simplicity of the BMW engine, first unveiled at the Paris Motor Show in 1923.