Hello, When we were young, we always dropped by the local auto parts store dumpster. They usually had stuff they threw out that was scratched, but in excellent working order. That was not the best thing we found. We found, on two separate times, a complete chrome wire market basket with wheels,(dented basket) and on another day, a complete unit, but no handle. Someone had cut the curved handle off and dumped the complete lower unit. At least we had one set of handlebars for our purposes. That was the start of our "Doodlebug" adventures. The lower end of the chrome basket made a perfect frame for a homemade doodlebug.(with a few mods...) We found two of them, but one was wrecked. There were no names of stores on them and the nearest big name store was many blocks away. We did not know how they got into the dumpsters. But, several parts from the good one and some from the wrecked one, plus parts from several old bikes made our first Doodlebug. We used the various curved parts for the rear and the front of the chassis. We already had a complete front end taken from an old bike, including the neck, forks and handlebar. So, all we had to do was finish the frame, weld the complete front fork assembly to the newly constructed frame and we just needed tires. Of course, my mom "donated" the motor from "her" lawnmower. "Mom...the motor does not work anymore, so we need a new lawnmower...!" Off we went, on our Doodlebug adventures. Jnaki We called these mini cycles...Doodlebugs in So Cal back in 58-60. Ours was a home made “Doodlebug.” The retail Doodlebugs were too expensive and ours was hand made from old grocery store chrome baskets. The bends in the lower frame was perfect for our needs. Just a few modifications, a bicycle head unit with handlebars and wheel barrow rims and tires with a bicycle gear hub for the chain. a throttle lever and cable from the lawnmower was mounted on the handlebars The modified lawnmower motor from our homemade go kart made this Doodlebug fast. Time to tell mom the lawnmower broke and that we needed a new one. One version used the small wheels and chain from the lawnmower, but he larger tires were better. The doodlebug was very cool and fun to ride around the neighborhood. Stopping was made up of thick soled tennis shoes or old dress shoes with thick soles. Stopping was an exciting adventure. But, we eventually rigged a tire rubbing bar to slow down the doodlebug. This guy had the right idea going back and forth from the pits, to the entrance, and to the spectator seats. Note: Since our birthdays were gone by or too many months away and Christmas was definitely too many months away, we had to be creative at the moment. I we had the money, this commercial Doodlebug was available as a kit and all we needed was our mom’s lawnmower motor. But, as teenagers, money was barely there. YRMV
Slabside Shovelheads aren’t welcome here . Panhead cases with a Shovelhead top end is questioned . So it’s best to post those machines on the OT . I know nothing about the years or models of the Sportser so I’m not sure where you should post those . K models and flathead 45’s are safe on here .
By now it was early June and some of the Bultaco magic was wearing off. I had no money for parts like tires or fresh piston rings and was barely surviving. Then I got a phone call from Bob Bays at Woodland Honda, their Novice rider was struggling and they remembered me from the winter series, would I be interested in riding their 350 twin? Yes indeed, I was interested! So it was mid June and the switch was made to the Woodland Honda ride. The first couple races the twin felt very odd after the light and zippy Astro, the Astro weighed around 200 and the 350 twin had to have been at least 280 or more. The throttle response was slower, the Bultaco was instantaneous, while the Honda needed a second to respond. The Honda made decent power and would rev to the moon, I'm sure it had a big over bore and probably a megacycle cam, TT pipes and carb work. The Honda still had the stock K1/K2 double down tube frame that had the engine cradle lowered with 2" lowering slugs. Not sure but I think the forks and shocks were stock, it did have a front fork brace. When ridden super hard, you could feel the frame absorb the torque and then "unload" and it would kind of oscillate, but in a way that was controllable. I was very comfortable on this bike and aside from many low sides (usually in practice), never had any big bad crashes that would come later in the 750 class. After a few races I learned to roll on the throttle about 20 feet sooner than the Bultaco and eventually found the rhythm. We were starting to move up in the main events and the Woodland crew was pumped. In early July, the week before the Castle Rock National, they held what was called the "Junior Nationals" at Castle Rock and it was for Novices and Juniors. I rode to the races with Bob Bays in his black and white 64 F100. The whole way he was giving me a pep talk and telling me "I could do it". When we arrived, he had a real skid shoe made for me by a guy with a van (I think his name might have been Ken Maley?, these are very old memories so if I'm off on details I apologize) So now I had the new skid shoe, was gaining a lot of confidence in the bike and had the full support of my new sponsor and also an awesome pit man named Jim Bays (Bob's younger brother). Around this time of the season, a lot of Californian Novices and Juniors came up to the PNW, looking to get easier points than Ascot or other tough tracks they rode. In my heat race were two of them, future national numbers Tom Berry (#30 and #58) and John Allison (#55 and #79). We were really pumped up and John and I both jumped the start. We were sent back to the third row, but despite that, charged thru the pack. John ended up 3rd and I ended up 4th. With over 70 Novices present, you had to get at least 3rd (out of 16) to transfer to the Semi and 1st or 2nd for direct transfer to the Main. It was very disappointing. The next Friday night we were at Sidewinders and did well, like a top 5, then the next day we went to Salem for the 5/8 mile horse track. Sidewinders and Castle Rock were both TT Tracks (Tourist Trophy, an old British term for tracks with left and right turns or jumps or other obstacles like Sidewinders’ hill) and big ovals were called Dirt Tracks. At the time Salem would have 3 or 4 races a year and I loved riding there. In my heat race, once again, were both Berry and Allison and they were mounted on twin cylinder Yamaha 250 road-race motors with Trackmaster or Champion frames. I stayed with them until the back straight where they lofted their front wheels and rocketed away. I transferred to the Semi, finished in the top 3 and went to the main where we ended up 5th. 5th place at Salem was pretty much our standard, no matter how hard I rode. The next week, most of the Californians went home and we finally won our first pro main at Sidewinders. My fiercest rival was 198Y Ron Chesney (we are now good friends) and he won the trophy dash that night. Other notable rivals were Brad Taggart, Tony Nova, Dave Howard and Don Smith. 2 of the best Novices of '73 that had dominated early in the season were both out with broken legs, one was future National Number 41 Billy Oliver (his step dad was the famous Muzzy) and the other was Randy Scism. Randy also rode a 350 twin that I believe was later ridden as a Novice bike by Mickey Fay. Here is the only news clipping I have, it is from that first pro win (note "Turf Trophy" instead of Tourist Trophy); Next up, the lost weekend; The lost weekend was to be the regular Friday night race at Sidewinders and then head to Spokane for a Saturday night race, just over the border in Idaho. The Idaho track was a big 1/2 mile with 90 foot wide corners and I was pretty excited as I really liked riding the big ovals. The weekend started well and ended badly, but then that's racing. At the Friday night race we were running good and about midway thru the main event were running fourth. 1st, 2nd and 3rd were all within reach and I made a move to the inside of 3rd place (not sharing the name because we've never talked since) on the downhill, made what I thought was a clean pass, but then as I rubbed the wall entering the front straight the bike did a pretty big wobble. About halfway thru that next lap all the flagmen were waving red flags and as we came around we saw a rider down at the beginning of the front straight. Mort Becker, the AMA referee was pointing the black flag at me as I came by. I honestly didn't know what I'd done. As we went into the pits, there were a lot of angry faces and head shaking. My crew told me that it looked like I had put the rider into the wall on purpose and I'd been disqualified. I went over to talk to Mort, but he was angry and didn't want to hear any explanations. I then went to talk to the riders father, both to apologize and to plead my case. He was nice enough but also said it looked pretty bad. At the time a lot of us were wearing the original Bell mail-slot helmets and did not have much in the way of peripheral vision. I've had years to think it through and what I believe happened was I got to his inside and he stayed right there with his front wheel to the outside of my rear wheel. It was common to brush the wall on the corner exit so he must have just hung there and I'd taken him into the wall. He was taken away in the ambulance and we later learned he had a broken arm and leg. We all felt terrible but we had another race to get to, so we loaded up and headed out of Portland around midnight. One of the guys we were racing with (Neal Hulet - an Expert who had done very well in '71 but had a really bad crash that almost killed him) said we could stay at his folks near Spokane, so as the sun came up and we were entering Spokane, we thought we were there. It turns out his parents lived in Colville, another 75 miles North. We got there around 8 am and tried to sleep a few hours, but we were upstairs and it was about 90 degrees. After a couple hour nap, we got up and worked on the bike, changing the front wheel to the spool and the exhaust to the RH Dirt track pipes. We then drove to South to Spokane, then East towards Coeur d'alene and prepared for practice. In practice the bike felt great and we were looking good for the night. In our heat race, we got a great start and were running handlebar to handlebar with Don Smith out of Salem Yamaha, he was a very good dirt tracker, he'd pull me down the straights by a bike length then I'd go hard into the turn, get by him a little ways and back down the next straight. On the straights we would just turn our heads and look at each other. With a lap to go, I heard a little "pop" and the bike slowed down, I thought the choke had flipped on (which sometimes happened) and felt to see if it had, but it was in the correct position. I coasted into the pits and Neal (an excellent mechanic) checked the motor and after a while said that we’d dropped a valve into the piston and the motor was blown. I was pretty bummed but Bob Bays told me not to worry, he had another motor at the shop that came from Long Beach Honda (California) and was better and faster. After Neal raced, we drove back to Colville and were all exhausted. We crashed on the upstairs floor and slept hard. We got up the next morning and Neal's folks fed us a pancake breakfast and then we got on the road. Neal said he knew shortcuts and to follow him. Jim Bays and I were driving the Shop's old black and white F100 with the bikes in back and were followed by Tiny and Mona in their Oldsmobile. Neal was going too fast for the old F100 to keep up with and we were soon lost. At 7:00 that night we were in Lake Chelan, and as much as we needed to push on, we took a swim, then got food and hit the road. We rolled into Portland at 4:30 Monday morning and I had to be at work by 8. Boy was I pooped! Monday evening when I got back home to the Bells, I was greeted by some very unhappy people. Jack and Pat felt like I’d embarrassed them at Sidewinders and would not hear any excuses. I was told to leave. I later learned (and should have realized) they were also upset that I’d taken the Woodland Honda sponsorship and left them out in the cold after all they'd done for me. I was a stupid selfish kid and didn't understand it at the time, but I do now. We later made amends and even went to some races together, but at the time, I headed back to Scappoose. After hearing the news from the Bells, I had to clear out my stuff and move somewhere. I called my mom and asked if there was any chance I could come home? After I left the summer before, they'd sold our little farm that without my brother and I to work, they couldn't handle it alone. Mom would always pretend like things were going to be better and said dad would be fine if I came home. I already had a job lined up at the Scappoose Tire Center, so I went home hoping somehow it would be ok. When I'd left the previous summer, dad and I had our last big fight and the details are too awful to share, suffice it to say we had bad blood between us the rest of his life. At the moment I was desperate, so I made the move. Bear in mind I worked every day and just about every penny went to travel and sign-in expenses to race, so I had no reserves. The new job was great, my boss and shop owner was Louie, a very likable character. Within two weeks it was getting too rough to stay at home with mom and dad, so Louie let me sleep in the office on a couch. It was at this point I went to see the Army recruiter in St Helens. He told me tall tales of a new "Scout Patrol" riding motorcycles that would be attached to the Tank Corp in Texas and that seemed great to me. I did not tell the folks in Woodland or anyone else, only my mom knew what I was thinking of doing. So I worked, raced on the weekends and started to go through the steps of enlisting. Somehow and despite all this chaos, the racing was going well. I attribute much of this success to my pitman Jimmy Bays, who was much wiser than I and knew how to get the best out of me. The first race after the blown motor was another half mile in Salem and true to his word, Bob Bays had installed a Long Beach Honda motor in the race bike. Breaking in the motor was an interesting story. Bob had me come up to Woodland the night before Salem and had me take his F100 with the bike in back. He said the motor is brand new and needs to be broke-in. When you get about 20 miles from Salem, pull over, start the bike up and don't touch any adjustments. It is set to a fast idle and after you start it up, just let it run til you get to the track. I did as I was told and presumably the wind in the back of the moving pickup was enough to cool the motor. That night we had a great start in our heat race and was running at the front, when suddenly it started to pop and miss fire. As I fell back through the pack, I moved over against the outside rail and kept going. By pure chance another rider had engine problems and pulled off and two other riders tangled and went down. I had finished well enough to make the back row of the semi. In the semi you needed to get in the top three for a direct transfer to the main and we had found the problem with the motor, the points plate had come loose and was just out of time. Bob put it back to the original witness marks and it sounded good, so we decided to take our chances. Coming off the back row of the 16 rider semi, we fought hard but only made it to 4th. This made us the 2nd alternate into the main event. The alternates would park near the starting grid and hope someone would drop out. It didn't happen often, but what did we have to lose? Again chance shined in our favor, and one of the riders had engine problems. The 1st alternate wasn't ready and we were waved onto the track! Coming off the back row, we fought hard and ended up in 5th place. It felt like a victory after the disasters of the prior weekend and set the stage for a string of good races. It was almost the end of August and I was still thinking about the Army. I don't recall, but I may have asked the recruiter if I could enlist but delay leaving until the end of the season. I honestly don't remember and some of the details are a bit vague. I took a written test, took a physical and was all set to sign up when my brother came home, discharged from the Army on August 28th, 1973. He had talked to mom and they were dead set against my going. He asked me why I would enlist, I said because I have nowhere to live. This conversation took place while I was working at the tire center. He said (with conviction) don't do anything until I get back! A few hours later, my big brother walked into the shop and handed me the key to a tiny little apartment. He had paid the first two months rent. So that ended my plans to enlist. So now it's the end of August, my brother has returned home and heroically presented me with my first living quarters of my own, and the racing continued. As I've written out these stories for the first and only time, it has struck me how little continuity there was in my early adult life...except for motorcycles. I was a lost young soul and motorcycles helped me hold my world together. As we entered September and the '73 season began to wind down, we had several good finishes at Sidewinders and the points were adding up. You needed 40 points to move from Novice to Junior and we were already well above that. About mid September there was a regional scheduled for Sidewinders and we were psyched. Pitman Jim had put a decal on the gas cap that was a large #1 and we only talked in phrases like "when in doubt, gas it" and similar BS. There was trash talking in the pits and on the starting line and things we said to other competitors like "I'm going to use your 2 stroke for traction" and other crap. As hokie as it sounds, this bravado worked for me and we were highly competitive. The night of the September regional, we won our heat race and entered the Trophy Dash against the winners of the two other fastest heat races. At this particular regional there were over 70 Novices entered and at least 5 heat races. Only the fastest 3 heat winners entered the dash. One of these winners was Ron Chesney out of Redding California, the other rider I do not remember. Ron was a Vietnam veteran that had returned home in early '73, and had won a lot of races that year up and down the west coast. Ron was tough. In all our racing Ron usually came out on top, but for this one race it would be different. I don't remember much except the finish of that race, beating Ron at the finish line by maybe a foot or two. Little did I know this would be the biggest win of my pro career. Here I am on the Woodland Honda 350 twin, after winning that race; It seems silly now, but I didn't like to smile, as I had a chipped front tooth. This trophy (and most of our photos and other memorabilia) were at Bob's house and lost in the flood of 1996. One other interesting note regarding Ron's 360 Yamaha and our Honda 350 twin, was they were both stock framed, his frame being bone stock, ours being stock other than the lowering slugs. Ron and I battled against a lot of Champion and Trackmaster framed bikes and did very well with our stock frames. Ron lives in Oregon now, we reconnected about 20 years ago and remain good friends. There were lots of stories to tell for the '73 season, too many for these pages, but one last story was the final race of the '73 season at Sidewinders at the end of September. The rider I battled that night was Tony Nova. I don't remember the heat races or trophy dash from that night, but the main event was memorable. I got the "scratch" or hole-shot for the main event and there was a big crash behind me on the first lap, and the race was red flagged. On the 1st re-start we once again had the hole-shot and led into turn one when I was hit very hard in the left rear and went down hard. Tony had ridden so hard into turn one, he had lodged his front wheel in between our left shock and rear wheel and had torn our left shock off. We had just a few minutes to make the restart and someone gave us a spare shock off of a Triumph and it was quickly fastened on with some random bolts. We lined up for the 3rd and final start of the Novice main and once again had the hole-shot, leading the race until the mid point, when the left rear shock came off. As I rode, I knew the shock had either came loose or fell off because the bike started gyrating badly as I crested the hill, and to compensate I rode wider and wider thru each corner. Tony got by me after a couple of laps, and then was passed by another rider, but was able to hold onto 3rd. It was quite an ending to our Novice season. We ended the year with 64 points for Novice TT, good enough for 14th in the Nation. We had another 15 points for Novice Dirt Track (ovals), for a grand total of 79 points. Not bad for an ignorant Scappoose hillbilly. It had been a ferocious ride since the first amateur race in July of '72, to the end of that first pro season in September of '73. It seemed like all things were possible at that point, but my lack of maturity, low self esteem and poor financial resources said otherwise. It was all downhill from here, at least for a while. Little did I know that '73 would be the high point of my pro racing career. My efforts in the 750 class were mostly un-sponsored and on junky or unsuitable machines. The Honda shop tried to sponsor me but they were low on cash too. My first 750 at Boise '74, wrecked about an hour later in the heat race; The Triumph only lasted 5 races before the stock crankshaft blew out of the bottom end. That sidelined us for almost a year, until building a stock framed Norton Commando. It was a nice looking bike, but I was too ignorant to realize the isolastic frame was never going to work on a dirt track; Easily the worst handling bike I ever rode! My final year (around 76-77) I snagged a ride on a Yamaha 750 mile bike that was converted to TT with a front brake and TT pipes, but the same mile motor. It was a handful! One of my very last races on a 750, I'm on the 50q, chasing the late great Ricky Graham (19y); I don't remember much about the last year I raced pro, I'm guessing too many concussions. Beat up and broke and lacking the desire to continue at that level, I finally quit. Riding and racing would continue to this day on an endless variety of machines and venues. It's been a hell of a ride.
The Jalopy Journal
