Editorial Director Mitch Boehm on being young and dumb 10 FROM THE PRESIDENT
AMA President and CEO Rob Dingman on the 1990s
Membership feedback on recent issues
14 BACK IN THE DAY
Where the photos are blurry but the memories are clear!
16 TRIUMPH ROCKET 3 STORM GT
The world’s biggest production motorcycle engine packs quite the punch 18 CHEVRON DEFERENCE
The Supreme Court overturned a 40-year-old ruling that may have a ripple effect on motorcycling
24 COVER STORY: SUMMER OF ’69
Honda’s CB750 and Kawasaki’s 500cc Mach III sent shockwaves through the motorcycling world
38 THE ’90s
While motorcycling thrived, the AMA made huge strides — and one misstep — during the 1990s
50 LEATHER’S LAST BASTION
Vanson Leathers’ 50-year journey defined by made-in-America quality and craftsmanship
68 AMA GARAGE
Tips, tweaks, fixes and facts: The motorcycle ownership experience, explained
72 LAST PAGE
Our latest sweepstakes winner!
ON THE COVER:
1969…A summer to remember, with the release of not one but two streetbike legends — Honda’s CB750 Four, and Kawasaki’s H1 Triple. The pair would change the big streetbike market in ways still being felt today. CB750 and H1 owners and restorers Vic World (left) and Dave Singleton demonstrate.
by Kevin Wing.
Photo
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Young and dumb…they often go together. I have been both in my years, and after spying a late-’80s Kawasaki EX500 at our recent Vintage Motorcycle Days event, I flashed back to one of the craziest (and dumbest) happenings in my nearly four decades of doing this.
Most of you have heard about newbike intros, many of which involve flying editors all over the country — or world — to ride a manufacturer’s latest offering. These are typically pretty posh affairs, but not all intros are so buttoned up, and the world launch of the then-new Kawasaki EX500 twin in 1987 in Baja, Mexico, is a fine example.
Kawasaki’s PR manager at the time was Mike Vaughan, whose roots reached back to bikes like the Eddie Lawson Replica KZ1000R, which Vaughan had a hand in making happen. Vaughan somehow got Kawasaki brass to agree to launch the lightweight, fun and peppy EX500 (later called the Ninja 500) down in Baja by entering participating editors on EX500s in one of the peninsula’s craziest events — the La Carrera road race.
“Road race” was apropos, too, as there wasn’t any racetrack to speak of, the race happening on the 140-mile stretch of public road from Ensenada on the Pacific coast to the coastal town of San Felipe on Baja’s eastern coast, right up against the Gulf of California. The promoters told the 70 or 80 entrants (and Kawasaki) that the local cops and Federales would have the road closed to traffic during the race, but I remember thinking that could easily be wishful thinking. This was Baja, after all.
Looking back, I still can’t believe it
CRAZY INDUSTRY STORIES, CHAPTER ONE
BY MITCH BOEHM
The author (right), chatting with a German journalist on the “starting line,” probably about the four-wheeled — and four-legged — obstacles they might encounter on their way to San Felipe.
happened as it did…that Kawasaki ginned up the idea; that my boss thought it was a good idea to send me; and that I agreed to attend. But hey, it was the 1980s (when things were a bit looser, even corporately), and of course I was young and dumb.
The idea of “practice” was top of mind, but I quickly learned I’d get none, and because of editorial deadlines I’d not been able to come early — as many had — to pre-run the course and learn what the route would be like at race speeds. So basically, I’d be racing blind. What could go wrong?
Still, being 25, young and dumb, and illogically adventurous, it didn’t seem like that big of a deal. At Motorcyclist, I’d been riding daily in LA traffic, and club-racing and backroad testing constantly, so I figured this would be cake…and that maybe the road might actually be free of cars and trucks (and donkeys and goats). But it wasn’t.
We started in groups of two and would be running against the clock,
with a fuel stop along the way that was pretty close to the El Oasis orphanage supported by AMA Hall of Famer Malcolm Smith and family. On a long, straight stretch from one edge of a valley to the other, about halfway to San Felipe, I spied a dark mass in the road a few miles ahead of me. At 120 or so mph, it didn’t take long to get close enough to see what it was…a large truck, in my lane, so at least it was going my direction.
But when I got within 50 yards of what turned out to be a ratty ol’ garbage truck, I spied a faint left-turn light blinking…and had no time to do anything other than pray — and harvest some seat foam. I zipped past the thing at probably 90 mph just in time to look in my mirror and see the truck turning left a couple seconds after I whizzed by. The adrenaline in my gut almost made me sick.
Should I have slowed way down? Of course. But young and dumb struck again.
While partying that evening during a posh Kawasaki dinner overlooking the Sea of Cortez, I didn’t think much of what happened — and actually laughed about it with some of the other guys. Just another example of the always-dangerous “I’m young and invincible and nothing can hurt me” mentality.
Is there a lesson here for you younger riders? Absolutely. Think things through. Don’t do stupid stuff. And don’t let being young and dumb — which happens to us all in our lives — affect the rest of yours. For me, apparently, that’s easier said than done.
Mitch Boehm is the Editorial Director of the AMA and a long-time member.
As we have been chronicling the history of the AMA (and some of the high points of motorcycling) decade by decade over the last handful of months, I have learned a great deal about the history of our organization. We have now reached the decade to which I can most relate, the 1990s, as it is during that decade that I first became involved with the AMA. I first became aware of the AMA when I joined the government relations staff of the Motorcycle Industry Council (MIC) in 1990. It was during my initial year on that job that I first traveled from the Washington, D.C., area to the AMA’s headquarters, then in Westerville, Ohio, to meet the AMA’s
From the President and CEO THE 1990s: CLOUDS ON THE HORIZON
BY ROB DINGMAN
Rasor noticed the job I did on behalf of the off-highway vehicle community in this effort, and as part of a departmental restructuring in 1994, he asked me to join the AMA’s government relations staff as Washington representative. And so it was 30 years ago, shortly before I came to work for the AMA, that I first joined the Association as a member in 1994.
I WOULD RETURN TO THE AMA STAFF IN THE FALL OF 2006 AS AMA PRESIDENT, AND WOULD BECOME PRESIDENT AND CEO IN THE SPRING OF 2007. WHAT I FOUND UPON MY RETURN WAS AN ORGANIZATION IN A BIT OF CRISIS ON THE PRO-RACING SIDE...
government relations staff.
This was the first time that I met 2024 AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame Inductee Rob Rasor, who was then serving as the AMA’s vice president for government relations. Over the next nearly five years I would have the opportunity to work closely with Rasor and his staff on a range of issues for the benefit of motorcyclists.
In my role with the MIC, my focus was on land use issues. I ultimately became involved in and played a key role in the effort to enact what was then called the National Recreational Trails Fund Act, now known as the Recreational Trails Program. I also co-founded the Coalition for Recreational Trails, which still exists today, to advocate for the Recreational Trails Program and increased funding for it.
I thoroughly enjoyed representing the AMA in our nation’s capital. It was during that time that I came to understand the power of the AMA as a grassroots organization, and how critically important the organization is to protecting the future of motorcycling. I must confess that since I worked out of the AMA’s Washington, D.C., office and would only travel periodically to the home office in Ohio, I was only tangentially aware of the many and varied facets of the AMA. My work for the AMA then was primarily in the area of rights and advocacy, and I consequently had limited exposure to racing and therefore the many racing controversies whose origins can be traced back to the decade of the 1990s.
Although I left the AMA staff in 1998 to return to my home state of
New York for an opportunity in state government, I continued to maintain my AMA membership, as I was still an avid motorcyclist and continued to firmly believe in the need for a strong AMA. For the rest of the 1990s and into the next decade (which we’ll cover in these pages in next month’s edition), I continued to advocate for motorcyclists in my position with New York State. I oversaw the implementation of the then-newly-legislated state motorcycle safety program, and facilitated the issuance of custom picture license plates for motorcycles, including an AMA-themed license plate featuring the AMA logo that’s still available today. Prior to my involvement, custom picture plates were only available for cars — and not for motorcycles. I would return to the AMA staff in the fall of 2006 as AMA president, and would become president and CEO in the spring of 2007. What I found upon my return was an organization in a bit of crisis, one borne of good intentions but also a mix of misguided planning and over-confident execution on the Pro Racing side of things during the 1990s – which you can read more about on pages 46-47.
That, however, is a story for another column next month about the first decade of the new millennium.
Rob Dingman is the President and CEO of the AMA, and a Charter Life Member
BACKFIRES
MORE ON THE MONTHLY MIX
So, some members are unhappy because they perceive their type of motorcycling doesn’t receive enough coverage in the magazine, and even threaten to cancel their memberships? I’d like to say I love the magazine and would not change a thing. As I read each issue, I marvel at the history that’s shared, the names of racers from the 1920s and 1930s, the photos of them and their beloved machines, all of it. This month I’m enjoying the 1970s, a decade I remember well. I feel more a part of the motorcycling community with each issue, and to the detractors I’d say this: read all the articles, especially those on the AMA’s relentless advocacy for our rights and interests. That alone makes my annual subscription the best money I spend every year. Please keep doing what you’re doing.
Robert Rich South Burlington, Vt.
You folks just can’t catch a break. No matter what you do, someone is going to find a reason to complain. Seems the majority of complainers have probably not even read a single full issue. If they had, they wouldn’t be whining. I’m 35, and primarily a dirt rider, but I dabble in just about everything, and I love every part of what you folks put together each month, even the “old guy” stuff. I heard this great quote from a movie once: “History is not just a study of the past…it is an explanation of the present.” Your 20th century “decade” articles and all the other retro stuff are important not only to see where we came from, but to give context to where we are. Sure, I’d love a little more of “this” or a little more of “that,” but I understand the magazine has to cater to an audience that is niche as well as incredibly diverse. I maintain my AMA membership because I love being part of
a motorcycle community, and your monthly print (key word!) efforts are a major part of that community for me. Other clubs I’m part of have moved to digital formats, and it’s a shame. It’s just not the same without a physical magazine. Please keep the good stuff coming to my mailbox every month!
Steve Abraham
You can’t let the naysayers get you down. I equate it to the numerous Facebook forums I belong to. I go there to share and get info, but ask someone what battery to use, what oil, what brand of gear, and you better put on your seatbelt. Given that the American Motorcyclist Association is about motorcyclists and the issues affecting
LETTER OF THE MONTH
missed the cover story on Thad Wolff’s steel-tank Six Days 125 restoration (May 2024) until just recently, and I have to say it’s the type of story that keeps me renewing my AMA membership. The mix of the personal (Thad’s) and two-wheeled history (the Penton) is both entertaining and informative, and it’s an angle I don’t see much of anymore in the print (or digital) bike media. I’m wondering…do you know if John Penton saw the issue, and what his reaction was? I have to believe he would have smiled if he saw it. Thanks again for your monthly efforts!
Martin Ford Lexington, Ky.
Thad tells us he sent a few copies of the May 2024 issue to Mr. Penton in Ohio, and that he got a signed copy in return for his efforts. Apparently, when J.P. first saw the issue, he thought it was an old magazine, but smiled when he realized it was a recent issue. Good stuff. – Ed.
Letters to the editor are the opinions of the AMA members who write them. Inclusion here does not imply they reflect the positions of the AMA, its staff or board. Agree? Disagree? Let us know. Send letters to submissions@ama-cycle.org or mail to American Motorcyclist Association, 13515 Yarmouth Drive, Pickerington, OH 43147. Letters may be edited for clarity and brevity.
JOHN PENTON
us all, you are on the bull’s-eye. The whiners are mere static given the things you have accomplished.
Brian Hennessy Wausau, Wis.
One quick comment on your 1970s cover story…my wife Denise and I were there!
Stephen Ligon
Have you thought of producing a special AMA anniversary compilation issue that would package the decades you are covering into one complete issue? You could even add some additional stories that highlight both the organization and motorcycling in general.
I think it might be something the membership and the wider public might have an interest in.
Dale Durchholz
You are reading our minds, Dale! Stay tuned. – Ed.
A CLASS ACTION
I’ve been a member of this fine organization since 2003 or so. I love the new look of the magazine, and please keep up the great work there. After reading the July 2024 issue and Jack Emerson’s article about autonomous autos, it occurred to me that to effect change, it has to cost those who are responsible. There needs to be a penalty for what is happening. When I look at other situations in our society, one of the most effective ways to do this seems to be a class action lawsuit. It has worked for those affected by cancer-causing substances such as weed killer chemicals and asbestos. Why can’t it work for motorcyclists and computer-driven cars and trucks? All this seems to have some legal legs if folks are dying because of this technology. Just an observation. Please keep shining the light on our rights as riders.
Bob Greene
Interesting question, Bob. Any lawyers out there want to weigh in? – Ed.
THE JACKET THING
Reading Perry King’s comment about how putting the jacket on brings your riding skills to the fore…so true! I go shopping by motorcycle, and just walking around my local store in biker gear makes me a more alert shopper.
Becky Worledge San Jose, Calif.
WHOOPSIES ‘R’ US
Wanted to point out an error in your 1960s coverage in the June 2024 issue…or maybe it was simply a typo? Martin Luther King was taken from us on April 4, 1968, not 1969, and Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated a couple months later.
David Logan
Loved the July issue’s section on motorcycling in the 1970s, but the piece on Craig Vetter is not quite correct. There may have been six variations of the legendary Windjammer fairing, but what you show there is a Honda CB750 with a Series 1700
Phantom fairing, which came before the Windjammer. Vetter did make variations of the Phantom for Kawasaki and BSA triples, as well. But the Phantom came first.
Norman Gaines
Thanks for the heads-up, fellas, and yes, when we hurry we make mistakes. My mom was right! – Ed.
CRAIG VETTER
BACK IN THE DAY
Where the photos are blurry but the memories are clear!
I6
got a Yamaha 125 when I was 19 in May 1975. I had just started riding in the local coal strip mines, and my buddies told me I had to learn to wheelie. They showed me how, and that’s me practicing in the picture. My first street bike was a 1986 Yamaha Radian 600. The photo (right) shows me picking
the bike up after not riding for over 20 years. It was time for a new hobby. I loved it and have ridden close to 500,000 miles in 27 states since. I am an MSF RiderCoach and teach beginners, high-performance, threewheel, and ADV classes. Four wheels move your body, two wheels move your soul.
Bruce Dinoff
Here’s my dad and 8-year-old me during the summer of 1972 in Nassau Bay, Texas. I’m aboard my first bike, a Honda QA50, while my dad is on his CB500. See the blue and white NASA sticker on the CB’s left fork? Shortly after my mom took this photo, my father [Edward G. Gibson] was selected to fly on Skylab IV, the third and final manned mission to America’s first space station. He spent 84 days in space (launching Nov. 16, 1973, returning Feb. 8, 1974). I was fortunate to see his launch and witness this proud and exciting part of our nation’s early space program. My next motorbike was a 1977 Honda XR75, which I bought new on my 14th birthday after saving my pennies mowing lawns and delivering newspapers on my Schwinn 10-speed. When I wasn’t in school, working part time or goofing off, I was riding my XR or tinkering on it in the garage. There’s no doubt the mechanical and motor skills I acquired riding my QA and XR gave me the foundation to earn a pilot’s license and eventually get hired as an airline pilot for American Airlines. Years later, it was a proud moment to have my dad on my flight from San Diego to Phoenix.
John Gibson
5I was 18 years old and looking for a Norton Commando to buy. Driving one day, I saw this motorcycle sitting at the end of a driveway. I immediately stopped and said to the owner, “Nice custom Trident!” He quickly informed that it was not a Trident but a Triumph Hurricane X75. This was in 1975, and the rest is history. I had to have it, and 48 years later I still own and ride it at 66 years young! The rare 750 Triple only had 1,148 made and only for one year…I got lucky that day back in ’75!
Art Miner
3In 1971, I got my first motorcycle — a yellow Honda Z50 — at the age of 10. After that Z50 I rode many different motorcycles over the next 10 years. The 1980s marked the beginning of a motorcycling hiatus for me, although I never lost my love for motorcycles. In 2016, I retired and bought a Harley-Davidson. The pictures tell the story. (Shown is me at 10, and also my current collection.) Never give up on your dreams.
Donald
Parker
5In 1982 I was serious about buying a new motorcycle, and partial to a new GPz Kawasaki, especially after attending the California Superbike School in 1982 at Pacific Raceway in Kent, Wash. I was reading all about the new V-four Honda, so I waited, and finally got one in April of 1983 at the age of 25. What a motorcycle! I rode that bike for 10 years and around 35,000 miles all around the Pacific Northwest and to Laguna Seca and back in 1988 to see the United States Grand Prix. I sold it after a serious injury, and did not have a motorcycle for around 15 years. I started riding in 1970 on a 50cc Honda, then went through a bunch of bikes, including a Suzuki TS125 and RM250, Yamaha RD350, Kawasaki KZ650 and KDX175, Honda ST1300 and GL1800 Goldwing, and my current bike, a Yamaha Ténéré 700. I have much to be thankful for with many memories and friends through the years related to motorcycling. Don Traeger
3A friend sent me this photo from 1991 (now 33 years ago… whoa!). I had a lot of good miles aboard that 1984 Kawasaki GPz750 Turbo. This shot was at or near the Washington Pass summit of the North Cascades Highway in Washington. Pretty sure the color coordination back then added 2 percent more horsepower. Ben Getz
up to speed
News, notes, insight and more from the motorcycling universe
TRIUMPH ROCKET 3 STORM GT
The world’s biggest production motorcycle engine will blow your cobwebs clean off
STORY AND PHOTOS BY JOHN BURNS
There’s a certain amount of sphere-of-influence shrinkage that happens when you stop having a 9-to-5 and semi-retire. It’s usually a good trade, because it leaves time for an afternoon nap, often followed by a leisurely soak in the hot tub with a cocktail and a nice podcast.
And yet, you do miss the hurly-burly, the engagement, the rat race… And nothing says, “Hey, I’m still in it,” like the Triumph Rocket 3.
Updates for 2024 gave me the excuse I needed to borrow one for a
couple weeks. Not only does it look like you’ve got a Supermarine Spitfire parked in your driveway, it actually feels about as agile as the legendary WWII fighter when you take off down the runway — er, street — on it, even in spite of its claimed wet weight of 705 pounds. That’s not light, but it’s still almost 100 pounds less than a Fat Boy.
der) is now good for 15 more horsepower than before — 180 at 7,000 rpm, and 166 ft-lb of torque at 4,000 rpm.
SAMPLED
H-D claims 119 ft-lb of torque from that bike’s Milwaukee Eight 114, and 94 horses. Triumph says its latest 2,458cc triple (that’s 819cc per cylin-
Triumph did what it could to soften the blow, but when you give the throttle a less-than-gentle twist, especially in Sport mode, you are blasting off Neil Armstrong-style. Luckily there’s a nice seat bolster, but on the GT, with its forward footpegs, it’s not easy to get your left foot up there for the second-gear upshift before you’re into the 7,500-rpm redline. Rocket is a good name; it feels more like jet-thrust than horsepower.
There’s something about bikes with longitudinal crankshafts that makes them feel agile yet trustworthy, and the low CG that narrow engine allows makes the Rocket easy to balance. The fat Avon Cobra Chrome tires might make you think it might not like to turn, but you’d be in for another surprise. The Rocket banks into turns quicker and with less effort than you’d think, and has more cornering clearance than you’d expect, too. (This GT’s forward pegs and higher handlebar make it a bit less sporty than the Rocket 3 R, which gets mid-set pegs and a lower bar.)
Fully adjustable Showa suspension at either end and big Brembo
Stylema brakes (with lean-sensitive ABS!) mean there’s nothing keeping you from not embarrassing yourself on a blast down yon curvy road. It’s a power cruiser and a big sportbike.
Blasting, for some of us of a certain age, isn’t necessarily what the Rocket’s about: 150 cubic inches means you never have to say I’m sorry I didn’t downshift. Here we are in sixth gear rolling up the freeway ramp; now, here we are at — how’d that happen? — 100 mph and 3,200 rpm! Effortless. Low Earth orbit seems within reach. The sheer frontal area and small windscreen lead decent interference even at extralegal speeds. And at any speed, the Rocket’s just plain nice to you: 4.2 inches of linkage-equipped rear-wheel travel and a wide, cush seat are way kinder to the old coccyx than motorcycles with half the travel; just dial back the compression for leisurely strolls around town. Ride like a maniac when you want, but it’s also
easy to relax on the Rocket…except at the gas pump. The best I could do was 36 mpg, which should give about 170 miles per 4.76-gallon tank.
Twenty-five gees used to seem like a lot for a motorcycle. Now it’s the norm for a premium cruiser, and I scratch my head coming up with a cruiser more premium than this one.
(A new Honda Gold Wing could work, $24,700.) The quick-shifter is optional (and would be great for shifting those big gears), but everything else you need is already here, including one-button cruise control and heated grips. The two classic bug-eye lights take us right back to the original punk Speed Triple, and clever engineering touches like hide-away bifold passenger pegs abound.
Nobody needs a Rocket. But quite a few people want one: Triumph says it’s sold more than 18,000 since the 2.5-liter engine was introduced in 2019. You know who you are.
The bug-eye headlight theme, carried forward from the old Speed Triple, totally reinforces the impression of that old hooligan; older, wiser and quite a few pounds heavier, but still ready to rock ‘n’ roll.
Supreme Court Overturns Chevron Deference up to
Landmark decision poised to curtail autonomy of government agencies
BY JOY BURGESS
On June 28, the Supreme Court overturned the doctrine of “Chevron deference” in a 6-3 decision, restricting the ability of government regulators to act outside of Congressional or federal judiciary oversight.
This decision will likely alter the scope and power of regulations impacting motorcyclists, from off-highway access to the right-to-repair. Dating to a 1984 Supreme Court decision, Chevron deference referred to the directive that federal courts accept the judgement of regulators regarding relevant law and resulting regulations. This made challenging rules, such as land closures impacting motorcyclists, difficult in the courts.
“Overturning the Chevron deference makes it much harder for the executive branch to implement onerous or misguided regulations,” said AMA Government Relations Director Nick Haris. “The list of bureaucratic fumbles affecting motorcyclists is long, with one such instance taking place in the 2000s when the Department of Health and Human Services was able to undermine the will of Congress and circumvent legislation passed to prevent health insurance discrimination against motorcyclists. Working
with Congress, the AMA was able to defeat this dangerous situation, but it took years of work and significant resources to do so.
“In a post-Chevron world, we anticipate having more leeway to fight, but we are also cautious that the road ahead is largely unknown,” Haris added. “We will continue to monitor the effects of this decision and update AMA members on how it will impact them in the future.”
Across its long history, the AMA has engaged on issues potentially impacted by the Chevron deference ruling, repeatedly taking on the overreach of government agencies. Specifically, the AMA has fought the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on multiple occasions, including working against noise regulations that would have cost individual motorcyclists thousands of dollars. The AMA also took on the Internal Revenue Service, getting it to rewrite its regulations to allow proper sales tax deductions for motorcycles.
To stay informed with the latest legislative news impacting motorcyclists — including updates on the aftermath of the Chevron deference decision — visit AmericanMotorcyclist.com/rights/
“We will continue to monitor the effects of this decision and update AMA members on how it will impact them in the future.”
AMA OFFERS SUPPORT FOR THE REPAIR ACT
Collection of organizations cosign letter backing HR
BY JACK EMERSON
In a letter to the House Energy and Commerce Committee by the Auto Care Association, the AMA joined 24 organizations in support of HR 906, the Right to Equitable and Professional Auto Industry Repair Act (REPAIR Act).
The REPAIR Act — a piece of bipartisan legislation with 56 cosponsors evenly divided across the aisle — aims to protect consumer and independent business access to affordable vehicle repair and equal access to the necessary parts, maintenance, tools, components and data to complete repairs.
Since November, Rep. Neal Dunn (R-FL-02), the lead sponsor of the REPAIR Act, was responsible for negotiating provisions regarding the bill, which included an effort to remove
motorcycles from the legislation.
The AMA worked closely with Reps. Tim Walberg (R-MI-05) and Troy Balderson (R-OH-12) to ensure that all language regarding motorcycles remained in the proposed bill.
“It is imperative that all language regarding motorcycles remain in the REPAIR Act, and thanks to the work done by Reps. Dunn, Walberg and Balderson, and their willingness to work with the AMA on this issue, motorcycles remain at the forefront of conversations surrounding the right to repair,” AMA Government Relations Director Nick Haris said. “This bill could have immense implications for the future of motorcycling, and we continue to support all efforts to allow motorcyclists to repair their vehicles as they see fit.”
The AMA remains committed to protecting the right to repair motorcycles for all motorcyclists, and will continue to work with Congress to ensure these rights are protected for our members and beyond.
THE RIGHT TOOLS
Q And A
MAX COLCHIN up to speed Rights ROUNDUP
Get to know the AMA’s government relations eastern states representative
With an eye on altering its approach to regionalization in its Government Relations Department, the AMA set out in 2023 to reimagine its GRD structure to better serve motorcyclists, and the recent hiring of Eastern States Representative Max Colchin marked the final step in this process.
Growing up with a father who was a lifelong motorcycle enthusiast and collector, Colchin learned to ride at a young age and received his first motorcycle — a Yamaha PW50 — as a Christmas present before he was 8 years old. Later in life, Colchin earned a degree in political science at Indiana University before the native of Fort Wayne, Ind., left the state to work on Capitol Hill, where he gained a wealth of experience working as a full-time staffer in the United States House of Representatives.
Today, Colchin is blending his passion for motorcycling with his experience in government to help the AMA’s government relations team tackle its mission to protect the future of motorcycling
AM: What is your favorite motorcycle memory?
cating the issues facing motorcyclists to policymakers, and I look forward to working with them on amplifying that message. My goal is to contribute my expertise, network and passion for motorcycles to our exceptional government relations team and build upon our past achievements by expanding our influence on Capitol Hill and in state legislatures nationwide.
MC: My earliest recollection is riding to tee ball practice with my father in the sidecar of his ’78 BMW R100 when I was 6 years old. I started riding soon after, opting [for] a dirtbike before a traditional bicycle. After the PW50 I moved through a TTR-90, TTR-125, TTR-230 and eventually to my ’86 Yamaha XT350, which I still take out on trails.
Some of my favorite riding memories are the summers I spent in Indiana with my cousins building jumps and riding through the wooded areas of their property. Exploring those various trail systems ranks high on the list of my favorite memories, as well.
AM: What can people expect in the way you pursue the AMA’s mission to protect the future of motorcycling?
MC: I am excited to work with our membership to strengthen the AMA’s efforts and preserve the rights of riders in the eastern states region. My time on Capitol Hill served as a great experience to learn about the issues and legislative process, and I look forward to building coalitions on issues of personal interest.
Our grassroots advocates and volunteers at the AMA are tremendous champions when it comes to communi-
The AMA’s Government Relations Department has booked several big wins this past year, including getting motorcycle lane splitting/filtering bills signed into law in Colorado and Minnesota, and I am excited to continue this momentum in the eastern region.
AM: Given the people that serve in the department and how it is set up, why is the AMA Government Relations Department properly equipped to fight for motorcyclists’ rights?
MC: Understanding local dynamics and connections is essential for effective advocacy and lobbying. The structure and organization of our department is unique in that individuals on our team can specialize and zero in on the issues that affect a specific region. For example, issues affecting motorcyclists in the West may differ significantly than issues in New England or the South Atlantic. By having dedicated government relations team members assigned to the western, central, and eastern regions, along with the federal side, we can ensure comprehensive monitoring and coverage of all our priorities across the United States.
The AMA is fortunate to benefit from a wealth of institutional knowledge in our Board of Directors, AMA President and CEO Rob Dingman, and Government Relations Director Nick Haris. These folks bring decades of valuable insight to the government relations team and are also passionate motorcyclists that truly care about the issues they represent. I couldn’t ask for a better team to be working alongside, and I cannot wait to get out and meet more of our members.
AM: What are issues motorcyclists need to be aware of in the coming years?
MC: I’m currently focused on several emerging issues, such as autonomous vehicles, lane splitting, rider train-
ing, access to safe fuel and distracted driving legislation.
As fully autonomous vehicle operation, automatic emergency braking and blind spot monitoring technology continue to become standard, it’s important that Congress, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Department of Transportation establish safeguards that ensure the safety of vulnerable road users. The transition to electric vehicles has raised concerns about ensuring continued access to safe fossil fuels for the broader motorized community, and addressing this concern remains a priority for the AMA.
AM: What advice would you give motorcyclists on how they can help make a difference?
MC: The most effective approach to advocacy is at the state and local levels. There are many opportunities to engage with lawmakers during town halls, public meetings and on the campaign trail. Agencies often hold public comment periods on changes to land use, and participation in these is how we can amplify our message and reach the most.
Most people are surprised by how accessible their lawmaker is to them as a constituent, and I would encourage all members to develop a rapport with their elected officials at the state and federal levels. The more we engage and cultivate relationships with our elected officials, the more likely they will become lasting allies of the motorcycling community. For detailed government relations updates, visit the “Rights” section on the AMA website, which offers insights, actionable steps and subscription options to receive updates from the government relations team.
Our goal is to be a resource to all AMA members, so if you have an issue in your state that affects your ability to ride freely or safely, please do not hesitate to reach out to our Government Relations Department. We would be more than happy to assist in resolving it.
SCHADE SUPREMACY up to speed Racing ROUNDUP
The Schade brothers are learning life lessons and collecting hardware along the way
BY KEATON MAISANO
Before the 2023 racing season, the three oldest Schade boys set goals for themselves, providing a “why” for all the hard work they were putting into racing.
Ultimately, the same racing goal was named by all three brothers: Win the overall youth district championships, which are won by scoring the most points across multiple racing disciplines
“We just made mention of overall championships and kind of how it works,” Gary Schade, father of the boys, said, “and they said, ‘Yeah, that’s what we want to do. We want to try and take each of our own classes and be the three brothers that everyone else is chasing after.’”
While their goals aligned, the boys, who are from Corona, Calif., are unique in how they go about their business. Gary described 11-year-old Jedediah, the oldest of the brothers, as methodical when it comes to his racing craft. Jedediah’s thoughtful approach to
riding stems from his training and early exposure to racing, which he started training for before he turned 4 years old.
Unlike Jedediah, 9-year-old Malachi — known as “Wild Guy Chi” — is the wild card of the bunch, and is fueled by his upbringing that has consisted of him chasing Jedediah.
The balance of Jedediah and Malachi helped shape 7-year-old Ezekiel, who Gary said is a blend of the two oldest boys.
Despite a difference in approaches and temperaments, the boys reached their goals, and the Schade family name won three of the nine youth overall championships in the District 37 desert series: Jedediah took home the Youth Overall 65cc Junior title in hare and hound, desert and grand prix; Malachi earned the Youth Overall Peewee Senior championship in hare and hound, desert and grand prix; and Ezekiel rounded out the trifecta with the Youth Overall Peewee Junior honor for desert and grand prix.
The work the boys put in extended beyond the track and themselves, as the family had to work together to make sure the three boys — and their bikes — were ready to go throughout a race season that spanned many weeks and many miles.
Malachi Schade showing off his 2023 No. 1 honor. Lead photo: Malachi, again, this time moving much faster and kicking up dirt in the desert — something all Schade boys do well.
While many will equate the boys’ success with the hardware they received, Gary values how the boys responded off the bikes and in moments of adversity. Whether it was lifting each other up after bad races or going out of their way to cheer up a competitor, Gary has seen the boys take strides in developing strong character that will benefit them for life.
“I can only do so much as a dad, and my wife can only do so much as a mom,” Gary said. “What we’re trying to get out of racing is growing good character and raising future men. That’s all coming together at this point where we start to see those things, and it’s so awesome to see.”
Gary also stressed that the boys’ success is a testament that motorcycling does not have to be restricted to those who can afford the newest and best equipment, citing that the boys accomplished their goals on older, 2018-spec bikes.
“A lot of people ask, ‘How do you do it with so many kids?’” Gary said. “Just show up. Come race and have a good time…It’s doable on a budget. You can go out and have fun. Support the sport and the sport will support you back.”
With a strong brotherly bond, plenty of determination and 4-year-old Jericho waiting in the wings, there appears to be no end in sight to the success the Schade family finds out in the desert on their bikes.
GRAND ALPS TOUR
CONQUER THE HIGHEST AND MOST SCENIC ROADS OF THE ALPS!
Bottom left photo, from left to right: Jedediah, Ezekiel and Malachi Schade posing with their 2023 overall titles.
Bottom right: Malachi and Jedediah posing with their father Gary Schade while showing off their 2022 FirePoliceMX hardware.
THE TUMULTUOUS 1960s ENDED WITH SOME MIND-BLOWERS: MEN ON THE MOON, WOODSTOCK, THE JETS OVER THE COLTS IN SUPER BOWL III — AND THE LAUNCH OF HONDA’S CB750 AND KAWASAKI’S 500cc MACH III. MOTORCYCLING WOULD NEVER BE THE SAME.
Oh, and when I look back now
The summer seemed to last forever
And if I had the choice
Yeah, I’d always wanna be there
Those were the best days of my life
—Summer of ’69 by Bryan Adams
BY MITCH BOEHM
KEVIN WING, AMA ARCHIVE
ven for motorcycle enthusiasts experiencing the sometimes-crazy goings-on that year — Richard Nixon’s inauguration and “Vietnamization” plan, reviews of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Dwight Eisenhower’s passing, Qaddafi’s takeover of Libya, the release of Easy Rider, and more — the two new-bike introductions must have been difficult to comprehend.
PHOTOS BY
Into what had become a predictable and somewhat boring big-streetbike category dominated mainly by Ironhead Harleys and old-school British and European twins — with a smattering of small-bore two- and four-stroke Asian bikes beginning to generate noises of their own — came the staccato bursts of Mitsubishi Zero cannon fire in the form of two allnew Japanese motorcycles: Honda’s CB750 Four and Kawasaki’s Mach III 500cc triple, also known as the H1.
Even today, simply reading those two model designations lights goosebumps in most baby-boomer enthusiasts.
“Kawasaki,” wrote the late, great Gordon Jennings for Cycle in early ’69, “has thrown together from the ground up one of the most devastating two-wheelers ever to happen on the scene.”
“The H1,” wrote the late and exCycle Guide, -Cycle and -Motorcyclist staffer Charles Everitt, “was a
multi, man, and quickly earned a rep for being rad, mad and bad. We all wanted one. Kawasaki built performance, and the H1 was the nastiest yet.”
The Mach III was light, loud, smoky, funky and fast, a true two-wheeled hot rod, a bike that stretched both credulity and riders’ arms, and one that definitely got you noticed.
The CB750, which hit showrooms months later, couldn’t have been more different. Jennings called it “the most
sophisticated production bike ever.”
“The Honda,” wrote Everitt, “totally redefined performance and sophistication. Every motorcycle that came after (or before) was measured by it. The CB750 was nearly as consciousness expanding as LSD. You could travel on it — go places The English bikes and Harleys were fragile enough to want to stay close to home.”
Each embodied the culture and reputation of its maker — the H1 emitting Kawasaki’s bad-ass, performance-first MO like smoke from its trio of chromed chambers; the 750 Four seamlessly and beautifully blending high-end componentry (four cylinders, electric starting and a disc brake) — with all-around ability,
reliability and shocking-for-the-time sophistication.
Together, the pair rocked motorcycling’s status quo, and spun the two-wheeled world on its axis.
MACH III MADNESS
Introduced in early ’69, the Mach III/H1 was pure Kentucky bourbon, straight-up and without a beer chaser — a 500cc two-stroke triple designed from its ’67 beginnings as project “N100” to pack the best power-toweight ratio available and be an absolute menace at the dragstrip, cornering or handling performance be damned.
“The H1 was for the power-hungry American market,” wrote classicbike journalist Frank Melling, “where
What the H1 lacked in aesthetic polish was countered in spades by an honest and raw functionality. It smoked and shook and screeched, but when you cracked the throttle there was nothing like it.
straight-line power ruled the day.”
Jennings, with perhaps the savviest take on the bike, wrote this: “We are a profitable market for the Japanese, and to earn our dollars they have been obliged to custom-build motorcycles for us.”
The Mach III — which Jennings called the Blue Streak throughout that first road test — was the best example of this thus far.
“I was a test rider for Kawasaki when the H1 was announced,” the late Steve Johnson, longtime Kawasaki R&D/race-team member and mechanic to champion Hall of Fame racers Brad Lackey and Eddie Lawson, told me years ago. “We got a pre-production bike, and it was a big deal. Before that, Kawasaki only
“Kawasaki,” wrote the late, great Gordon Jennings for Cycle in early 1969, “has thrown together from the ground up one of the most devastating two-wheelers ever to happen on the scene.”
made 250 and 350cc twins. The bike was advanced, with a CDI [capacitive discharge ignition], though it leaked so much energy and ran so hot that if you ran it in a dark garage you’d see sparks flying everywhere!”
Johnson found the bike frighteningly fast, but it was by no means a handler. “It wobbled like crazy,” he said with a laugh. “It also had very little cornering clearance. We had a freeway frontage road next to our shop in Santa Ana that was really long and had an 80-mph sweeper at the end. We used it for testing, and man, that H1 wobbled and dragged and scraped like you wouldn’t believe. But it was so far
triple displaced 498cc (via a 60 x 58.8 mm bore and stroke) and featured five-port cylinders for max breathing, a roller-bearing crankshaft, electronic ignition and a close-ratio five-speed.
Its steel tube frame was considered a decent copy of a Manx Norton’s, but with an extra brace welded just below the steering head area for added rigidity. The H1 was also surprisingly light, weighing just under 400 pounds sans fuel. It was all business, a fact highlighted by its lack of electric starter.
Jennings cited this racer pedigree in Cycle’s first road test: “In a lot
“Finally, Kawasaki had something to sell to folks wanting a big, fast and nasty streetbike, a big bike that could outrun anything out there. And it did.”
KAWASAKI TEST RIDER STEVE JOHNSON
advanced compared to the W1 and W2 (Kawasaki’s BSA twin copies) we’d been selling.
“Finally, Kawasaki had something to sell to folks wanting a big, fast and nasty streetbike, a big bike that could outrun anything out there. And it did. Kawasaki didn’t even hint at handling or cornering; it was all about acceleration and top speed. When the things came out they were instantly all over the dragstrips; they were club-raced, but that was trickier to pull off.
“Through the years,” Johnson added, “Kawasaki always seemed able to beat the other manufacturers to the punch, and always from a performance standpoint. It was all about horsepower. I mean, the H2 [sort of a 750cc version of the H1 introduced in ’72] and 903cc Z1 [launched in ’73] are perfect examples. It really was, ‘Let the good times roll!’”
A good chunk of the Mach III’s go-fast persona came from its decidedly racebike-like physical makeup. Its two-stroke air-cooled
of ways,” he wrote, “the Kawasaki reminds me of some of the better racing motorcycles I have ridden. It is, for one thing, sudden. A bit flat at low revs [but] really gangbusters after the crank starts churning. And, at full song, it even sounds like a racer, with a hard, sharp businesslike edge to the exhaust that evokes memories of Daytona and the Isle of Man.”
The bike backed up the racer impression, at least in terms of straight-line acceleration, running quarter-mile ETs in the mid- to high12s at terminal speeds of nearly 100 mph. Impressive, especially considering that level of performance equaled or surpassed that of the fastest Brit-bikes of the day, the Norton Commando twin and Triumph Trident triple — 750s both.
Of course, that straight-line speed potential didn’t translate to handling performance or touring comfort, traits the Mach III would never be known for. “The Mach III seemed to get absorbed into the American scene pretty quickly based on its speed and quickness,” wrote Everitt. “But those qualities limited its usage. One rarely,
“I’ve always liked the Kawasaki Mach III,” said Northern California Kawasaki H1 restorer Dave Singleton (left). “I guess I just like to let the good times roll! When I pull up at a stoplight, people seem to want to comment. They either had one, or know someone who had one.”
if ever, saw a Mach III with a Vetter Windjammer fairing; it was hardly the first choice of touring riders.
“People couldn’t recreate the Mach III in their own image the way they could, say, the CB750,” Everitt continued. “The Mach III didn’t spawn an entire aftermarket industry the way the CB750 did, either. It was popular among drag racers, and semi-successful as a road racer. But its influence didn’t reach much past that. What made it so popular was
that it was a two-stroke — which are inherently easy/cheap (relatively speaking) to tune. You got a grinder tool? Hog out the ports! It was hellishly fast, but it didn’t inspire quite the way the CB750 did.”
Still, the 400-pound, $999 Mach III offered motorcycling’s absolute best bang for the buck. “The Kawasaki 3,” wrote Jennings, “cracked the quarter-mile in less than 13 seconds flat, making it the quickest production motorcycle ever offered. Take my
word for it…There are going to be a lot of sacred icons knocked over, a lot of records broken, and a lot of long four-stroke faces.”
“Riding the H1 was always an experience,” Melling wrote, “which is why demand for them continues to grow.”
And boy, has it. Nice examples of original-year H1s — restored or unrestored — go for $20,000, and usually more, these days. And followup-year models aren’t much less.
THE 750 FOUR
Honda’s CB750 debuted in spectacular fashion at the Tokyo Motor Show in late ’68, but it didn’t arrive in U.S. showrooms till May of the following year — which squares with the fact that its final engine design details weren’t decided on until sometime in early ’68, and why the first 7,400 or so had sandcast crankcases and other engine architecture bits.
The story of how an inline-four came to power in what Honda insiders called “Project 300” has been well told, most accurately in Aaron Frank’s Honda Motorcycles (available through Classic Motorbooks). The idea resulted in a discussion between AMA Hall of Famer Bob Hansen (1919–2013), American Honda’s savvy national
CB750 development moved quickly but was comprehensive, and happened all over the world, from Japanese test tracks and Honda’s R&D center to the deserts of California and Nevada. The 750 Four was pretty much bulletproof except for an early-model penchant for throwing chains and damaging the crankcase.
service manager, and fellow HOFer Soichiro Honda (1906–1991) himself during a trip Hansen made to Japan in late ’67.
“We had a meeting,” Hansen remembered, “with Mr. Honda and all the engineers. Honda looked at me and said, ‘We’re going to build a big motorcycle, [which] will be known as king of motorcycles.’ I’d been thinking that day they’d probably build a big twin, so being a brash American, I said, ‘Good! I just hope it’s not a twin!’”
When this made its way through a translator (Mr. Honda was taking English lessons at the time), Honda looked fiercely at Hansen and said, “Why do you say that?”
Hansen replied, “A twin is an old design. Even now, Triumph makes a three-cylinder. If Honda is to be the
king of motorcycles, it must build a four-cylinder.”
Honda responded thusly: “We have much experience with four cylinders [via its years of Grand Prix racing].” And Hansen replied, “Exactly.”
“I have a framed letter from the R&D team,” Hansen said proudly, “which says, ‘Because it was your idea to Mr. Honda to build a four, we are sending you the very first pictures. Don’t say anything to anybody in Gardena!’”
Development of the new Honda — an SOHC, two-valve, air-cooled inline-four wrapped in a traditional, twin-downtube steel frame — was rapid but exhaustively thorough. Bob Jamison (1930–2021), a colleague of Hansen’s, was chosen to be involved with Project 300 testing.
[Honda National Service Manager Bob] Hansen replied [to Soichiro Honda], “a twin is an old design. Triumph [already] makes a three-cylinder. If Honda is to be the king of motorcycles, it must build a four-cylinder.”
“The 750s that scuffed pistons during our testing were immediately taken down,” Honda’s Bob Jamison said. “It was total chaos, the engineers swarming, elbowing, taking notes, and in no time flat the engine was in a million pieces on the bench.”
“They didn’t want us complaining once the bike was finished,” Jamison remembered, “so we began testing right after the dealer show in the fall of ’68. Those prototypes were weird-looking, not beautiful like the show bikes
wanted to run the machines to death to see what would break. We did that for five days.”
Jamison’s crew then tested in Japan at various Honda test facilities, on Japanese roads and also at the Suzuka Circuit against
This beautiful, sandcast and 100-percent original K-zero CB750 is owned by noted CB750 restorer and collector Vic World (worldmotorcycles.com), and had just 400-some miles on it when we photographed it. World uses it as a guide when he restores one of his signature sandcast 750s, one of which sits in Honda’s Collection Hall in Motegi, Japan.
chain breakage and derailment issues (traced after production to improperly machined rear sprockets), etc. But it was the piston-scuff issue that showed Jamison why the bike would be successful, and why Honda would
the dealers had seen — drum brakes, disguised body parts, just a hodgepodge of stuff.
“We once tested for five days in the Nevada desert, from Boulder City to a place called Searchlight, from where you can see California and Arizona. It was 50 miles one way, and we were never to be out of the red zone, no matter what. If we went up a hill and it wouldn’t pull redline, we were to downshift. They really
the other superbikes of the day.
One of the Suzuka test riders was none other than Tadeo Baba, father of the CBR900RR, also known as the Fireblade in other markets. The testing was grueling — 12-hour days (Saturdays included) and many meetings. “The Honda guys even worked Sundays!” Jamison said.
The test crew had a few problems: torn-up primary drives, piston scuffing and the resultant smoking, some
become a powerhouse.
“The 750s that scuffed pistons during our test were immediately taken down,” Jamison remembered. “It was total chaos, the engineers swarming, elbowing, taking notes, and in no time flat the engine was in a million pieces on the bench. We had a meeting, the engineers made a bunch of sketches on the blackboard and in their notes, and one told me, ‘Don’t worry, we will solve the problem.’
“[The CB750] changed everything. Every other manufacturer instantly knew it had to step up to the CB’s level or get left behind...”
JOURNALIST CHARLES EVERITT
“The changes, which he sketched for us, were subtle, like reducing the thickness of the dome by 1 mm, etc. The next morning a guy walked into the workshop with four sets of pistons, which they’d machined overnight. We put four engines together, ran them on the dyno, and that was the end of the problem. We were dumbfounded.”
On March 15, 1969, Jamison watched the very first CB750 roll off the assembly line. “I remember,” he said, “because it was my birthday. That trip to Japan was quite an adventure.” In all, 63 engineers worked on the CB750 project. To Jamison, it was an amazing thing to behold.
More amazing, perhaps, was the fact that Honda wasn’t at all sure the bike would find success in the U.S. “The bike was going to retail for a little over $1,000,” Jamison remembered, “and they were worried, being very conservative. We felt it would be a success, and said so.”
And boy, was it ever. CB750s rocketed from showrooms, dealers generating waiting lists once they ran dry of initial shipments, magazines fanning the flames with hugely positive coverage and word-of-mouth testimonials galloping across the country.
Jennings once again captured the CB750 best in Cycle’s August ’69 issue: “The Honda 750 Four is the motorcycle for the person who wants big-bike road stability and the smoothness that only a four-cylinder can give. The Four handles like a road racer, is comfortable and has fantastic brakes. If you don’t care about any or all of those qualities, a lesser bike may be what you need — maybe what you deserve.”
“Like everyone else,” remembered
Everitt, “I was bowled over. Such a thing — an inline-four production streetbike — didn’t even seem possible at the time, especially at that level of performance and sophistication. There’s no possible way to overstate the CB750’s impact and importance. It changed everything. Every other manufacturer instantly knew it had to step up to the CB’s level or get left behind – and a lot of them got left behind.”
It can be argued, and pretty easily, that the CB750 is the most important motorcycle of all time — for the possibilities it represented; for the engineering road blocks it easily hurdled; and for what it forced the entire industry to do — and respond to. It not only created an entire aftermarket industry previously unknown, with names such as Vetter,
Yoshimura, Jardine, Vance & Hines, etc., it formed the basis for what became known as the UJM — the Universal Japanese Motorcycle, a concept that held powerful sway over the U.S. market for decades.
As Aaron Frank wrote so succinctly in Honda Motorcycles, “Honda’s brilliance [wasn’t so much electric starting, or disc
brakes, or the inline-four, which had been around for years]; it was combining these previously exotic technologies in a single, highly versatile package, ironing out all the kinks to produce downright civilized character, and bringing it to market at a price and in a quantity that nearly anyone could access. With the CB750, modern Japanese motorcycles arrived.”
And together with Kawasaki’s nasty-boy Mach III, they had arrived in a big way — even among all the craziness of the summer of 1969. AMA
THERACERS
FKawasaki’s H1R and Honda’s CR-kitted CB750 took the streetbike fight to the track
PHOTOS COURTESY NORM BIGELOW AND WORLD MOTORCYCLES
our years before Yamaha’s devastating TZ750 burst onto the scene in 1974 at Daytona with a 200-mile victory in the hands of world champ and Hall of Famer Giacomo Agostini (TZs would win nine-straight 200-milers), Kawasaki debuted a production race bike that helped set the stage for the wave of big-bore two-stroke road racing domination that was about to crest.
That machine was Kawasaki’s H1R, which packaged a high-performance version of the Mach III’s two-stroke triple in a special racing frame surrounded by then-stateof-the-art chassis pieces.
While the H1R was relatively simple in design, it proved highly competitive, finishing a surprising second overall to Agostini and his MV Agusta in the 1970 500cc World Championship under Kiwi Ginger Molloy.
It was also rare, Kawasaki building fewer than 50 units during its short, two-year run in ’70 and ’71. All of which puts any H1R into TZ750 territory collection- and value-wise.
World Motorcycles’ beautiful CR-kitted CB750 with Dave Rosno aboard.
Honda went about racing the CB750 in a slightly different way…ways, really. First, it built four exotic factory bikes for the 1970 Daytona 200, hand-made specials with tons of magnesium and titanium that were nothing like the streetbike. Only HOFer Dick Mann’s finished, and just barely, but it was enough for the win — which vaulted CB750 sales even higher into the stratosphere.
The other paths to CB750 competition were more than a hundred CR-spec “kit” parts from Honda, which at the time, totaled up, cost an astronomical $10,000. Privateers mixed and matched parts they felt they needed and could afford, but very few fully kitted bikes were built.
Sandcast CB750 collector/restorer Vic World (who owns the 400-mile CB750K0 in our Summer of ’69 feature) assembled one of those (see inset), and even campaigned the thing in select vintage-racing events in the early 2000s with racer Dave Rosno aboard. – Mitch Boehm
BY JOHN BURNS, JACK EMERSON AND KEATON MAISANO
PHOTOS: AMA ARCHIVE
Like the Roaring Twenties, the insane ’90s were a great time to be a motorcycle nut, and many would say the best of times.
On top of the two-wheeled tech explosion of the 1980s, which gave us some of the most functional and fun motorcycles in history (Honda Interceptors, Kawasaki’s original 900 Ninja, Suzuki’s first GSX-R750 and 1100, Yamaha’s 20-valve FZ750, Evo-engined Harleys, a range of watercooled, disc-braked, long-travel motocrossers, and many more), mostly-great economic times for most demographic groups during the 1990s allowed enthusiasts, veteran and rookie alike, to afford just about any motorcycle they wanted — all of which fueled a motorcycle-sales uptrend that wouldn’t peak until the mid-2000s.
And those motorcycles were world-beating, too, both functionally and aesthetically. You had bikes like the light-isright CBR900RR from Honda, plus new-gen VFRs and the ST1100; updated Suzuki GSX-Rs, plus a crazy thing called Hayabusa; the vaunted YZF-R1 and four-stroke YZ400F motocrosser from Yamaha; lots of new Ninjas and KXs; updated oil-head BMWs; Twin-Cam 88-engined Harleys; hightech tourers galore; and the instantly legendary Ducati 916. And most weren’t terribly expensive, either.
Life in the ’90s was pretty good. The future was bright as motorcycle mania continued its breakout around the globe.
The AMA was breaking new ground, too, literally and figuratively. The organization notched a range of significant high points during the decade, including establishing a museum element in 1990; holding the first Vintage Motorcycle Days event on its Westerville, Ohio, campus in 1992; topping 200,000 members for the first time in 1993; establishing the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998; and finally, later that year, moving to its current – and amazing – headquarters in Pickerington, Ohio.
Sitting on 23 acres and comprised of a 30,000-squarefoot administration building and a sky-bridge-attached 26,000-square-foot museum complex, the AMA campus — home to the AMA headquarters and Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum — is much more than a home; it’s a destination for motorcyclists worldwide. Come see us sometime, won’t you?
A booming economy and the Best Bikes Ever made for a heckuva motorcycling
1990 HONDA RC30
Honda’s World Superbike homologation special — also known as the ’88 and ’89 VFR750R in the rest of the world — was just that… special. With titanium this, magnesium that and geardriven cams, we bowed and scraped before the VFR750R’s $15,000 price tag. They’re more than double that nowadays.
AMA MUSEUM OPENS
Hailed by Chairman of the AMA Board of Directors John Hasty as “the single most significant event in the 66-year history of this association,” the Motorcycle Heritage Museum opened Aug. 16, 1990, at the AMA office in Westerville, Ohio. According to estimates, the grand opening ceremonies — which included an AMA Heritage Homecoming ride from Athens, Ohio, to Westerville — attracted more than 5,000 motorcyclists — including AMA Hall of Famer Jay Leno, Robert Forbes (son of HOFer Malcolm Forbes) and Rep. John Kasich (R-OH).
The inaugural exhibits of the museum included “Decades of Development” and “Women in Motorcycling.”
WAYNE RAINEY
Rainey won the first of his three-in-arow 500cc world championships on a Team Marlboro Roberts Yamaha, and was battling AMA Hall of Famer Kevin Schwantz for his fourth in 1993 — right up until a career-ending crash at that year’s Italian GP. From there the AMA Hall of Famer went straight into race management…and never looked back.
AMA SUPERCROSS, ATLANTA, GA.
1990 HARLEYDAVIDSON FAT BOY
Ridden by Ahhnold the year after its introduction in Terminator 2, the FLSTF was one of H-D’s hottest bikes throughout the ’90s, before body shaming was a thing. There’s still a Fat-bottomed Boy in the 2024 line.
1991
THE SOVIET UNION BECOMES…
…15 separate countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.
1990 KAWASAKI ZX-11
Our ZX-11 Ninja was the ZZ-R everywhere else. Sleek bodywork (with faired-in turn signals) and ram-air
DOUG POLEN
After winning more than his share of ’80s road races, Hall of Famer Doug Polen (23) teamed up with Fast by Ferracci to race the new Ducati 851 in World Superbike, a championship he won easily in ’91 and ’92. In 1993, the team adjourned to America at Ducati’s request, and won the AMA Superbike title.
VMD: HUMBLE BEGINNINGS
Now a breathtaking gathering of more than 40,000 vintage enthusiasts at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio, AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days got its start in July 1992 with a two-day event at the AMA’s headquarters in Westerville, Ohio. At the time it was uncertain if an event focused on vintage motorcycling would work, but the more than 6,000 motorcyclists that attended the inaugural VMD provided a resounding answer: Yes! The event included a bike show, swap meet, vintage auction, vintage bike exhibits, new displays in the museum, demos and more.
1991 BRITTEN V1000
Dyslexia made New Zealander John Britten a great visualizer of his own ideas; a lack of funds made him a genius at making things himself, including carbon-fiber wheels, entire engines, and nearly every part of his amazing V1000 Superbike, except for a few items like pistons and brakes. Not only was the V1000 a work of art, it was art that worked. The 10 that were built were all coming around to being capable of winning races at the highest level when Britten died of cancer in 1995
HUNGARIAN 500 GP
Cagiva’s first win and HOFer Eddie Lawson’s 31st and last, after winning the 500 title four times in the ’80s.
1992 HONDA NR750 Oval pistons, why not?
The street version was an outgrowth of the NR500 Honda had built to return to 500cc competition in 1979. “When I look back at it, I’m not sure if we were experimenting with cutting-edge technologies or obsessed with foolish ideas,” recalled Toshimitsu Yoshimura, an engineer involved in oval-piston
SCOTT RUSSELL, AKA ‘MR. DAYTONA’
AMA Hall of Famer Scott Russell won the first of his record five Daytona 200s (with the record-breaking fifth title coming in 1998) on the way to that year’s AMA Superbike Championship. In ’93 he took his Muzzy Kawasaki to Europe and won the World Superbike Championship.
1993 DUCATI MONSTER
Miguel Galluzzi’s nude Duc launched the modern Naked Bike craze. Just because every day’s a rat race doesn’t mean your motorcycle has to treat you like a racer
MICK DOOHAN
After nearly losing a leg as a result of a nasty injury and infection in ’92, the 80-grit Australian won the first of five straight 500cc world championships
MCGRATH MANIA
Hall of Famer Jeremy McGrath’s first season with Honda was supposed to be a learning year under the wing of teammate, defending champ and fellow HOFer Jeff Stanton. But on a January night in Anaheim Stadium, McGrath powered past Stanton to win his first AMA Supercross race. The King of Supercross, and inventor of the nac-nac, was on his way to his first of seven SX titles and the top of the all-time wins list with 72 career wins.
500CC WORLD CHAMP KEVIN SCHWANTZ
Kevin Schwantz’s 1993 championship marked the end of a golden era of U.S. riders in the premier class: Hall of Famers Schwantz, Rainey,
Spencer won nine of 10 titles between ’83 and ’93, and 13 of the last 15 if you count fellow HOFer Kenny Roberts’ three titles from ’78
200,000 STRONG
For the first time in its history, the AMA hit 200,000 members on May 28, 1993. The member that toppled the milestone? Tom Porrier, a 31-yearold resident of New York who enjoyed street and trail riding. AMA Charter Life member and motorcycling activist Dana Bell had this to say about the milestone: “I don’t think motorcycling would exist today without [the AMA]. That’s why reaching 200,000 members is significant. It’s a number with clout that we can use when dealing with legislators.”
500CC MOTOCROSSERS…
…were just toooo powerful for the average rider, and so the AMA discontinued the 500cc class after the 1993 season. Honda ceased CR500 production after 2001, and that lovable beast is now a bit of a cult bike.
1993 HONDA CBR900RR
Introduced in late 1991, seven years after the light-is-right Suzuki GSX-R750, the CBR-RR welcomed the second coming of the lightweight revolution. The fact it was 100 or so pounds lighter than the competition more than made up for its “only 893cc” four-cylinder.
1993 YAMAHA GTS1000
Because it could, Yamaha built the first Japanese hub-steer motorcycle, based upon the late James Parker’s patent. Despite eye-opening functionality the $12,999 GTS did not sell like hotcakes, but was clearly ahead of its time.
RICKY GRAHAM
In a dirt-track decade defined by Scott Parker vs. Chris Carr on factory H-D XR750s, Ricky Graham’s recordsetting six-race winning streak (and 12 wins total) in ’93 catapulted him to his third and final AMA Grand National title on a privateer Honda RS750 five years after Honda had quit the series. Graham was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998, just months after he passed away in a house fire.
CRUSTY DEMONS!
Who could forget Seth Enslow and company doing the craziest stuff imaginable? “You’ve got some serious problems you need to work out with yourself…” Freestyle motocross, FMX,
AMAZON.COM
It all started as an online bookstore…
GOOGLE DEBUTS
Just Google it.
1994 DUCATI 916
Massimo Tamburini’s masterwork didn’t evolve in a wind tunnel, but instead by Massimo riding the prototype between San Marino and Rimini, Italy, on rainy days and observing the raindrops. The 916 was more than ready to carry on the 851/888 World Superbike tradition, winning WSB
MIGUEL DUHAMEL
The AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer added the AMA Superbike title to his five Daytona 200 wins, five AMA Supersport titles, and two AMA Formula Xtreme titles on his way to amassing 86 career AMA wins.
HAYDEN AND MLADIN
HOFer Nicky Hayden won the AMA Supersport title on his way to bigger things, while Mat Mladin won the first of his seven AMA Superbike titles.
NAC-NAC
1994 R1100GS
BMW’s first oil-head boxer debuted in 1993 in the R1100RS, but putting that new twincylinder into a new bike with the GS suffix the following year, and giving the world its first modern adventure bike, was one of the best moves BMW ever made.
1995 National Highway System Designation Act
President Bill Clinton signed it but said, “I must note that some of my most serious concerns with this legislation have not been remedied. I am deeply disturbed by the repeal of both the national maximum speed limit law and the law encouraging states to enact motorcycle helmet use laws.” Free at last.
KAWASAKI KDX200
Born in 1980 as the KDX175, everybody loved Kawasaki’s never-say-die, doit-all, for-everybody two-stroke enduro. It got its last big redesign in ’95, and soldiered on until 2006, a victim of tightening emissions rules.
SPARTANBURG POLICE VIOLATION
At a September 1994 charity poker run benefiting the American Red Cross, riders were harassed in Spartanburg, S.C., as police videotaped, searched and interrogated participants. Authorities expressed intent to handle future motorcycle events in a similar fashion, so the AMA and the American Civil Liberties Union worked on behalf of motorcyclists at the event. Two years later, 107 motorcyclists were vindicated in a class-action suit — which was partly supported through a grant from the AMA — when U.S. District Judge G. Ross Anderson ruled that the actions of the Spartanburg police violated the rights of motorcyclists participating in the charity poker run. “While the court’s ruling is a victory for all motorcyclists, we feel that similar police activities in the future cannot be tolerated,” stated Robert Rasor, AMA vice president of government relations. “We are committed to ensuring that motorcyclists are not arbitrarily harassed and treated as criminals simply because of their legitimate choice of transportation. We will support any appeal effort on behalf of the motorcyclists who were searched that day.”
THE CHALLENGES OF A NEW PRO RACING PARADIGM
How the AMA’s effort to reformat professional racing fell short of expectations
BY AMA STAFF
Back in 1994 — 30 years ago this month — the AMA launched an entity that would dramatically and forever change the shape and texture of professional motorcycle racing in the U.S., along with the AMA’s then-70-year involvement in and management of it.
The entity was called Paradama, an amalgam of “a new paradigm” and “AMA,” and was, in a nutshell, a wholly owned “for-profit” subsidiary of the strictly non-profit AMA that was intended to “further develop professional motorcycle racing events and series,” according to an Aug. 29, 1994, AMA press release.
“Developing professional motorcycle racing through Paradama is based on a totally new way for the AMA to look at its professional racing properties,” then-AMA President Ed Youngblood said in the release. “Sports
marketing activity will no longer be treated simply as a department within the AMA.
“The new corporation’s management will be mandated to focus on a single task,” Youngblood added, “…to achieve a new level of professionalism. Through that process, we intend to nurture the much higher level of commercial support and media attention we believe motorcycle racing deserves. We want to achieve greater profitability for all our constituents, including riders, teams and promoters.” [Emphasis is ours. – Ed.]
To make that happen, Youngblood described the new corporation’s objectives thusly:
• To establish a governing body with proven experience in professional motorsports, media, promotion and entertainment, providing focused and expert leadership over all aspects of professional motorcycle racing.
• To improve the quality of events and attract greater and more favorable media exposure for the benefit of spectators, sponsors, riders, teams and the sport as a whole.
• To increase the prestige and profitability of professional motorcycle racing for the benefit of licensed riders, promoters and the governing body.
• To participate in the promotion of individual events when it will strengthen a series, thereby benefiting all parties involved.
• To enable the elected Board of Trustees [now called the AMA Board of Directors – Ed.] of the parent corporation to
focus exclusively on the mission of the Association to pursue, promote and protect the interests of motorcyclists and its general membership.
The AMA tapped longtime race promoter Cary Agajanian to chair the unit’s new board, which would include longtime race announcer — and ex-AMA public relations man — Dave Despain, longtime AMA Vice President of Finance Patricia DiPietro, NHRA/ motorsports lawyer Russ Deane, AMA Board member, race promoter and longtime AMA member Carl Reynolds, and later, others from various motorcycle manufacturers and aftermarket companies.
Under the new structure, professional racing sports marketing
and activity of the AMA would be governed by this new board, which was to operate independently from the AMA Board. A Pro Racing Department staff numbering nearly 20 and led by the AMA’s Tom Mueller would carry out day-to-day operations.
“The other positive side of this equation,” said Youngblood at the time, “is that the AMA Board will be free to focus its full attention on the needs of a growing member-service division that faces even greater challenges as it seeks to pursue, promote and protect the interests of motorcyclists.”
It all sounded good: bigger, better and more exciting racing for all stakeholders — promoters, organizers, sponsors, AMA members and fans. And on the flip side, the ability of the AMA mothership to focus more intently on doing what had always been its primary focus — promoting, preserving and protecting the sport of motorcycling for its members.
But Paradama’s platitudes and generalizations outnumbered by 10-to-1 the specifics and tactical moves that were necessary to make it all work.
Questions, which are much more obvious now thanks to 20/20 hindsight, are plentiful. Who, for instance, would do and control what? Would Paradama control professional road racing
and Supercross, while the AMA continued to manage and run, say, professional off-road racing? No clear and logical distinction was provided. How would Paradama mesh with outside promoters and organizers, who had been partners but who now would be in direct or semi-direct competition with the AMA? What activity, exactly, would generate the “profits” for the “for-profit” Paradama?
It was even less clear how it would all work alongside the non-profit and member-focused AMA. How would a Paradama board composed almost exclusively of AMAaffiliated folks (or ex-employees) keep its independence, and not drag the AMA and its membership (and their dollars) into the often-risky promotional/financial mix of race promotion? Who would shoulder the cost of the extra Paradama employees that would be needed to run this new enterprise?
There were more contradictions. If the demands of “sports marketing” required more flexibility and quicker decisionmaking than a 501(c)(4) non-profit could handle (as stated by the architects of Paradama), how was the AMA able to do so much and so successfully in other areas, such as government relations, membership marketing, amateur racing, etc.?
If “for-profit” status was necessary to be involved in event planning, how was the AMA able to plan and operate its events and happenings, which were growing
successfully at the time?
Agajanian, early in his tenure, said in an AMA press release that, “…the only true form of sanctioning body that will work is a profit-motivated, independent group of people who have nothing to do with competition itself except in controlling it. This is the kind of structure and leadership that the AMA’s new professional racing subsidiary intends to provide.”
The lack of clarity and the apparent contradictions inherent in the statement are obvious. Were the non-profit AMA’s many successful event and amateur racing and riding endeavors not working? (Answer: They were.)
Problems surfaced immediately, with organizers, track owners and promoters chafing at the new structure, and feeling they were being squeezed by Paradama’s promotional involvement.
All of this came to a head in the latter half of 1994. When Paradama was established, the AMA split with longtime road racing organizer Roger Edmondson. Edmondson helped build the AMA’s professional road racing and Superbike series into a popular concern during a 10-year run from 1984 to ’94 before the relationship splintered.
Edmondson countered by establishing his own North American Super Bike (NASB) series, which was designed to compete directly with the AMA series. And when that ran into snags, Edmondson sued the AMA for, among other things, interfering in his business. Following a $3 million verdict
in favor of Edmondson in federal court in North Carolina, and a subsequent ruling in the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals that sent it back to the lower court to recalculate the damages, the AMA Board considered the advice of counsel and settled the matter, according to an open letter to AMA members in the August 2001 issue of American Motorcyclist by then-chairman Richard Gray.
Claims at the time that the money wasn’t “members’ money” because it would be paid from “reserves” generated by investments only fanned the flames. Obviously, those investments were funded by membership dues in the first place. In reality, the entire Edmondson/Paradama ordeal, and how it was handled from a communications perspective in its wake, cost the AMA mothership dearly from a financial point of view. Indeed, longtime AMA President Ed Youngblood resigned shortly after the Edmondson judgement was handed down.
The Paradama enterprise stumbled along during the 1990s (and into the early 2000s) despite all this, making money in some racing categories, but losing much more in others, and generally costing the AMA dearly year after year. In fact, those losses were actually being figured into the AMA’s yearly budgetary calculations, which highlighted the fact yet again that AMA members were shouldering the costs of an ill-conceived
professional racing arm of the AMA that clearly and measurably wasn’t working as advertised.
Over the years, many have asked how this could happen. Over and above what turned out to be a poorly conceived and just-plain-bad Paradama business and operational plan, the makeup of the AMA and Paradama boards during much of the 1990s — which included head honchos from American Honda, Kawasaki Motor Corp. and Suzuki Motor Company, along with managers from aftermarket companies — certainly helped push things along.
Understandably, these folks’ prime allegiances were to their employers, OEs and aftermarket companies alike, and they wanted professional racing to happen, regardless of who paid for it, because it sold motorcycles and generated excitement among their customers.
Obviously, this de facto industry control of the AMA and Paradama boards was a systemic problem, and a structure that clearly wasn’t optimal for the AMA, an organization that put its members first. But it was an organizational structure the AMA allowed to happen, and it caused considerable hardship and heartburn for the AMA throughout the 1990s and well into the 2000s — in road racing, for sure, but also in Supercross and other racing categories.
Something at the AMA would have to change, and drastically, for the organization to survive the financial and reputational damage done by all this. And that’s something we will cover in the next edition of American Motorcyclist.
1996 SUZUKI GSX-R750
Superbike rules at the time had 750cc fours competing against 1,000cc twins. What was Suzuki to do but get right back to the GSX-R’s roots and produce the lightest, most powerful 750 the world had ever seen? The “Gixxer” became the de facto choice of racers on a budget and squids the world over.
GRD TEAM VS. TEAMSTERS
After motorcyclist Tom Klimek was seriously injured in a motorcycle accident caused by an automobile, his union refused to cover any of his medical expenses despite Klimek paying dues to Teamsters Local 705 for more than three decades. The union cited an exclusion of coverage for any injuries suffered in motorcycle accidents, and the AMA’s Government Relations Department promptly got involved. In March 1996 — less than a year since the incident — Teamsters Local 705 agreed to change the discriminatory health insurance policy. “The problems that Tom Klimek encountered are symptomatic of a larger problem that motorcyclists are increasingly confronting,” noted Robert Rasor, vice president of AMA government relations. “However, as the Teamsters situation demonstrates, these forms of discrimination can be changed if motorcyclists take the time to make their views known and work with our government relations staff to overturn these sorts of discriminatory policies.”
1996 BUELL S1 LIGHTNING
Quite possibly inspired by the Ducati Monster, HOFer Erik Buell’s new 80-horse 1,203cc Sportsterpackin’ hottie was a quirkyyet-viable choice for American enthusiasts.
1996 1997
HIP HIPAA HOORAY!
AMERICAN MOTORCYCLIST TURNS 50!
The January 1997 edition of American Motorcyclist celebrated 50 years (and some 600 issues!) since the official publication of the AMA began in the mid-1940s.
After many instances of health care discrimination against motorcyclists in the workplace, President Bill Clinton signed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 — a health-insurance reform act — into law on Aug. 21, 1996. Language specifically protecting motorcycling was included in the legislative intent of the bill through the efforts of the AMA and the Motorcycle Riders Foundation. AMA Washington Representative (and current AMA President and CEO) Rob Dingman, who worked hard to ensure motorcyclists benefited from HIPAA, said this at the time of the signing: “This could well be the most important piece of motorcyclist rights legislation ever enacted by Congress. Companies that have arbitrarily denied health-insurance benefits to motorcycling employees have, in essence, attempted to outlaw motorcycling. Many people faced with the choice of riding without coverage have given up motorcycling, knowing they may be one accident away from financial disaster. This new law will rectify that situation and ensure that motorcycling employees are treated just like other workers.”
VALENTINO ROSSI
The Italian won the 125cc world championship, followed by the 250cc title two years later. Possibly someone to watch.
JOHN KOCINSKI, WORLD SUPERBIKE CHAMP
John Kocinski and Honda did it the hard way, beating the bigger Ducatis with the RC45 750cc V-four. Kocinski was inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 2015.
1998 SUZUKI HAYABUSA
Did anyone need a 1,299cc Suzuki GT capable of 194 mph, all made possible by what looked like Salvador Dali-inspired wind-tunnel-sculpted bodywork? As it turned out, more than a few people did. Suzuki will still sell you a new one for $19,099. The Persistence of Speed
1998 MV AGUSTA F4
Massimo Tamburini strikes again; the man who designed the Ducati 916 a few years earlier helped make the first modern MV Agusta a knockout. A lowly GSX-R750 might have been lighter and faster and way cheaper, but listen to that four-into-two-intoone-into-two-into-four exhaust growl! Radial valve combustion chambers!
Hurt me again, cara mio!
1998
HELLO, WORLD (WIDE WEB)!
The AMA launched its website in April of 1997 under the domain www.ama-cycle.org. The website offered visitors the ability to access information on key government relations issues, AMA Pro Racing results, museum news, organized motorcycling events around the country and much more. A section of the website even allowed for membership renewal or application.
THE FIRST 124
In February of 1998, the American Motorcycle Heritage Foundation announced the formation of the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame, which selected its first 24 inductees two months later from a pool of Grand National champions; Mert Lawwill, Dick Mann, Joe Leonard, and Bubba Shobert were among those selected. In June of that year, an additional 100 members — this time from all corners of the motorcycling world — were announced to bring the 1998 class total to 124.
HALLOWED HALLS
The Motorcycle Heritage Museum followed the AMA headquarters in its move from Westerville to Pickerington, and the museum used the move as an opportunity to reinvent and better itself. When the museum reopened in the summer of 1999, it did so as the Motorcycle Hall of Fame and Museum.
“The new name,” the AMHF said in a release, “reflects one of the original goals of the museum board: the creation of a Motorcycle Hall of Fame.”
YOUNGBLOOD RESIGNS
After nearly two decades spearheading the AMA’s efforts, AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer Ed Youngblood (1943–2024) ended his tenure in 1999. Starting as managing editor of American Motorcyclist in 1970, Youngblood served as head of the Government Relations Department before stepping into his role as executive director in 1981.
HOMEWARD BOUND
1999
In the final weeks of 1998, the AMA made the move from its Westerville office — which it called home for 26 years — to its present-day Pickerington, Ohio, headquarters. With a 30,000-squarefoot office building and a 26,000-squarefoot connected structure to house the museum, the new 23-acre campus had everything the AMA wanted. “Each morning when I arrive at the property, I still find it hard to believe that it has happened — that the AMA has acquired such an exquisite facility seemingly designed specifically for us,” AMA President Ed Youngblood wrote in the March 1999 issue of American Motorcyclist.
Last
PART I
Last
VANSON
LEATHERS CHIEF
MIKE VAN DER
SLEESEN AND HIS 50-YEAR FOCUS ON MADE-INAMERICA
QUALITY AND CRAFTMANSHIP
BY AARON FRANK & SAM FLEMING PHOTOS: SAM FLEMING AND VANSON LEATHERS
merican manufacturing. A decent-sized chunk of it has disappeared since 1980 (many reasons for that), but there are holdouts to the old ways of doing things. Massachusetts-based Vanson Leathers — which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year — is one such holdout, a company that still manages to handcraft its full line of leather (and textile) motorcycle apparel right here in the United States of America. Vanson is known for producing heirloom-quality goods that deliver superior durability and protection, apparel that will quite likely outlast the motorcycle you’re riding — if not yourself.
AThe man behind Vanson Leathers — founded in Boston in 1974 — is Mike van der Sleesen, a seasoned motorcycle enthusiast who, 50 years ago, was struggling to get his
newly formed motorcycle parts and accessories business off the ground. Born in San Francisco but raised in Holland by his Dutch father and American mother, van der Sleesen grew up deeply embedded in European moto culture, and was introduced to motorbikes as a child in the ’50s by an aunt who owned a crude Solex moped. Little more than a bicycle with a 50cc two-stroke, friction-drive motor located above the front wheel, this was van der Sleesen’s introduction to the fun, freedom and adventure of two-wheeled travel.
Reality in post-war Europe was grim for many like van der Sleesen’s extended family, who essentially lost everything during Operation Market Garden in September of 1944 (remember the movie A Bridge Too Far?), but for a young motorcyclist with few responsibilities, it was heaven. Van der Sleesen’s aunt had been re-homed in the carriage house of an old estate near Arnhem, and he found himself free to roam the walking and bike paths that wound through the woods and fields surrounding that estate on the old Solex.
Soon van der Sleesen saved up for a used Puch 50cc moped of his own, which he immediately modified with a 60cc “big-bore” cylinder and a foot-shift conversion. “Holland was special back then,” van der Sleesen remembered. “Bike paths crisscrossed the country, and these were open to mopeds up to 50cc. You could journey hundreds of miles across the country and avoid almost all auto traffic.”
A few years later van der Sleesen’s family moved to Belgium, and he upgraded to a 50cc Garelli Monza motorcycle — modified with caféstyle clip-on handlebars — that he rode everywhere alongside his best friend Jamie Goodson. This was long before the establishment of the European Union, but as long as you had a “green card” — an international insurance card — you could essentially travel anywhere.
And travel they did, from Belgium to Holland, Italy, France, Switzerland and beyond, both on 50cc bikes and carrying little more than a small tent and sleeping bag. A favorite destination was to ferry across the English Channel and visit London, then recognized around the world as the capital of “cool” — the coolest fashion, music, cars and, most
importantly, motorcycles.
In 1970 van der Sleesen and Goodson moved to Paris to attend university. By this time van der Sleesen had graduated to full-sized bikes, first a BSA 650 Lightning, then
a Norton Roadster, and then a Norton Interstate. To support his bike habit, van der Sleesen picked up part-time work at Britannique Moto, a British bike shop located in a small village outside Versailles. Van der Sleesen’s primary task was to travel to London — often with Goodson — to buy British bikes, parts and accessories that were otherwise too difficult or expensive to source through official channels.
After van der Sleesen returned to the U.S. in 1972 he continued to import bits and pieces from his British connections to sell to dealers stateside. At the end of 1973, van der Sleesen moved from San Francisco to Boston, and together with Goodson formed Vanson Associates (Vanson a portmanteau of van der Sleesen and Goodson).
During one of his shopping trips to England, van der Sleesen made a visit to the “factory” of an apparel supplier in Northampton. It was “eyeopening,” van der Sleesen said of the operation, located in a residential row house with leather cutting in the basement, pockets assembled in the living room, sleeves arranged in an upstairs bedroom and linings cut in the attic on a long table — all the work done on machinery that appeared to be at least 50 years old to van der Sleesen’s eye.
“I left there with a strong feeling that we at Vanson could do it better on our own,” he recalled. And so upon his return to Boston, van der Sleesen rented a 3,500-square-foot loft, filled it with cutting and sewing machinery, and went to work satisfying the burgeoning demand for special custom-made motorcycle racing suits and performance garments.
different entirely, something much more demanding and detail-oriented. Fortunately, Boston’s South End was a garment industry cluster that included sewing machine manufacturers, leather tanners,
thread suppliers, producers of lining cloth, snaps, buttons, and everything else Vanson needed to construct American-made riding gear.
nation in the pre-internet age was a constant battle, requiring many weeks of grueling travel. “There was no easy way to identify prospects other than to drive into a region, stop at a Howard Johnson’s or Denny’s, get a cup of coffee and a copy of the local Yellow Pages, and start calling shops,” van der Sleesen recalled.
Vanson’s first big break came after making racing leathers for AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer Dale Singleton, the famous pig-farming privateer who beat all the factories on his TZ750 not just once but twice, to win the Daytona 200 in 1979 and 1981. A second wind came after the company supported 1979 AMA Grand National Champion and AMA Hall of Famer Steve Eklund.
It quickly became apparent that selling leather motorcycle gear was one thing…and making it something
The company was soon up and running, but it wasn’t an instant success. At one point, when business became difficult, van der Sleesen even gave up his apartment and moved into the factory for 18 months. And recruiting dealers across the
The ’80s and early ’90s were a period of steady growth for Vanson, with grids full of racers that wanted top-quality American-made leather racing suits. As manufacturing changed over the years, however, and as tanning and other processes
Grassroots support of privateer racers has always been central to Vanson’s success, beginning in the late ’70s with AMA roadracer and AMA Hall of Famer Dale Singleton (above) and Grand National flat track competitor and HOFer Steve Eklund (right).
[The] employees, some of whom have been with the company for 30 years or more, are the primary reason Vanson has survived and even thrived for the past 50 years.
that were formerly done in the United States were increasingly offshored to foreign countries, it became harder to find thread suppliers, skilled seamstresses and all the many other resources and skilled practitioners required to maintain production domestically. Industrial clusters are an ecosystem, and if one aspect gets out of balance, it impacts the whole.
Still, Vanson persisted, and today, 50 years after its founding, remains
one of the few apparel manufacturers of any size maintaining American manufacturing operations. Van der Sleesen has had to sail his company through decades of perilous economic waters by innovating his product line and vertically integrating some of the production processes — like leather finishing — while always scrupulously maintaining the highest possible quality in every detail,
down to snaps and even thread. This exacting attention to detail has earned Vanson a reputation for making the toughest race leathers and jackets on the planet.
Vanson experimented with offshore production in the early 2000s, setting up a second Vanson factory in an industrial free-trade zone in El Salvador. But after years of planning, equipment installation, labor training and supply chain negotiation, the factory happened to open on the
same day in 2008 that Lehman Brothers failed, helping send the global economy into recession, and forcing Vanson to shut the enterprise down not long after. It didn’t help that some key OE customers immediately canceled large orders.
Without the ability to compete in the lower-tier gear market against the offshore producers, van der Sleesen decided to double down on American-made production at the company’s facility now located in Fall River, Mass.
But it hasn’t been easy. Sourcing quality materials remains a constant challenge. Due to the combined complexities of U.S. environmental regulations and USDA export credit policies, almost all the leather tanneries in the U.S. have now been shut down. “There used to be more tanneries just in Peabody, Mass., than there are now nationwide,” van
der Sleesen said.
Individual components have been an issue, as well: “We’ve been buying our knit cuffs for years from Minnesota Knitting Mills,” van der Sleesen said, “but we just got notice that the machinery used to make those cuffs was scrapped.” Snaps and zippers are another issue: “We got notice recently from our snap guys that they were having their third 15-percent pricing increase since last October. The snap guys can’t get the copper, brass and nickel they need. To keep our quality high, we need to make sure that our suppliers aren’t skimping on their materials.”
Still, van der Sleesen says that sourcing materials domestically remains a priority. “We are fortunate to have a local knitting mill that makes our Kevlar cloth,” he said. “We’ve been using it in the stretch panels of our racing suits for
years, and now we’re looking at incorporating the Kevlar into our waxed-cotton street-riding gear.”
Another priority, van der Sleesen said, is continuing to vertically integrate all aspects of the business, which not only creates efficiencies
and reduces costs, but also further differentiates Vanson’s product from anything else on the market, giving customers something unique and desirable. “We’ve got our leather iron fired up so we’re going to be milling our own leather soon,” he
Vanson headquarters are found behind this weathered yellow door in a 19th-century mill located in Fall River, Mass. Riders are encouraged to visit and see for themselves how the leather apparel is made by hand. Vanson customers are intimately involved in the design, specification and fitment of their custom leather riding gear.
said. “We’re headed towards more inhouse work for the finishing and the making of the leather itself.”
Even though Vanson makes numerous textile products, van der Sleesen said that leather isn’t going anywhere, despite the manufacturing difficulties. “Leather is still the best choice for protection,” he said. “It’s always a battle between making something that is comfortable and something that protects. We’re primarily in the protection business, and that means the suit has to be designed to protect and hold together. An aramid-Kevlar fabric is going to feel stiffer and less forgiving than something that’s nylon-spandex, but we’re going to choose the tough stuff and deliver comfort in our tailoring.”
Innovation is another key to the Vanson success story, especially in terms of safety. “We have three different options for armor in the leathers,” van der Sleesen said, “and we’ve incorporated airbag technology, too. We use a CO2 canister, and it fills up a chamber. We control the shape
and the direction of the chamber using a spandex tube throughout the garment. The tether system requires about 60 pounds of pullstrength, so it won’t accidentally go off; you really need to be launched. Our system is serviceable at the track, as well, so you can crash, reset it, put in a new CO2 cartridge and be back on the grid.”
Protective apparel for motorcycle racing — primarily road and drag
racing — is the bulk of Vanson’s business, and the brand offers both off-the-shelf and custom-tailored options. Vanson also offers a diverse lineup of both leather and textile jackets for street riding and, more recently, has done a few off-bike collaborations (including leather handbags and backpacks) with high-profile streetwear brands including Supreme and Comme des Garçons, which translate the iconic look of the Vanson race wear to hyper-fashionable urban streets.
“I think we are seeing a bit of a renaissance of the appreciation of artisanal, handmade high-quality American products,” van der
“I think we are seeing a bit of a renaissance of the appreciation of artisanal, handmade high-quality American products.”
MIKE VAN DER SLEESEN, VANSON PRESIDENT
Sleesen said. “A lot of brands call up a factory in Pakistan or China and they’ll send off specs and tech books. When the factories produce something that doesn’t match, they go back and forth. Then, after ‘x’ number of months, the brands have to make a fundamental decision: Are they going to lose the [selling] season and continue to argue over a half-inch? Or are they just going to give up and tell the guy to just make the stuff and hope that it sells on the racks?”
Vanson pursues the opposite strategy, carefully controlling the
entire manufacturing process from the very beginning to ensure the ultimate result in both quality and durability. “Each suit has a serial number. We guarantee the fit and we offer aftersale repairs and alterations, both for crash damage and refinishing,” van der Sleesen said. “We like to say that Vanson is ‘heirloom quality’ because, if the leather is maintained properly, the suits will last a lifetime. For reconditioning, we suggest customers send the piece back to us,
dirt and sweat out of the leather, using a formula that uses the same oils and waxes that are used in the tanning.”
Quality always counts, and van der Sleesen’s obsession with quality and his painstaking attention to detail — traits shared by most of his employees, some of whom have been with the company for 30 years or more — are the primary reason Vanson has survived and even thrived for the past 50 years. As long as van der Sleesen is in charge, the company’s focus will remain on
making the highest-quality, bestbuilt motorcycle gear available, manufactured 100-percent here in the United States of America. In many ways, van der Sleesen said, there hasn’t ever been a better time to be doing what he has been doing in Massachusetts for the past half-century.
“At one point, in America, what we do here [at Vanson] was common, and not considered particularly valuable,” van der Sleesen said. “Now we are considered at least interesting, and maybe even valuable. The fact that we can actually take a raw material and end up with a finished product — and a desirable product — is now recognized as being of value.” AMA
Mike and Kim van der Sleesen (top) are the proprietors of Vanson Leathers, where leather riding gear is still painstakingly handcrafted to deliver the finest in quality and durability. Limited-edition, goldtrimmed products like this signature race jacket and star handbag celebrate Vanson’s 50th year of manufacturing in America.
...AND SAVE MONEY! THE ESSENTIALS PRODUCT DISCOUNTS
Take advantage of discounts from our quality partners and save loads of money – and pay for your AMA membership – in just a few keystrokes! From gear, event tickets and rentals to accessories, hotels and performance parts, it really is that simple.
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Save 15% at participating Choice Hotels Properties.
Up to 10% off at Motel 6.
Use code: M64AMA
20% discount off available rates, call (800)RED-ROOF and use the code VP+ 503343. To make reservations online use code: VP+ 503343 in the field labeled “VP+/ID#”
ADVMoto 20% discount. Use code AMADV20
Aerostar.Life
Save 50% on Thunderbird Medical ID Necklaces. Visit Aerostar.life.
AMA Motorcycle Hall Of Fame Free admission to the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in Pickerington, Ohio.
AMA Supercross Tickets
Save $5 on up to 8 tickets at supercrosslive.com Use code 4AMA5
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ASV Inventions
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Car Rentals Up to 25% off at any Avis or Budget. Avis Code: D388100 Budget Code: Z942000
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Evans Cooling System 25% discount on Evans Coolants and Prep Fluid. Use code AMAFUN at evanscoolant.com.
EVS Sports 10% discount and free shipping on all orders. Use code AMA100RIDING.
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AMA members receive a 15% discount on Gryphon Moto orders at gryphonmoto.com. Use code AMA at checkout.
an additional 15% on all Haynes & Clymer print and online repair manuals. Use code AMA15
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Cardo Systems
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The Dirt Bike Academy 10% exclusive discount on instruction. Learn more at thedirtbikeacademy.com Use code TDBAAMA10
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Helix Racing Products
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AMA members save 10% on rentals in all locations globally at hertzride.com/us/ promo/American-motorcyclistassociation-1065 or use code AMA10
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Save 15% on all products (except accessories) at innovv.com
Legacy Track Dayz 15% discount on Legacy Track Dayz events. Use code AMARideLTD
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AMA members save on standard bike tour. Use code 21AMA-EBT03 at checkout. MAD Maps
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MotoAmerica 20% off 2-day and 3-day passes at select MotoAmerica events. Use discount code AMA20
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MX Boot Repair 10% discount. Use code AMADISCOUNT
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MYLAPS 20% discount off MSRP or current sales price on web-orders or orders coordinated by the AMA. Use code AMA-789HJK
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AMA members save 10% on all products featured on the National Cycle website, to in stock items only. Does not apply to special price promotional items.
Nationwide Pet Insurance AMA members save on pet insurance at benefits.petinsurance.com/americanmotorcyclist
Nelson Rigg 25% AMA Member Exclusive Discount on all products! Use promo code AMA-NR20
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Eye Design 10% discount on inView, a wireless brake and signal light. Use code AMA at thirdeyedesigninc.com
Get a quote and receive a $10 gift card at voominsureance.com/ama
AMA ALABAMA
SANCTIONED COMING EVENTS
Be sure to check the event website or call the organizer for the latest information, including postponements or cancellations.
Motocross Sept. 22. Tallassee. Round 8 Tristar MX Motocross Championship Presented by ATVS and More, TRISTAR MX, www.tristarmx.com
Adventure (600cc and above) School Sept. 14. Wilseyville. Adventure Bike Training - Level 1, Kantu Outdoor Adventures, 209-256-5556, denise@kantuoutdooradventures.com, kantuoutdooradventures.com
Adventure Ride Sept. 15. Adventure Bike Tour #2, Kantu Outdoor Adventures, 209-256-5556, denise@kantuoutdooradventures.com, kantuoutdooradventures.com
Grand Prix Sept. 15. Rancho Cordova. Trailblazer GP, Women’s Dirt Bike Racing Association, womensdirtbikeracing@yahoo.com, https://www.facebook.com/womensdirtbikeracingassociation
Speedway Sept. 21. Auburn. AMA 2024 National Championship Series, Fast Fridays Speedway, 530-878-7223, fastfriday@aol.com, www.fastfridays.com
Adventure Ride Sept. 21 - 22. Oakhurst. 13th Annual Membership Drive BBQ Adventure Bike & Dual Sport Ride, Stewards of the Sierra National Forest, 831-801-1111, info@ sotsnf.org, www.sotsnf.org
Dual Sport Sept. 21 - 22. Oakhurst. 13th Annual Membership Drive BBQ Adventure Bike & Dual Sport Ride, Stewards of the Sierra National Forest, 831-801-1111, info@ sotsnf.org, www.sotsnf.org
Road Ride/Run Sept. 22. Freemont. Northern California Ride for Kids, Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation, 470-9892098, akaras@curethekids.org, rideforkids.org/norcal
Flat Track - Short Track Sept. 28. Lodi. 2024 D36 Dirttrack Championship, Lodi Motorcycle Club, 209-368-7182, lodimcemail@gmail.com, www.lodicyclebowl.com
Flat Track - Short Track Sept. 29. Lodi. 2024 D36 Dirttrack Championship, Lodi Motorcycle Club, 209-368-7182, lodimcemail@gmail.com, www.lodicyclebowl.com
AMA COLORADO
Road Ride/Run Sept. 8. Sedalia. RRMMC Fall Poker Run, Rampart Range Motorized Management Committee, Inc., 303-809-6628, coreycorbett@q.com, www.rampartrange.org
Observed Trials Sept. 8. Lake George. RMTA Series Event #7, Rocky Mountain Trials Association, rockymountaintrials. org
Motocross Sept. 8. Washington Park. MoState MX, Archview MX Park, LLC, 618-719-3438, info@archviewmxpark.com, archviewmxpark.com
Hillclimb Sept. 14. Mount Vernon. Dist 17 Hillclimb Series, Illinois State Championship HC, King City Dirt Riders Inc., 618-246-0199, rhorton8282@gmail.com
Road Ride/Run Sept. 14. St. Charles. Chicagoland Ride for Kids, Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation, 470989-2098, akaras@curethekids.org, rideforkids.org/ chicagoland
Road Race Sept. 15 - 16. South Beloit. ASRA Rnd. 16, American Superbike Racing Association LLC, 725-7557550, support@asraracing.com, blackhawkfamrs.com
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 15. White City. CCDR Hare Scramble, Cahokia Creek Dirt Riders, 217710-5343, https://cahokiacreekdirtriders.com/
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 15. Mt. Pleasant. IERA 22, Burlington Valley Dusters, 319-601-9327, rob. schnathorst@gmail.com
AMA KANSAS
Drag Race - Asphalt Sept. 1. Ozawkie. ABATE of Kansas State Rally, ABATE of Kansas, 913-704-9233, harleytower@aol.com, abateks.org
Motocross Sept. 21 - 22. Maize. Kansas State Championship / Vet MX Championship, Bar 2 Bar MX Park, LLC, 316-744-5283, bruce@bar2barmx.com, www. bar2barmx.com
AMA KENTUCKY
Dual Sport Sept. 7 - 8. Golden Pond. LBL200, Thomas Brothers Promotions LLC (KT Riders), 270-350-6324, ktriders@gmail.com, lbl200.com
Motocross Sept. 8. Leitchfield. AMA Kentucky State Championship / Nathan Hall and Nick Howard Memorial Race, NXT LVL Sports LLC South Fork Motoplex, 270230-2005, nxtlvlsports@yahoo.com, www.southforkmotoplex.com
Motocross Sept. 21. Leitchfield. South Fork Motoplex - St Jude Benefit - Race For A Cure, NXT LVL Sports LLC South Fork Motoplex, 270-230-2005, nxtlvlsports@ yahoo.com, www.southforkmotoplex.com
AMA MASSACHUSETTS
Motogiro Sept. 14 - 15. Sturbridge. MOTOGIRO USA, United States Classic Racing Association, 603-3217271, raceuscra@yahoo.com
AMA MARYLAND
Road Ride/Run Sept. 8. Thurmont. Nostalgia Run 2024, Western Maryland Motorcycle Association, 443605-2938, westernmarylandmotorcycles@gmail.com
Motocross Sept. 15. Mechanicsville. MD State Championship / Capitol Motocross Cup, Pro Ready Racing LLC, 443-223-9171, ezra@buddscreek.com, buddscreek.com
Motocross Sept. 21. Mechanicsville. Masters MX, Pro Ready Racing LLC, 443-223-9171, ezra@buddscreek. com, buddscreek.com
AMA MICHIGAN
Motocross Sept. 7. Newaygo. Big Air Motocross ATV / Vintage, Big Air Motocross, 616-788-1727, bigairbig-
SANCTIONED COMING EVENTS
Be sure to check the event website or call the organizer for the latest information, including postponements or cancellations.
Motocross Sept. 8. Newaygo. Big Air Motocross ATV / Vintage, Big Air Motocross, 616-788-1727, bigairbigfun@gmail.com, www.bigairmotocross.com
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 8. Crystal Falls. Crystal Falls, Four Wheeler Dirtbike Cross Country (FDXC), 920-360-4405, info@rendlux.com, FDXCr.com
Motocross Sept. 15. Brookston. Motocross / North Star Series, Echo Valley Motopark, LLC, 218-391-8422, echovalleymotopark@gmail.com, echovalleymotocross. com
Flat Track - Short Track Sept. 15. New Ulm. Flat Track Race, Flying Dutchmen Cycle Club, 507-388-1671, dutchman65.as@gmail.com, flyingdutchmenmotorcycleclub.com
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 22. Browerville. District 23 - Hare Scrambles, MotoCity Raceway & Recreation, Inc., 218-894-2826, motocity-RNR@hotmail. com, motocityraceway.com
Motocross Sept. 21. Las Vegas. 2024 SuperMotocross World Championship - World All-Stars, Feld Motorsports, 309-314-4879, sxfinfo@feldinc.com, www.supermotocross.com
AMA NEW HAMPSHIRE
Road Race Sept. 2. Loudon. United States Classic Racing Association Roadrace, United States Classic Racing Association, 603-321-7271, raceuscra@yahoo.com
Motocross Sept. 1. Carlisle. MSC / AMA District 34 Championship MX Series, Metropolitan Sports Committee, 845-554-8717, chairman@mscmotocross.com, www.mscmotocross.com
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 1. Moravia. Twisted Fence, Twisted Fence, 607-423-4621, linsander14@gmail.com, nyoa.net
Road Ride/Run Sept. 7. Yaphank. Blue Knights NY 15 Lighthouse Run, Blue Knights Law Enforcement MC NY 15, 631-807-6099, mpchief30@aol.com, www. bluekightsny15.org
Motocross Sept. 15. Middletown. MSC / AMA District 34 Championship MX Series, Metropolitan Sports Committee, 845-554-8717, chairman@mscmotocross.com, www.mscmotocross.com
Enduro Sept. 15. Newark. AMA D4 Sprint Enduro, Wayne County Motorcycle Club, waynecountymc.com
Trail Ride Sept. 20 - 22. Hancock. Family Fun Ride, Bear Creek Sportsmen, 908-334-1637, bearcreeksportsmen@yahoo.com, www.bearcreeksportsmen.com
Motocross Sept. 21 - 22. Greig. High Voltage Hills NY State Championship, High Voltage Hills MX, 315-7250368, nzielinski74@gmail.com, highvoltagehillsmx.com
Motocross Sept. 7 - 8. Shippensburg. Doublin GapYamaha All Star AMA ProAm Featured Event / MDRA, Doublin Gap Motocross, Inc., 717-571-5824, doublingap@gmail.com, doublingap.com
Flat Track - TT Sept. 7. Parkesburg. Double Header, E PA Piston Poppers MC Inc, 610-656-0315, pistonpoppers@hotmail.com, www.pistonpoppersmc.com
Flat Track - TT Sept. 8. Parkesburg. Over the Hump, E PA Piston Poppers MC Inc, 610-656-0315, pistonpoppers@hotmail.com, www.pistonpoppersmc.com
Enduro Sept. 8. Biglerville. Michaux Enduro, South Penn Enduro Riders, 717-385-6014, dashughart@ aol.com
Trail Ride Sept. 12 - 15. Tamaqua. Over and Out 2024, Over and Out Productions LLC, 908-303-1582, info@overandoutmoto.com, overandoutmoto.com
Dual Sport Sept. 12 - 15. Tamaqua. Over and Out 2024, Over and Out Productions LLC, 908-303-1582, info@overandoutmoto.com, overandoutmoto.com
Off-Road/Trail Riding School Sept. 12 - 15. Tamaqua. Over and Out 2024, Over and Out Productions LLC, 908-303-1582, info@overandoutmoto.com, overandoutmoto.com
Motocross Sept. 14. Fredericksburg. U.S. 2 Stroke Shootout, Sleepy Hollow Motocross Park, Inc., 717278-8998, swarr4@aol.com, www.sleepyhollowmx. com
Road Ride/Run Sept. 21. York. Twin Rose Lady Rider’s Ride for H.O.P.E., Twin Rose Lady Riders, 717-682-8198, gnattrlr@gmail.com, www.twinroseladyriders.com
Motocross Sept. 22. Seward. PAMX Spring Championship, Pleasure Valley Raceway, 814-317-6686, jeffcernic@gmail.com, pvrmx.com
Flat Track - TT Sept. 28. Parkesburg. Regular Race, E PA Piston Poppers MC Inc, 610-656-0315, pistonpoppers@hotmail.com, www.pistonpoppersmc.com
Motocross Sept. 28 - 29. Seward. Travis Pastrana Pro Challenge, Pleasure Valley Raceway, 814-317-6686, jeffcernic@gmail.com, pvrmx.com
Motocross Sept. 1. Sutherlin. Virginia State Championship D13 MX & Ultra Series, Birch Creek Promotions LLC, 434-253-0505, birchcreekmx@gmail.com, birchcreekmotorsportspark.com
Off-Road/Trail Riding School Sept. 1. Glen Lyn. Say No To Slow Adventure Bike Clinic, Tiaha Group, info@ saynotoslow.nz, www.saynotoslow.nz
Adventure (600cc and above) School Sept. 2 - 3. Glen Lyn. Say No To Slow Adventure Bike Clinic, Tiaha Group, info@saynotoslow.nz, www.saynotoslow.nz
Road Ride/Run Sept. 7. Ashland. Virginia Ride for Kids, Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation, 470-989-2098, akaras@curethekids.org, rideforkids.org/virginia Road Race Sept. 8 - 9. Alton. FIM Mini Moto, American Superbike Racing Association LLC, 434-822-7700, info@virnow.com, https://virnow.com
Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 15. Spring Grove. Pipsico Presented by TDR, Virginia Competition Hare Scramble Services, 757-434-8223, tidewaterdirtriders@gmail.com, vchss.org
Motocross Sept. 28. Sutherlin. Fall Classic District 13 SX, Birch Creek Promotions LLC, 434-253-0505, birchcreekmx@gmail.com, birchcreekmotorsportspark.com Hare Scrambles/Cross Country Sept. 28. 29. Rural Retreat. Rattlesnake, Virginia Competition Hare Scramble Services, 276-620-2015, peerybornw@gmail. com, vchss.org
Motocross Sept. 29. Sutherlin. Fall Classic District 13 MX & NCMX & Ultra Series, Birch Creek Promotions LLC, 434-253-0505, birchcreekmx@gmail.com, birchcreekmotorsportspark.com
Sept. 28-29. Big Woods 200. Wabeno, Wis. Wisconsin Dual Sport Riders. (920) 350-2030. widualsportriders.org
Oct. 5-6. Shenandoah 500. Mount Solon, Va. Washington Area Trail Riders. (619) 244-9630. watr.us
Oct. 26-27. Scenic Dual Sport Ride. Morgan Hill, Calif. P&D Promotions. (408)249-4336.
Nov. 2-3. Howlin at the Moon. Payson, Ariz. Arizona Trail Riders. (602) 692-9382. arizonatrailriders.com
Nov. 2-3. Hammer Run. Port Elizabeth, N.J. Tri-County Sportsmen MC Inc. 856-785-2754. hammerhead@teamhammer.org. www.teamhammer.org
Nov. 29-30. LA-Barstow to Vegas. Palmdale, Calif. AMA District 37 Dual Sport. (626) 684-2336. paulflanders37@ gmail.com. labarstowvegas.com
AMA Trademarks
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• AMA Dragbike® • AMA Endurocross® • AMA Motorhead® • AMA Pro Grand National Championship®
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Garage
Tips,Tweaks, Fixes and Facts: The two-wheeled ownership experience, explained
TRIALS BY FIRE
BY JOHN BURNS
PHOTOS BY MICHAEL KULA
Ican confidently state that the Beta 200 is the finest trials bike I’ve ever ridden. It’s also the only trials bike I’ve ever ridden. My trials experience is limited to watching people like Toni Bou defy physics on YouTube. Then again, eyeballing all the vintage trials riders at VMD last year gave me just enough courage to say “yes” when a chance to attend a Beta trials demo day popped up. So off we went to MotoVentures in SoCal on a cool, damp day.
TECH RIDING
Trials seems antithetical to every basic thing I know about motorcycles, which is limited to (and formed as an adolescent) always go as fast as you can. The Beta invite had me doing a bit of research, which took me directly to our own AMA website: MotoTrials, also called observed trials, is not only one of the oldest forms of motorcycle competition. It also is one of the best disciplines for developing safe, well-rounded riding skills that can make you a better racer in everything from motocross to road racing.
MotoTrials puts no premium on speed whatsoever. The winner is simply the most skilled and
Beta has been cranking out high-end two-wheelers since 1905 in Italy. Famous stuntwoman/trials champ — and AMA Motorcycle Hall of Famer — Debbie Evans (above) hasn’t been riding them quite that long.
(sometimes) luckiest rider on a particular course. The format is relatively simple. Trials competitors must negotiate individual sections of extremely difficult terrain without putting their feet down. Penalty points are assessed for mistakes, and the rider with the lowest overall score at the end of the day wins.
Some of the sections for advanced riders are so difficult, it’s hard to imagine a mountain goat traversing them, much less a rider on two wheels. The top rung of the sport in the United States is the AMA/NATC National Observed Trials Championships.
People who are into trials are way into it. There was a woman riding around doing all sorts of physics-defying stuff, and at lunch I sat down across from the guy who turned out to be her husband, three-time national champion Lane Leavitt. Turns out she’s Debbie Evans, trials rider, famous Hollywood stuntwoman and AMA Hall of Famer. Leavitt knows his way around a pile of rocks pretty well, and he and Debbie have been riding trials and doing stuntwork since the ’70s.
Lane explained: “I saw the first Inter-Am races [a late-1960s MX series] and saw [AMA Hall of Famers] Roger DeCoster and Joël Robert playing on a Bultaco trials bike near the pits. Then [HOFer] Jeff Smith came to speak at the
Richmond Ramblers motorcycle club, and he said to ride trials before you race MX. I was under 18 and my parents wouldn’t sign the release forms, but a release form wasn’t required to compete in trials. So my plan became, ride trials for a while and then go MX racing. I got so good at trials that Bultaco offered me a full-time job riding for them. So I never did transition to MX.”
Among his many moto-related activities, Lane’s also a riding coach, and he is totally down with Beta’s goal of showing riders that trials is a great cross-training tool to help any racer up their game. In fact, he says it’s the primary tool he used to train championship-winning rider Kalie Duncan,
who just won the Expert Ladies National Hare and Hound Championship.
“The issue is bike control and understanding how to pick lines,” Lane said. “And the fastest and easiest way to do that is trials cross-training. Most all of the current top Endurocross riders and extreme enduro athletes are solid trials riders.”
DeCoster and Robert were onto something.
THE BETA CONNECTION
Tim Pilg was like every other motorcycle kid hanging around a dealership when the dealer offered him a job at
Team American Motorcyclist politely declined to take part in the afterlunch competition, as we didn’t want to create industry animosity with a dominating victory. Yeah, that’s it…
GARAGE
Beta also makes some 15 trials bikes in twostroke, four-stroke and electric guises.
DOING IT
I was led to believe that there would be some brief instruction, but in the actual event there was only me and one Evo 250 two-stroke in the paddock waiting for me to climb onto it, which is at least easy to do thanks to the low non-seat.
Rolling around the flat parts of MotoVenture’s playground was easy enough, and I could see the Beta Trials Team pro riders clambering over big rocks and obstacles off in the hilly distance. The first time I tried rolling over a big concrete culvert I nearly landed on my nose; the second time I got stuck.
15 years old. What? You’d pay me to hang out here? Tim grew up racing MX and off-road, and he had known Lane and Debbie since childhood. That led to him riding trials at the pro level himself for about eight years — traveling with Cody Webb’s father Kip and mother Fran before Cody was born.
Tim eventually acquired his own multi-brand moto dealership, and one day around 2006 he fired off a fax to Beta in Italy, asking if they’d be interested in him selling their bikes in the U.S? They were, and Pilg became American Beta.
Beta’s been at it a long time from their factory 20 miles north of Florence, since 1905 when the still-family-owned business started building Bianchi bicycles. After WWII, the switch was made to motorcycles via a strap-on engine, just like Honda, Ducati, et al., and later actual small motorcycles of all kinds.
Off-road was always the main arena, though, and when the Japanese dirtbike invasion seriously began, Beta zigged heavily into trials. Jordi Tarres won the world trials championships on Beta, followed by Dougie Lampkin winning three world titles, running 1997 to 1999. It seemed to be a good niche for a small manufacturer with a premium product in a segment Japan largely ignored.
Trials…it’s a whole different world out there. We learned a ton, but stuck to the simple stuff.
Actual trials riders have a graceful way of dismounting when things go wrong, like a Ha! I meant to do that! sort of backward-spinning dance move. Without that skill, I had the distinct feeling that if I fell off I was going to hurt myself. Not the usual motorcycle kind of slidey tumbling hurt, but the falling-off-a-ladder with a thud kind. I’ve never been fond of heights, especially falling from them onto rocks.
They tell me trials is physically way more demanding than it looks; I could never ride long enough to find out, since I quickly pooped out standing on the pegs.
One of the big reasons they say trials is so popular in Europe is that you can have a lot of moto fun in a small area, and the bikes are pretty quiet, too. Across Highway 371 down there in Anza, Cahuilla Creek MX Park takes up an entire hillside. But 20 of us clambering around on a clump of rocks? We’d fit into a suburban lot.
We dragged AMA Sales and Event Specialist Alex Boehm out to get the 27-year-old perspective, which was this: “I had a great time on the Betas,” Boehmthe-younger said, “and it was a really interesting new experience. It felt like a huge BMX bike, and I felt like a kid hanging with friends again, riding on some fun and dumb stuff we shouldn’t have been riding on. Fun stuff, for sure.”
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Feeling lucky? Looking to win a true two-wheeled legend? This limited-edition, 1997-spec KTM 200 Jackpiner raffle bike — built to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the first Penton motorcycles sold back in the late 1960s and named after the Penton 175 that used the first full-sized engine KTM built — will absolutely do the trick. Only 133 were built, and to make the package even more special, each is numbered and has a John Penton-signed sticker on the front fender. Get your tickets — $5 per, or 5 for $20.
OUR LATEST SWEEPSTAKES WINNER!
o people really win those sweepstakes and raffle bikes the AMA routinely offers in the pages of this magazine? Yes they do! And if you don’t believe us, just ask AMA member Kaipo Chung, suspension tech for Kawasaki’s pro
motocross and Supercross team, who won our most recent sweepstakes and just picked up his brand-new Triumph T100 Bonneville from the folks at Riverside Triumph. Congrats, Kaipo, and thanks to Triumph USA for supporting the AMA!
100-YEAR MEMBERSHIP PACKAGE
.1 Year AMA membership*
.100-year membership card
.Embroidered anniversary patch
.Anniversary decal
.Limited edition 100-Year Anniversary pin
.Limited edition 100-Year Anniversary t-shirt
.Discount AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame
Induction ceremony tickets
100-YEAR LIFE MEMBER PLUS PACKAGE
.1 Year of Life Member Plus Enrollment*
.100-Year Life Member Plus membership card
.Limited edition Life Member 100-Year Anniversary t-shirt
.Embroidered anniversary patch
Limited edition 100-Year Anniversary pin
Discount AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame
Induction ceremony tickets
THE GSX-8R HAS ARRIVED
Track or street, the new GSX-8R smashes the standard for middleweight sportbikes. 776cc of broad, linear power in a balanced chassis. Clutchless shifting with bi-directional quick shift, traction control, and the Suzuki Intelligent Ride System (S.I.R.S.) so you can set your own riding experience. Oh, and did we mention it’s gorgeous?
Introduced in 1969, Kawasaki’s 500cc two-stroke H1 Mach III spun the big-streetbike world on its axis. It was a straight shot of raw, unadulterated performance — a light, loud, smoky and fast two-wheeled hot rod, and the undisputed dragstrip and stoplight-to-stoplight king of its day.
Along with Honda’s refined CB750 (read about both in this issue’s Summer of ’69 cover story), the H1 established legend status almost instantly, and remains one of the most coveted and collectable Japanese motorcycles in history.
And you can own it by participating in the AMA’s 100th Anniversary Raffle!
