Before he died Paco Bultó requested that he be laid to rest in a Bultaco shirt with his moustache properly waxed. Perhaps more than anything his final request showed who he really was, an avid motorcyclist with an eccentric streak a mile wide and a famously wry sense of humor.

Paco Bultó had founded Montessa motorcycles with Peter Permanyer in 1944 in their native Spain, the marque quickly gained a foothold and a reputation for race winning motorcycles. By 1957 the two men were at loggerheads as an economic downturn had left Permanyer wanting to disband the racing division, and Bultó lived for little else than competition.

Bultó would leave the company he had co-founded, and within days many of the leading lights of the racing division had followed him. It was these men who convinced Paco to start his own motorcycle marque, even suggesting the name Bultaco using the first four letters of his surname and the final three letters of his nickname “Paco”.