Big news for 2003 from the Motor Company is ... paint. and a wait and see message for the end of the celebrations in Milwaukee. Victory are getting their act together in the UK, and meeting after meeting is creating a dealer network and working out how to get the bikes to them. There is more, but not much:

Harley-Davidson's V-Rod and the XL883R are the sole rebels of the range in that they don't take the colour schemes of red, white or blue, or Anniversary Black, Anniversary Gunmetal or the Anniversary two-tone Sterling Silver and Vivid Black.The V-Rod does get a black strip if you want it, as well as the Anodised Silver, but the 883R sticks with its Fort Harley racing Orange, and a few embellishments. No new models announced as yet, but rumours abound of a couple more VRs to keep the V-Rod company, and a new Sportster but announcements won't be made until the Milwaukee finale of the 100th Birthday Party. Changes? New mirrors with a nicer shape.

Victory have finally launched the Freedom-engined bikes in the UK, and have called a press conference for late April 2003 (a reference I'll hopefully remember to change after the event) when it expected that the Vegas will be announced for the UK. We understand that the TC and its derivatives will not come to these shores for a while as they will require further homologation for the longer frame.

Buell have added the XB9S Lightning to the XB9R Firebolt and are rumoured to be developing a higher output engine having got the chassis and brakes sorted out. Still at pains to stress that there are no plans for water-cooling, and no need to on the basis of emissions.

H*nd* have given the Ohio-built (or is that "assembled") a running mate in the form of the VTX1300.

We hear very little on these shores about the new Indians, but if we get chance to get to the states, we will address that. Until then ... what can we say? You can't have one here because the Indian brand name is owned by Alan Forbes in Edinburgh and he uses it on the red-painted Scandanavian-built in-line 4s.

An American trip will include a visit to see Confederate but we have no more info now than we had in 2002 - but it does remind me that I really should send them a copy of the magazine.

We never did get the round-up of the also rans done last year, and I hold out little hope of redressing that for this year: they don't seem to want to tell us what they're doing, you can't easily get them over here, and they cost a lot of money, so I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. We'll send them magazines too, though, and see if they are more interested then.