Hot Shots
HOT SHOTS
Dirtier Desmo?
I really got a kick out of the cover of my December issue. It’s like we got two Slipstreams! In my mind, the picture of the red-white-and-green Desmo dirt-tracker should include the caption, “After watching Stoner, Hayden and Rossi spend more than their share of time in the dirt over the years, Ted decided to put the Ducati in more familiar territory.” Thanks for many years of great reading.
Ricky Vassallo San Francisco, California
Bring the Dirty Desmo to the Springfield Mile in May and let Cernicky ride it on the World’s Fastest Mile. We want to see what it can really do! ! I’ll bring the wheelbarrow. Dave Purves
Posted on Cycle World’s Facebook wall
Fill it with blank checks, just in case.
Malcolm’s Matchless memories
I just finished reading your Matchless feature (“The 1709 Story,” December).
It brought back lots of good memories.
In 1956,1 was 15 years old, living in San Bernardino, California, and had a 1949 Matchless 500cc Single, rigid frame. I had no money. To keep it running, I would go after school to all the motorcycle dealers in town, dig through their trash and get discarded parts. Pappy Mott, owner of Mott’s Cycle, was about 80 years old with a wooden leg from a motorcycle accident. Pappy kept seeing me in his trash, realized I loved motorcycles and offered me a job. f got to sweep floors and wash motorcycle parts with gasoline out on the gunk rack for 75 cents an hour.
Pappy would take trade-ins, and if very much was wrong with them, he’d put them in his collection of barns or garages he’d rented. The bikes were left intact, and he’d send me over to get parts, as needed. One day, he sent me to a barn I had not been to before, stacked full of used motorcycles. One of them was a 1948 or 1949 350 AJS 7R, the 350cc version of the Matchless G50.1 read all the European motorcycle magazines and knew this was a famous racing bike; Pappy had forgotten all about it. Donny Evans from San Bernardino had raced it at Daytona and, I think, made the podium. Later, an intake valve broke and the bike was relegated to the scrap barn.
I got permission to get it out and see if I could get it running (which would mean I could ride it for a while). I found not much damage to piston and cylinder head. I couldn’t get a valve for it but found a Chevrolet valve I could make work. Once it was running, the sound it made was unbelievable.
I would get up early in the morning and ride it up the mountain roads to Crestline, Lake Arrowhead, Running Springs and back down the mountain.
I’d had a driver’s license since I was 14, and if I left early, I could make the loop before any highway patrol were out.
The bike had no heador taillight, open megaphone exhaust. I also rode it to Pacific High School in San Bernardino and was never stopped or ticketed in the three months Pappy let me ride it before he sold it for $1000. If it exists today, it would be worth $100,000 or more.
Malcolm Smith Riverside, California
Kevin Cameron’s piece on the Team Obsolete G50 was great fun to read and brought back some vintage-racing memories.
At Bryar Motorsports Park in New Hampshire, corner-working my first AMA National, the ominous graunching sound of metal on pavement during Saturday Superbike practice caused my head to swivel upstream. Across my field of vision slid Dave Roper, locked in a futile struggle with George Vincenzi’s Suzuki. Dave and the bike disappeared over the berm on the pond side of Turn 3 into what we cornerworkers called the Valley of Death. When I looked over the berm, I found him doing a flawless imitation of the deadman’s float in the middle of the pond. I swam over to Roper, who was still napping quite buoyantly, and towed him back to the edge of the pond, where Doc “The Slow” Baldwin and the late great nurse/racer Karen Hornbeker revived him. Later that afternoon, after learning how far across the pond he’d gone, Roper commented, “That oughta teach me to stay off these damned modern bikes.”
Thanks for another great issue, guys.
John O’Connor Nashua, New Hampshire
Just opened the December issue of CW to the centerfold and laid eyes on the beautiful and seductive 1709! I’ve been following Rob Iannucci and Dave Roper in CW since the ’80s in their quest to revive the golden age of motorcycle roadracing.
Dave and I have joined up to take some checkered flags in the AHRMA Class C races these past two seasons.
In fact, I was building a Velocette MAC 350 roadracer for Class C AHRMA. Editor Hoyer should like this: Dave came out West to ride the Velo (and other bikes) at Miller Motorsports in Utah. First time out, Dave took the field, including a Vincent Grey Flash, BMW, Manx Norton and AJS—all 500s!
Vintage roadracing is a hoot. Vintage roadracing with Dave Roper is a hoot to remember. Check it out on Dave’s blog called “Dave Roper Blog.” Gary Roper Medford, Oregon
On Baggers
December 2011 ’s comparison between the Harley Road Glide and the Kawasaki Vaquero (“Bagger’s Banquet”) summed up in the “Ups and Downs” section about the Kawasaki something that has confused me for years: “Heavier and slower than a Harley? Seriously?” I was a Harley rider for 15 years and completely enjoyed the experience but never felt that I was the owner of a modern motorcycle. Rather, I enjoyed the cachet of being a Harley owner.
When I was ready to change to a more modern machine, I bought a Kawasaki Concours. What I can’t understand is why the Big Four bring out products like the Vaquero and other metric cruisers that attempt to duplicate the technology
and performance of a Harley when they have so much more to offer. The result is a steak with no sizzle. If you want a Harley, get one. Imitation may be the greatest form of flattery but it is still an imitation. By the way, I bought my 2008 Concours based solely on the Cycle World review from the fall of 2007.
Keep up the good work. Jack Cobb Spartanburg, South Carolina
We think they build cruisers because people buy them. A lot.
Let me get this straight. Cook favors the Toad Glide over the Vaquero because the Harley has better thrust out of the corners, even though he says the big Kawi rides better? Someone please explain touring to him. Oh, wait, it must be the horrible inconvenience of having to use the key to open the saddlebags! Oh, the burdens they place on us. What’s next, expecting us to flush the toilet and put the lid down? Here’s an idea: Take a grand out of the nearly $6K you’d save by buying the Vaquero and buy slip-on pipes and a Power Commander. Keep your cable TV and Starbucks, put the rest toward your kids’ college fund and get your noses out of Hardley-Ableson’s ass. Stan Hulet Bethany, Illinois
The $5500 premium for the H-D Road Glide Custom is a bargain if it includes four-valve heads ! Robert Kearley West Paris, Maine
Maybe one of these days it will be true, but it’s not. Apologies for the spec-chart error; the Road Glide has two valves per cylinder.
Disliking Change
Kevin, although we have never met, we die-hard motorcycle enthusiasts always seem to know of each other. Rarely do I comment on something I read that
sparks my interest these days. Matter of fact, most of today’s reading simply leads a person to believe we’re all going to be extinct next week. However, after just a few lines of “Disliking Change” (December), my interest sparked. I am not a baseball fan, but I do know the term “Hit it out of the Park.” Here’s a ’70s slogan: Right On! Hank Scott National #14 (1975-1988) Concord, North Carolina
While reading “Disliking Change,” I was once again struck by the glaring omission of the single most important fact regarding the shift of motorcycle demographics since the ’60s and ’70s: the electric starter. As a baby boomer who first got interested in motorcycles as a teenager, I can still see the “Harley guys” jumping up and down trying to get their bikes to fire. Back in those days, big bikes required a strong body and serious commitment—then see how much you love the freedom. The biggest bike I had with kick-start was a BSA 441 Shooting Star, which started rather well once I got the hang of it. John Valentin Santa Rosa, California
I was one of those guys Kevin mentions from the ’70s who spent the winter fabricating pieces and sending them off to be chromed and getting my ride just right for spring. When I realized that every accountant, dentist and 7-Eleven manager in the country was riding a Harley, the mystique kinda went away for me. I know, it was a business decision.
About the 250cc bikes: I picked up a 2000 Kawasaki Sherpa for a thousand bucks this spring, and I ride the daylights out of it. Gas mileage: a low of 67 while hail riding and a high of 82 (I ride like an old man). My other ride is a BMW Kl 100LT, and I’m boiling for a /6 or /7.
Robert Scheele Meridian, Idaho
