Slideways FUN

I could not wait any longer even though the winter is being winter. Loaded up and headed out into the desert to my favorite road. I drove around for 1/2 hr looking for a dry place to make sure the car could get back up the loading ramps but all I found was snow. Fuck it. I unloaded and took off feeling the car out. Little booger hooks up with the weight in the rear. Likes to understeer but if I used the hand break to set it up for corners and steered with the rear it was amazing. I think I may need a brake proportioning valve because the disc brakes in the front over power the rear drums so that using the brake pedal to set up the corner was futile. Otherwise the Edamame Commie had zero issues. I was having so much fun I could not turn around. All of a sudden I was an hour in and on top of the book cliffs in 4 foot snow banks. I could not turn around. I kept at it knowing I was being a real idiot. snow drifts were busting over the hood as I climbed the last steep hill. I finally reached an oil well and turned around and when I got back to the trailer the little bastard even had zero problems getting up the ramps. Sweet!!!

begininnings, stepping stones, and destinations

 I rode my BMX to the video rental store and the clerk, bald on top waterfall mullet on back, let me rent On Any Sunday with out paying and I had to convince my mom to rent a VCR from the grocery store.. Then it was The Dirt Bike Kid, Winners Take All, Time Racer,  and Herbie The Love Bug. I must have been 7 or 8 years old. I watched them Duke boys jump that charger and the A Team. I rode that BMX all over town and took to diving dumpsters. My single Mom let me pile up my findings in the yard. I hauled a clothes dryer on my wagon home. I snuck into the train yard and hauled home giant coil springs. Xerox machines, old bicycles, anything.
It should be no surprise the first word I learned to spell was JUNK. Followed shortly after by FART.
The dream was to build my own vehicle. My vision was a super buggy.
30 years later:

Subaru powered VW bug rally car

In case anybody wants to know what I have been up to for the past eleven months...

As with all my two wheeled builds, I did this on a tight budget. How tight? well tighter than a Nun's...  you know. Typical trash bin ravaging, junk yard scourer, free loader freddy every friend, acquaintance, person who will talk to me charity bit and piece conceivable.

Really it is just a bunch of time plus a $50 66 VW bug shell and a $75 crashed 2000 2.5 RS

It is amazing what you can do with help from decent people and eBay.

As soon as this winter freeze breaks I am taking this "Edeamame Commie" straight out into the desert and hopefully having more fun than a well oiled midget. The real vision is the Colorado Hill Climb Association 2wd rally car class. Something to do between the motorcycle class. The sickness is real. Sweet motorcycle jesus save my two wheel loving soul. er fuck, hail satan! oh holy father of hot fast nasty speed! Hell yeah! Fucking rage cage chariot of fire take me home.

Number font inspiration

Pillaging the internets for ideas to paint some old school stock car style numbers on my four wheel project...

To harness my inner Death Spray Customs/ Ornamental Conifer or just wreck slop havoc like the GP racer above...

Pikes Peak Closure

The first time I raced Pikes Peak I knew I was taking part in something special; At the riders meeting I was sitting between Eddy Moulder and Joe Kopp. It was the first time I had ever been on a race course with anything other than knobbie tires. It totally blew my mind. It turned me into a full blown high speed junkie and as the surface became less dirt and more pavement over the years I learned how to race my dirt bike with Supermoto slicks and then a full street bike and then a couple of full blown pikes peak specials with enough power to scare the shit out of anyone. After 11 years of competing (one of those as crew chief for Isle of Man racer Paul Baleta) I am trying to hang it up. Again.  2019 was the first year I didn’t show up and it will most likely be the last year motorcycles will race there.  Too many deaths and no bikes will be allowed next year... Closure.

The place has shown me great victory and horrible loss. One of the most amazing spectacles I have ever seen was Mike Ryan drifting his several thousand horsepower semi truck. Like a Run-away locomotive belching black smoke, sliding sideways through corners only inches from the edge of sheer cliffs. One practice morning he spun out on the lower section, his 18” wide truck tires leaving massive skid marks off the road where his rig left a huge swath of clear-cut forrest. He totaled his truck but come race day he rode his street going motorcycle to the top just so he could be there. The worst spectacle I ever saw was up top. After completing my race run I went to watch other bikes cross the finish line. The first bike I watched was a Triumph Daytona 675 with a cheeky rider giving the two finger hand signal as he crossed the checkers. The hand signal can mean peace or victory, neither of which he was about to receive. As his hand was not on his break lever he veered off the edge of the road surface at 80+mph and into a boulder field. His bike and body exploded right before my eyes as they rag-dolled through the air pinwheeling off of the large rocks.

In 2012, my 5^th year racing I had finished runner up twice and 3rd twice in the 450 class. It was the first year I built a Pikes Peak special race bike from the ground up. It was also the first year I got lucky and convinced a girl to slumber in my van with me during race week. To the credit of the special lady and motorbike I won my first class victory on the big hill. I used the large victory pay out money to open my own shop and I married that wonderful women.

My next victory on the hill was actually another 2^nd place finish but it was 2^nd overall motorcycle and 1^st was a HRC backed American Honda CBR1000RR with a full time pro employed by Honda so I consider it a victory not just for me but for the team I was on and the special construction Ronin EBR1190 radical motorbike they created in only a matter of a few short months. It was all the more meaningful of a finish since my friend and road race instructor Carl lost his life two days prior in practice near the top of the mountain.

Carl’s death led me to say some things to the press about the lack of communication and shitty organization of the race so the committee banned me. So the following year I build a Ducati Multistrada for Paul Baleta to race and worked as his mechanic and coach. It gave me a whole other perspective of the race and I realized the stress the dangers of the event put on those close to the competitor. I thought of hanging it up but the opportunity of a life time came together for me to race a Pikes Peak special construction Buell XBRR (1340 cc race use only twin cylinder air cooled push rod beast of an engine making over 100 ft lb of tourqe and 150 plus to the rear wheel.) Because of the "Moto GP engineered" superficial beauty of the bike and it coming from Spain I was accepted back. The Spanish “Moto GP engineered “ bike looked amazing with it’s hand painted carbon fiber body and even carbon fiber fork tubes. But it was so poorly assembled that in the 20 times I tested or practiced on it not once did it perform without something terribly wrong happening. During the race run the slipper clutch locked up solid and the lever would not budge. Pulling the lever was my only fail safe the many times that the throttle bodies would pop off the manifold causing the beast to rev to the moon. That bike finished 4^th over-all and won me my 2^nd class win. It also was the closest to suicide I have ever been.

My final year on the hill I went back to my 450 and tired to just have fun but like a sick pervert that had been exposed to some sick hardcore shit, the thrill was gone and my home built 450 was not enough to scare the living crap out of me. We finished runner up once again. I knew the special time was over. If I was king of the universe I would rip all the pavement out and go back to racing the mountain on dirt, bar to bar like those first few years I took part. Those were a truly special time in motorcycle racing that I am sure happy to have been part of. But instead of looking back it is much more essential to live in the present moment and make some future awesomeness happen.  Onward and upward!

Thomas E Dorrell - The Cosmic Cowboy

The first time I ever met him it was actually one of his many Triumph motorcycles that I met. I saw it parked in front of a Café in the middle of Kansas while hopping from one small town to another during the Kansas fair flattrack series. The ratty street tracker was a few years ahead of it's time in terms of Internet trends. The bike struck me so much that I had to turn around and take a photo with my camera. Later on in that same county fair flattrack series I saw the bike again in the pits at Norton Kansas after the races were over. It was weaving wildly through the grassy paddock. It's pilot, wearing sandals, a Hawaiian shirt, and large cowboy hat while handing out cans of PBR from a milk crate with reckless grace. From that moment on we were friends. Good friends. Best friends. He frequented often on this blog. The Cosmic Cowboy was his handle. Cowboy. A former Dodge City gun fighter. Stunts, movies, Vietnam helicopter gunner, Preacher, Skateboard shop owner, Family man, and of course Tommy's Triumph Shop. He sponsored me and many other racers. He would fill up my van with gas using his veteran assistance credit card. While visiting his shop he would send me home with a van load of five or six motorcycles to sell for race money. He brought a bunch of pampers diapers to Davey Durelle's Pits when his little ones were all over. He would bring back a tire for me from Davey's Pits when my tire was as bald as them little one's backsides. His Tommy's Triumph Shop shirts are worn by many, even Chris Carr. Never could I have ever had a better crew chief. He kept me fed, informed, and well hydrated... especially after the racing was over. For nearly ten years we had a lot of fun meeting up at the races in Kansas, Nebraska, Las Vegas and even driving together to Dirt Quake USA in Washington State. What a road trip that was. The dropped ice cream cones covered in Baja hair he ate while cursing. The whiskey. The Women. The party. And of course every flea market, swap meet, garage sale and antique store from Denver to Portland. Every single one of them. He knew how important Pikes Peak was to me and even though he hated the place, especially after Carl's death, he made sure to be there and to look after me with his blessings. He was preacher at my wedding and damn was he top notch. That god damned son of a bitch could dance! The stories are far too many to tell and some just far to fuct up to explain. Dealing with his passing is painful for sure as it must be to so many others in his huge network. He had some big boots. Very big and no one or nothing will ever come close to filling them but we all must do our best to keep alive the spirit of the greatest outlaw motorcycle cowboy the cosmos have ever known.
Ride on old amigo.

04-26-14 Flat Track 30+ Main @IMI with Bangin Bars

Good old Banging Bar days at IMI with Michael Neal all over my 6

Phone Dump (Hemorrhoid blood corn kernels)

Drinking in Vegas

500 cc of FUCK YOU!

I finally went and rode the half liter skeeter eater green dragon with a paddle tire and it was like listening to Slayer with the volume on ten through head phones. More violent than an Arnold Schwarzenegger fight scene. As much fun as Wonka's Oompa Loompa party at the strip club. I can now die happy. Or at least I am completely satisfied and ready to sell this PCP hopped Unicorn. If you or somebody you know would fancy the S&M pleasure and have $7k then take her. Please.

Moped Dick at Bonneville World Finals 2019 - 50cc Two Stroke Landspeed Bike

Moped Dick

There I was perched on another exotic motorcycle. I am not sure why I am so lucky or maybe it is just my lack of concern for my well being. But I'd like to call it my life's destiny. As I applied throttle and lifted my feet up and way back to the pegs the bike began to lean over more than the forward momentum and 14 degrees of steering lock could compensate for and my first ride on the special 50cc land speed bike from Norway ended in a crash not more than ten feet from where it started. Luckily there were no major damages. I felt a bit sheepish but my ego is able to take much worse. We re-started the engine and off I went down the old abandoned pot hole riddled highway behind my shop. As the engine revved up to 15,000 rpm it started to really move me. At 16,500 I was in my happy place; That precious rare place, as narrow as the power band on the little home made engine. So rare and precious. Yes! A feeling I was not expecting as the days prior we had made the trek to the holy salt flats only to find that over night rain had turned them into a giant lake. SCTA World Finals was canceled. All was not lost though as a good attitude of the crew was upheld despite Jim and Don driving all the way from Arkansas and Alex the amazing Norwegian two stroke stuffer flying half way around the world after building the entire bike in a few months. The quality of the crew was top notch. So I offered my shop and the back roads of western Colorado for our own speed trials week and it was a great way to break and repair parts. The bike should be a real contender for some record setting next season. Viva "Moped Dick"!