I had just finished the restoration of a 1972 Rickman-Montesa, and naturally sent pictures to a few friends. “Wow—that’s nice! Are you gonna ride that?” My friend hit upon The Big Issue in the vintage motorcycle hobby/community: “Ride ’em or hide ’em”. There are some that feel strongly that vintage bikes should be ridden, to […]
Oak Motocross Park swung open its gates/cow fence this past weekend for another great time in the country! Oak MX Park (Coalport, PA—west of State College, PA) is an enthusiast-owned (the Ecklund family) venue that retains what might have been the best of motocross. There’s low fees, a good, varied dirt track, food trucks, and […]
Saturday, June 11th was the second running of the new “Motorbike Day” at the Antique Automobile Club of America (AACA) Museum in Hershey, PA. The museum has, in the past decade, become much more of a recognized location for vintage motorcyclists, and has been featuring excellent motorbike exhibits, beginning with 2009’s joint AMCA/AACA Fast from […]
Our good friend Pete Noneman—who you may know from his work supporting the Legends and Heroes program—was recently fortunate to avoid the northern cold for a bit and be in Daytona, Florida. Pete attended the 4th annual Daytona vintage motocross, run inside the famous stadium. Besides the usual mixture of interesting motorcycles, Pete is one […]
Preparations started months—years—before, of course. There were discussions with local government and corporations, evening phone calls, maps and diagrams, disagreements, more phone calls. Retired club members worked out the plan with busy younger members—who later enlisted even younger volunteers to help with the grunt work, as well. Thousands of theoretical little two-dimensional squares on paper […]
Recently I’ve encountered many grateful motor enthusiasts from the Northeast area. They recognize how fortunate we are, not only to be finally post-COVID, but to be in such an epicenter of vintage motoring activity. After all, (and especially if you’re in the southeastern PA area, as we are) we’ve got the The Big One—the Fall […]
Hodakas incorporated competition-proven frame geometry, while at the same time attending to required street-legal equipment—though with minimalist (lighter weight) treatment. Built from 1964 through PABATCO’s demise in 1977, Hodakas were loved, at least initially, by the press and the riding public—possibly for relating to buyers as riders rather than simply customers—and filled a role in motorcycling not unlike American Motors Corporation in the automotive world: a small energetic competitor nipping at the heels of a sometimes deaf and monolithic establishment.
Up front, let me state that from nearly any direction you arrive from, to reach the small town of Oley, the ride will almost certainly be beautiful. The old villages of southeastern Pennsylvania, settled by German immigrants in the early 1700s, contain surviving period stone houses and original hardwood barns that continue to be studied by historians and sociologists
The story behind an iconic motorcycle photo Do you remember this magazine, this monthly feature, and this particular photo? If you were riding dirt bikes in the 1970s (or desperately wanting one), of course you do! The magazine was DIRT BIKE, the feature was the last-page monthly “Crash and Burn” tidbit, and the photo was…well, […]
“. . . the American character is in a large measure a group of responses to an unusually competitive situation.” David Potter While the new off-road sport of “Moto-cross” was sweeping across the United States, the presence and superiority of the elite European stars (brought over to publicize the sport and the European purebred bikes) […]