31 motorcycles that represent the mechanical history of the Dakar Rally. Curated by EICMA; Alessandro Re and David Castera. However, these motorcycles would be lifeless if not associated with the men who wrote unforgettable pages in the history of the Queen of Desert Marathons with these machines. There is one that makes your skin crawl. It is the Yamaha XT500 with which Thierry Sabine got lost in the desert during the 1977 Abidjan-Nice race. The race was a precursor, Thierry Sabine the inventor of the Paris-Dakar, the African marathon that would change the history of adventure and motorsport forever.

But almost all the motorcycles on display evoke memories and a heart-wrenching passion for incredible stories and characters. Whether it is Hubert Auriol's motorcycle or Fabrizio Meoni's, it makes little difference today: the difference was made back then, by the motorcycles and the riders. Today, EICMA's primacy and merit is that of having brought them all to Milan, the most famous ones and others that otherwise cannot be seen, jealously guarded in private and exclusive collections.

To tell the truth, there is one crime against humanity in this exhibition, on the day of the inauguration, just one. Not bringing the “authors” of those stories to the stage. Edi Orioli, Franco Picco, others that you also know. It is true, it is the history of motorcycles, but it was when Alessandro “Ciro” De Petri began to speak that the CaGiVa next to him came back to life and sent the passion of those present to the top of the scale. David Castera presented a beautiful new feature for the occasion: the race numbers of the motorcyclists who will be at the start of the 2026 edition of the Dakar Saudi Arabia. And this is the news within the news; the rest is available to that audience who know they cannot miss such an opportunity.