We love Ally Pally as a venue, and it has a history of great biking shows, but our expectations were very low. Not because custom shows don't have thier place, but because despite the mention of cafe racers being featured at the event, we knew deep down it would be a leather-trousered tassel-fest, with a generous helping of airbrushed dragons and Japanes kanji on bikes with a design ethos that simply can't escape the once glorious world of old school rock album jackets, with perhaps a hint of 1980s Cyberwarrior thrown in.

Milkcow Mag - celebrating 1940s and 50s lifestyle...

To be fair there was also a smattering of punk, burlesque, 1950s cool and one or tasteful cafes and flat trackers, plus the likes of Milk Cow mag and others, but after an hour of roaming around trying to capture decent images of bikes framed by white chain-link fencing (very helpful when you want a nice photo), we realised that it wasn't quite our scene ("you ain't from round here, are ya boy?"), so we lidded-up and headed off to the Ace Cafe to join Gary Inman and Sideburn at their brilliantly attended FlatTrack day. The few pics that worked...

Old & skinny, but takes a pretty closeup

My favourite of the show... but it wasn't really "on display", just owned by a stall holder

As a London biker it's mandatory to hate cyclists (sorry) - but if I did own a pedal-cycle, (and lived in Venice Beach) then ...

Nice metal flake on this Duc... You know what the rest looks like by now...

Someone's Garden Centre is missing some fencing... Lovely XS tho.

It would be rude to not appreciate the hard work and dedication that goes into the chopper custom scene. Acres of chrome and fantasy airbrush work, adorning low-slung, raked-out chassis shapes on bikes that may never be ridden anywhere except a show venue, may not be completely to our taste here in the Shed, but bikers are bikers - and it gave us an excuse to get the bikes out for a day of riding.