Steve McQueen’s Husky for Sale!

Bikes People

Collectors worldwide are all a-quiver with news that later this this year Bonhams, the auctioneer, will offer Steve McQueen’s 1971 Husqvarna 400 for sale – along with a trunkful of racing trophies the actor and self-confessed racer-bum accumulated over the years.

Hosted on May 14th at Quail Lodge in Carmel, California, Bonhams’ sale of “Exceptional Motorcycles & Related Memorabilia” will include what is understood to be the very motorcycle a shirtless McQueen was pictured astride on the front cover of the August 1971 issue of Sports Illustrated .


Photo by Heinz Kluetmeier/Sports Illustrated/Getty Images

You can’t help but love the stripped-down Husky’s profile – its nimbleness must have been a revelation for a new generation of yank offroaders who had been struggling on modded, but clumsy, weighty US bikes.

According to various recent wire reports The 1971 Husqvarna 400 was originally purchased from the Steve McQueen Estate Sale in 1984 at Harrah’s Auto Collection in Las Vegas, the very locale where Bonhams’ recent motorbike sale was conducted.

The motorcycle, which son, Chad McQueen, reportedly said was his father’s favorite off-road brand – comes with a box of accessories owned by McQueen. Other McQueen ephemera will be offered at the sale including numerous racing trophies won by the legend himself.

Is there no end to the power of the McQueen legacy?


Photo by Heinz Kluetmeier/Sports Illustrated/Getty Image

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