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FROM NORTON TO SNORTIN’ Kenny Dreer goes drag racing

What do you do if, after eight years of toil and tribulation, your dream of resurrecting the Norton Commando goes bust? Well, if you’re Kenny Dreer, you return to your roots and go drag racing. Pretty serious kit Dreer is running, too: a Pro Mod-style bike with a Koenig F-16 chrome-moly drag chassis on a 70-inch wheelbase, not including wheelie bars. Engine is Kawasaki KZbased, 1428cc, with 40mm Lectron carbs, makes approximately 175 hp on gas, more when the 60 shot of nitrous is working properly.

Got an e-mail from Dreer the other day, filling us in on the latest news:

“Hey, guys, the season is over for this year, I made a lot of progress, most of it in the last couple of months, but it’s all good and every bit helps to add to experience and knowledge base. This photo was taken at a test-n-tune at Woodburn about a month ago. Finally got the NOS working, and did my best run to date, an 8.12 @ 157 mph.

“Then, two weeks ago, of bunch of us North West Drag Racers went to the West Coast Challenge in Sacramento.

It turned out to be a great weekend of racing after more than a fair share of frustration. You’ll never know how much anguish a $2.49 part can create! After suffering some really off runs, (8.30-8.40,

how slow!), we found the problem in the above-mentioned $2.49 part and I agreed to a ‘grudge match’ race with the top qualifier in Top Gas. This wasn’t an index run, it was head-to-head, time to man up!

“My compadres from NWDB helped stage me with the burnout, and got me lined up straight as string. We did a little staging duel but after we both got in, I tree’d him with a .022 to .028 reaction time-not by much, but in this game it all adds up. His 1500cc Vortex-powered Kawi nipped me at the V8th, but my NOS was going 100 percent by then, I became a onion peel on the bike and just nipped him at the stripe, 8.11 @ 162 to his 8.13 @ 163, no doubt he was coming hard. I was on a nitrous high for two days!!!”

The bodywork on Dreer’s Kawasaki pays tribute to his late friend and mentor Barney Li, another hopeful revivalist of a great British marque, Vincent. Painted on the “gas tank” are the words, “As Barney would say, ‘You know what I like best about motorcycles? Ridin’ ’em!”’ There’s another telling inscription on the rear fender: “60 Going On 30.”

“Who knew this would turn out to be my fountain of youth!” says Dreer.

-David Edwards

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