Tag: California

ExNotes Event Review: AHRMA Motofest, Monterey, California

By Joe Gresh

After riding through the stifling heat of Utah, Nevada and central California the cold, foggy mists of the Monterey Peninsula penetrated my mesh jacket and I shivered. It was wonderful to be cold and it was wonderful to be at Laguna Seca’s Weather Tech Raceway. This wasn’t my first visit to Laguna Seca but it was my first time inside the track. Years ago I rode up from San Diego back when Laguna Seca was a date on the world championship calendar. Today, Austin’s COTA circuit has usurped that role in America but Laguna Seca is still way prettier.

Two strokes ruled Moto GP racing in that era and when I pulled up to the entrance gate the $50 ticket price almost gave me a stroke.  I was earning $3.50 an hour working on boats and $50 was a ton of money. I figured the hell with it and went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium instead. Oddly enough, the entry fee for AHRMA’s Motofest vintage racing was still 50 dollars some 40 years on. This time I paid for a ticket because riding from La Luz, New Mexico is a long way to go for nothing.

Motels around Monterey are sort of expensive. Your best deal is the 4-day camping pass at the track. I bought a reserved campsite because I wasn’t sure how things worked inside. Turns out there were plenty of campsites available for this event. I had site 110A, which gave me a view of turn 5 in one direction and a view of the bikes going up Rahal hill to the Corkscrew in the other direction.

Site A-110: it’s a good place to spend the weekend.

Plenty of portable toilets were sprinkled around the venue and hot showers were available in the more substantial structures. All the faucets were marked non-potable so bring plenty of water. I had to buy those little bottled waters in the paddock at $3 a bottle. The ground at my site was pretty hard so I never got my flimsy aluminum tent pegs to penetrate. Luckily my site had an old steel spike that someone left behind. I drove the spike into the hard ground on the windward side, tied the tent to the spike and used my gear to hold the other three corners down. The hydraulic jack came in handy as a hammer.

I say the ground was hard but apparently the hundreds of ground squirrels had no problem burrowing holes every 15 feet. The squirrels are all over the place at Weather Tech. I’m surprised that an aged vintage motorcycle racer hasn’t fallen in a squirrel hole and broken a leg. I’ve heard that when they get up in years it’s best to shoot them rather than let them suffer.

Me and Milich, he’s tall with a lot of drag but still wins.  You can visit Milich’s websites at http://guzzipower.com/ and https://www.ducpower.com/.
Thad Wolf’s Suzuki. I never did find Wolff, he must have known I was looking for him.

Thursday was practice all day. The bikes were sent out in groups with staggered starts. There are a lot of classes in AHRMA, like dozens, to keep track of but I mostly just listened for two-strokes. AHRMA’s Motofest had a sort of mini Motorcyclist magazine reunion vibe. The Kevin Hipp racing family was there along with Thad Wolff and Ed Milich. Go-Go Gulbransen, whose name the announcer never tired of uttering was there also. Go-Go was the guy who tested the upper limits of new sport bikes for Motorcyclist magazine. All these guys live and breathe motorcycles and it’s the passion you can’t fake that made them such good journalists.

This might be a real S2 Kawasaki production racer. Very few were built. You had to know somebody.

Vintage racing today looks a bit different from when the motorcycles were current models. Hondas seem to dominate. The 160cc slopers, 175 twins and 350 twins were much faster than I remember them. In fact, I don’t remember them racing at all. I assume it’s due to better oils and electronic ignition systems, because in the old days the small bore grids were mostly Yamahas with a few Suzukis and Kawasakis. If there was a Honda racing it was usually sputtering at the tail end of the pack and the rider was wearing construction boots and welding leathers. Of course, things were different at the GP/factory level where Honda did all right for itself considering the handicap it was working under. It helps to have Mike Hailwood and Freddie Spenser on your team.

A brace of H2s these sounded good when they pulled in.
Jewel-like T500cc twin Suzuki. This was a revolutionary bike when it came out. Some people thought you couldn’t go this big without heating problems. Another bike I want to own one day.
Zoomie RD 350 with DG sunburst heads. Going for that squish band action.
A pile of Ossas. These are Stilettos; I want a Pioneer.
Thames van. I imagine it’s British.
Stretched Honda Mini Trail with custom Grom-based block. 350cc, tops out around 100 miles per hour. I asked the kid if it was dangerous. He said he lived in Oakland, so it was the least dangerous thing he did.

After setting up camp I walked all over Laguna Seca: I needed the exercise after sitting on the ZRX1100 for five long days. To get to Monterey I took the long way around, up through Colorado to Grand Junction then across Utah and Nevada to California. I tried to ride Highway 120 through Yosemite Park but the road was closed. I detoured north from Lee Vining to Highway 108 and was rewarded with one of the world’s great motorcycle roads. Anyway, from my campsite to the paddock was only a 15-minute walk. Less if you didn’t tangle with a ground squirrel.

Vintage racing is all about the paddock. The racing, while serious, is almost secondary to checking out the old race bikes. The paddock is where the food is, where the beer is and where the old motorcycles are. Most of the spectators hang out in the paddock area. I wandered around for hours looking at motorcycles. I ate a turkey sandwich and drank a beer that was like 28 dollars but we need to support the moneymaking aspect of Laguna Seca or it’ll become luxury housing.

Turn 4 action.
Yamaha RD400 scooting right along.

Saturday and Sunday were race days. I hung out with Motorcyclist Magazine alumni Ed Milich for a bit. Ed has an admirable cost per win philosophy in that he expends just enough effort to get first place and no more. His bikes look like hell but they run great. Paint don’t win races, says Ed. On the track he never seems to be trying hard, the gap between him and second place grew larger as if by magic. Ed won every race he entered (four) I did some math and determined that Ed spends around $4.37 per win. Hipp won his races also. Hipp’s bikes are those fast Honda 350s and they look like show bikes. Hipp’s wins probably cost more than Milich’s, but they still count.

Montessssa on the trials course.

Sunday morning I went over to the trials section. Set in gullies and on the sides of hills, trials riding never looks too hard until you try it. Trials events at the level Laguna Seca puts on have the advantage of being relatively safe as the speeds are very low and you can’t fall very far. This isn’t the crazy stadium trials you watch on YouTube but it suits the old motorcycles participating. I might try the trials on Godzilla next time I go to Laguna.

The legend Dave Roper. I think he’s still the only American to win at the Isle of Man races.
Walt Fulton fetteling his XR750.

With such wildly different motorcycles it’s hard to compare rider skill. Except when it comes to Dave Roper: Roper, who resembles a stick of beef jerky with a cotton ball stuck on one end, was smooth and fast on any bike he rode. Roper and Walt Fulton, with a combined 300 years of racing experience, put on quite a show with their matching H-D branded, Aermacchi Sprints. There was a vintage motocross at Laguna Seca but it ran concurrent with some other races so I missed it. You really need to be two people to see all the action at AHRMA’s Vintage Motofest.

Nice, tank shift flattie. This bike sounded good on the track, very low rpm drone.

It was nice to have the campsite for Sunday night; I didn’t have to rush to pack and head out into the unforgiving freeways of California in the late afternoon. Wherever I ride the ZRX1100 it attracts attention. I’ve had people take selfie photographs standing next to the bike, I get asked what year it is almost every ride. The thing is bone stock. Laguna Seca was no different, the bike garnered a steady stream of complements from my camp neighbors. I must look hard up because the guy camping across from me handed me 40 dollars and said I had dropped it. I think he was trying to be nice to a vagabond. Normally I would have taken it but I’m trying to become a better person and told the guy it wasn’t mine.

Californians and Ex-Californians like to bitch about their state, but the damn place is beautiful. California has it all from the beaches to the mountains to the desert and all types of terrain in between. With straight roads crowded by farm equipment, the central valley (also known as The Breadbasket of America) was like the Tail of the Dragon for my nose. Sweet manure, grassy hay, dust and soil, the smells kept swapping back and forth giving my nasal passages whiplash.  If it wasn’t so expensive, I’d live in California again but my total running costs at Tinfiny Ranch are less than the annual taxes on any house I could afford there. The Californians I met were universally friendly and interesting to talk to, we would start up a conversation like we had known each other for years and had just spoken last Thursday.

I’ll go to AHRMA’s Monterey bash again. It’s closer than Daytona for me and with the camping, about the same cost. I give the event high marks for value. You really get your 50 dollars worth with AHRMA.

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Want the story on the ZRX resurrextion?  It’s right here.

Phavorite Photos: Odonata Porn

By Joe Berk

You might be wondering if we are switching to an x-rated site.  We are not. I just happened to be out and about with my camera when the above photo op emerged and I grabbed it.  I think it is probably one of the best nature shots I ever grabbed, although I have similar one with a couple of raccoons but that’s a photo for another Phavorite Photos blog.

We were out servicing a water treatment site in California’s Yucca Valley.  In those days I was lugging around a real tank of a camera:  The Nikon F5.  It was Nikon’s top of the line film camera when film still ruled.  The camera was huge and it weighed a ton, and I compounded the felony by mounting a 180mm Sigma macro lens on it.  I had ridden my Suzuki TL 1000S there (I could fit the camera and it’s lens into my tail bag).  The best thing about that job was that I could combine a lot of extra-curricular into my work, like motorcycle rides and photography.

Back to the Odanata story.  Odonata is the entomological classification for three groups of insects.  One of those groups includes dragonflies, and the dragonflies were out in force that fine California day.  And I was lucky to have brought that 180mm Sigma macro lens with me.  It was perfect for the photo ops that presented themselves that day.  I tried pictures in flight, but I had no luck.  When the painted ladies stopped on a twig or a weed or a branch, though, I was in Fat City.   I dropped the film off at our local Costco (they still sold and processed film in those days), I did a little shopping (I love Costco), and an hour later, they were ready.  The photo guy told me it was very unusual to see photos this “perfect.”  I took the compliment.   The pictures looked good on the 4×6 prints; they looked even better on my computer.

Both the F5 and the 180mm Sigma lens have gone down the road.  Digital took over from film, I went full bore into the digital world, and I found the 180mm Sigma macro lens wasn’t good for much else besides fornicating dragonflies.   Today I use a Sigma 50mm macro for all my closeup work (it’s about as perfect a lens as I’ve ever used for macrophotography), and my cameras are either Nikon’s D810, the D3300, or my cell phone.

Earlier Phavorite Photos?  You bet!  Click on each to get their story.

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Mustang Reborn: California Scooter Company

It was a bad one as motorcycles accidents go, and my recovery was a lengthy one.  A friend contacted me and asked if (while I was recovering) I’d like to write Internet responses to the keyboard commandos badmouthing a company making a new Mustang motorcycle.  Would I ever…and that’s how I hooked up with CSC Motorcycles and the modern Mustang.  The story is fascinating.  Here’s a bit of it, which appeared as a sidebar to my Motorcycle Classics Mustang article.

Ed Seidner founded one of the largest motorcycle superstores in the country, Bert’s Mega Mall in Covina, California, which today sells new Hondas, Ducatis, Triumphs and more. Son Steve ran that operation until he branched out on his own, starting motorcycle accessory company Pro-One Performance Manufacturing.

Ed never had a Mustang, but his friend Billy Buster had one when they were kids and Ed always wanted one. Steve grew up hearing stories about Billy Buster and his Mustang, so he decided to do something about it. He bought an unrestored 1954 Mustang on eBay and took it home to the Pro-One production facility to restore it, a surprise gift for Ed. Steve quickly discovered three things: Customers walked right past ultra-sleek Pro-One V-twins for a better look at the unrestored Mustang, the Mustang was
a simple design, and the little bike was solid. In fact, after Steve drained the stale gas, cleaned the fuel lines and filled the bike’s peanut tank, the old Mustang started on the first kick.

A 1954 unrestored Mustang with a new CSC-150 California Scooter.

Steve’s response was swift. With the 56-year-old Mustang as a template, he started California Scooter Company (www.californiascooterco.com), making the bikes he believes Mustang would build today. The new CSC motorcycles are EPA and CARB approved with modern amenities like electric start, turn signals, speedometer, hydraulic disc brakes, etc.

The bikes are built in La Verne, California, about 30 miles from the original Mustang factory, while the engines are sourced from Asia. Three years after introducing the 150cc CSC 150, CSC introduced the 250cc P51, taking the P51 designation from the World War II Mustang airplane. With its larger 250cc counterbalanced single overhead cam engine, the P51 absolutely rips. The Mustang formula — short wheelbase, light weight and 12-inch wheels — still works.

CSC-150 Mustang Replicas in Baja. That’s the Sea of Cortez in the background. We were at the Tropic of Cancer when I snapped this photo.  We rode our CSC-150s all the way down to Cabo San Lucas and back without a single breakdown.

So how does the new compare to the old? Fully broken in, my 150cc red CSC Classic tops out at about 66mph. With their 320cc engines, the original Mustangs were crazy fast. My geezer buddies tell me a stock Mustang would do 70mph (how they knew that is beyond me, as Mustangs didn’t get speedometers until the late 1950s). I’ve touched 80mph on the new P51.

I’ve ridden vintage Mustangs, but because of their value I was afraid to push them too hard. The old Mustangs feel a little wobbly to me, but of course they have old forks and old tires. The new bikes benefit from more than 50 years of advancements in technology. When I take my CSC on Glendora Ridge Road, the bike is light, tight and an absolute delight through the twisties. Which bike is faster or better is moot. Both are awesome, and each offers a riding experience like no other. There’s one fact, though, that riders of vintage Mustangs and new California Scooters both have to accept:
You can’t go anywhere without drawing a smiling crowd. — Joe Berk

As I mentioned in the prelude to this blog, when I wrote the Mustang story for Motorcycle Classics magazine I was also a consultant to CSC Motorcycles.  CSC Motorcycles stopped producing Mustang replicas a few years ago (around the same they started importing the advernture touring RX3), so there are no more new California Scooter Mustang replicas.  But the modern Mustangs do come up for sale now and then, and the best way to find one is by contacting CSC directly. If you’d like to know more about CSC, their Mustang replicas, and how the company became the North American importer of Zongshen motorcycles, you should pick up a copy of 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM.

Would you like to know about our CSC Mustang ride through Baja, as well other forays into Baja?   It’s all right here, in full color, in Moto Baja!

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Estrella Warbird Museum

Paso Robles’ Estrella Warbird Museum is way more than just warbirds.  There are military vehicles, a munitions display, classic cars, race cars, vintage motorcycles, small arms, and more.  And then it’s in Paso Robles, a worthy destination all on its own.  We’ll touch on each of these in this blog.

First, the warbirds.  There are a bunch on display, and there are two I feel most connected with personally…one is the F4 Phantom, and the other is the F-16 Air Combat Fighter.

That’s an F4 at the top of this blog.  It’s what the USAF was flying when I was stationed at Kunsan AFB back in the mid-1970s, and it is an impressive airplane.  I was on a HAWK air defense site just off Kunsan, high up on a mountain top overlooking Kunsan.  We could pick up the F4s as they started their takeoff roll on Kunsan’s runway.  When our high-powered illuminators locked on, the pilots knew it in the cockpit.  They’d take off on full afterburner (a sensory and sensual delight for anyone who witnessed it), execute a quick 180, and then fly directly at my missile site coming in at just under Mach 1 below the top of our mountain.  They were trying to break the lock my scope dopes had on them.  Then, at the last minute, they’d climb just enough to clear the tops of the HIPIR’s Mickey Mouse ears.  The radars would flip around 180 degrees in two axes with such force that one side of the radar’s support legs would clear the ground by 6 inches.  Ah, those were grand and glorious days.  At night, in the Kunsan AFB Officers Club, the Air Force jet jocks would ask me about the radars.  My answer was always the same:  Sorry, I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.  They’d laugh.  They thought I was joking.

When I left the Army, my first job was on General Dynamic’s F-16 engineering team, and just about every defense industry job I’ve had since was somehow associated with something on that airplane.  Munitions, 20mm Gatlings, fuel tanks, aerial refueling systems, ejection seats…it all seemed to come back to the F-16.  I loved being around that airplane.

Well, okay…maybe one more airplane, and that’s the F-86.  Yeah, it’s been obsolete for decades.  But when I was at Kunsan AFB in the mid-1970s, the ROK Air Force (as in Republic of Korea) still flew the F-86.   It’s a  svelte little bit of a fighter, and it was on display at the Estrella Warbirds Museum.

As soon as you enter the Estrella Museum, there’s a small arms display.  Hey, I love that sort of thing, and this display grabbed my attention.

I caught something the Estrella curators missed.  See those red arrows in the photo above?  That rifle was labeled as a Mosin-Nagant.  I know my Mosins, and this wasn’t one of them.  It was maybe a Mauser, but most definitely not a Mosin. I told one of the docents. She thanked me, but I don’t think she understood what I was telling her.

The Estrella Museum had a munitions display, too.  It was cool.  I like bombs and bullets.  And mines.  A mine is a terrible thing to waste, you know.

The Museum also houses the Woodland Automobile Display, which includes classic cars and race cars with an emphasis on dirt track oval racers.  The collection was extensive, interesting, and photogenic.

There were military vehicles and motorcycles, too.  I’ll get to those in a second, but first, take a look at this.  How about a water-cooled Harley Knucklehead engine used in midget racing?  That’s what you see in the photo below.

The engine you see above is a Drake-modified Harley V-twin, and it was way ahead of its time.  The Drake/Harley was called a “popper” because it vibrated so much.  These engines produced close to 100 horsepower, and that was way back in the 1940s.  100 horsepower.  Water cooled.  Harley, how could you have ignored this back then?

The Estrella Warbird Museum also has a few interesting military motorcycles, including a World War II US Army WL Harley, an M20 BSA single (used by the British in World War II), and real oddity…a 98cc World War II Welbike used by British paratroopers.

For me, a big part of the Estrella Warbirds Museum was its location.  I love the Paso Robles area.  Getting there is easy.  If you’re coming from the North, pick up the El Camino Real (Highway 101) south.  If you’re coming from the south, it’s the 101 north.  Take California State Route 46 east,  Airport Road north, and watch for the signs.

The best kept secrets in this area?  The obvious ones are not secrets at all:  The riding in and around San Luis Obispo County is awesome.  Paso Robles is a wine producing region, and there are plenty of vineyards.  You can ride west on State Route 46 to get to the Pacific Coast Highway, one of the premier motorcycle roads in the world (it intersects the PCH near Cambria and Hearst Castle; both are worthy destinations).   For a world-class dinner, ride just a few miles south to McPhee’s Grill in Templeton (make reservations, though…you won’t get in without a reservation).  There are great missions all along the 101 attesting to the region’s early Spanish influence (they followed the El Camino Real in developing the missions, you know), including the nearby San Luis Obispo and San Miguel Missions.  Paso Robles is a California destination, and the riding is good year round.  If you’re going in the winter months, dress accordingly.  If you’re riding in the summer, stay hydrated.

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More cool museums?   Hey, you bet!