News & Events

Sonny Angel

82-year old Sonny Angel has been a motorcycle dealer at the same location in the San Diego area for 55 years. Walk around his store and you won’t find many Japanese or American motorcycles. His specialty through the years has been brands like Norton, Moto Guzzi and Ducati… no surprise when you know his history. After getting out of the Navy after World War II, he moved to England where he landed a job at the Vincent factory. He raced for a time in England and Europe and was the first person to race a little known brand at the time called Yamaha at the Isle of Man. In his travels he was able to visit the factories of MV Agusta, Gilera and others, so when he finally moved back to the United States, his love of British and European machines was cemented for life.

After opening his motorcycle dealership, Sonny became very active in the early days of European style roadracing at California tracks such as Willow Springs, Riverside and others. In fact he was a founding member of the AFM organization.

Through the years, Sonny also built seats and fairings for roadracing and touring, sponsored many up and coming motorcycle racers, including a young kid name Cal Rayborn in the late 1950s. And to this day, he and his brother Don actively participate annually at Bonneville.

Chuck Basney

If you raced motorcycles anywhere in the country in the 1950s, chances were good you would have to beat Chuck Basney if you wanted to take home the winner’s purse. Chuck was the Pacific Coast Champion in 1951, ’52, ’53, ’54 and ’55. He also would have received the 1956 award on October 26^th of that year had he not been tragically killed in a crash that night at Gardena Speedway. Prior to his death, Basney who take some occasional trips from the west coast to big events such as Sturgis and Daytona. He was so successful that he twice scored the most overall dirt track points in the United States.

Don Brymer

One personal trait that served Don Brymer well in his life was not just a willingness to try new things, he was driven to experiment with new methods and ways of doing things. For a time he operated two Yamaha rental shops in Southern California, but in 1964, he came thought up a totally new way for motorcycle dealers to get their machines from the factories to sell. Instead of getting them crated and having to put the bikes together, dealers could now pay Brymer’s D&D Motorcycle Setup to do it for them and he would deliver the bikes to their stores ready to go. It was a big success and the business grew.

Brymer got a big warehouse in Long Beach to do the setup work and he and his crew would ride the finished bikes around the warehouse to test them out. Eventually they found themselves racing them around on the cement floor, and from that came the idea to promote actual race events on concrete inside the nearby Long Beach Sports Arena.

Don and his wife Lulu expanded their motorcycle promotion business to eventually produce some of the biggest motorcycles races of the day, both indoors at places like Madison Square Gardens, to outdoor races at Ascot Park and other major tracks around the country, many under the banner of the Yamaha Gold Cup series.

Bill and Annie Brokaw

Bill Brokaw grew up in a family that owned a motorcycle dealership in Iowa. Later, his father accepted a position as editor of Motorcyclist Magazine and they moved to the Los Angeles area. For Bill, it was a dream come true to be able to ride and race events throughout the Southwest. During the 1950s Southern California had all sorts of motorcycle events and activities to suit any and all likes. While Bill competed in many famous events like Catalina and Big Bear, his favorite form of competition was Trials and he won the 1951 and ’52 Southern California Trials Championships.

When Bill returned home after serving in the Army, he married Annie, who also was raised in a family-owned motorcycle shop. For a while they ran a shop in Southern California and also formed the Southern California Trials Club.

In the mid-1960s, Bill and Annie decided to move to Colorado and started a Yamaha dealership in Colorado Springs. He brought with him his love of Trials riding and helped form the Rocky Mountain Trials Association. He also became a member of the North American Trials Council. And keeping the family tradition going, Annie and Bill coached their two daughters Kerrie and Kelly who became top ranked Trials riders in their own right.

Annie was an essential part of the motorcycle business through the years and, like Bill, was also a very active rider both in Trials, Ice Racing as well as road riding, Dual Sport and other events. She even raced in the Pikes Peak Hill Climb for a few years.

Annie Brokaw rode motorcycles until she was nearly 70 years old. She succumbed to cancer following a long battle in December of 2007.

Bryon Farnsworth

We all know the story about how Steve McQueen had to race off-road races under the name Harvey Mushman so that the producers in Hollywood wouldn’t know about his unconventional form of weekend recreation. Well, a few years before McQueen came up with Mushman, Bryon Farnsworth was racing and winning in District 37 under the name of “Clutch Cargo.” He worked at the time at BSA West in Duarte and it’s true that the company actually had a policy prohibiting employees from racing motorcycles! Bryon’s “problem” was that he was winning races. He was especially dominant at the weekly TT events at Elsinore on a BSA 441, and BSA started running Race Win ads in Cycle News to promote his success. They even marketed a Clutch Cargo Hop-up kit for BSA 250 and 441 singles.

Farnsworth actually was born and raised up north in Redwood City where he knew, raced and rode with Ray Abrams (A&A), Joe Leonard, and others in the Bay Area. But before he could get a pro racing career started, Bryon went into the Marines and served until 1960. He then got his pro license in 1961 and raced Selma, Hayward, Lodi, Cotati, Chico Airport and other events in the area. His travel companion was often Joe Leonard, who only had to show up and his factory sponsored Harley KR would be waiting for him. In 1962 Farnsworth won the California State TT Championship.

Through racing Bryon began to know people in the BSA world, including Tom Cates, a top Class C Expert in the 1960s. Later, when Tom worked for BSA, he offered Bryon a job at the Duarte facility, which necessitated a move to Southern California, and the end of his professional racing. Later, after Bryon had left BSA, his racing moved from TT to off-road events where he won his class twice in the Baja 1000 and the 500 once.

Bryon’s business career has included years in the magazine field at Cycle Magazine, at Kawasaki Motors Corp where he played a key role in the development of the 900cc Z1 sportbike and numerous off-road models. He has also worked in Public Relations in the automotive and motorcycle industry.

Al Gunter

Al Gunter was not only one of the greatest motorcycle racers of his era, perhaps ever, but he was also ahead of his time as an innovator of motorcycle products. Gunter was born in Houston, Texas where he began his motorcycle racing career. His first AMA National win came not too far from there in Shreveport, Louisiana in 1952 riding a BSA, the brand he is most often associated with. He also finished 5^th at Daytona year.

Gunter eventually moved to the Los Angeles area where he became one of stars of the weekly Half-Mile scene, winning the famed 8-Mile National at Ascot Park three times, was the 1960 season championship as well as numerous Friday night Main Event wins.

Like many of his counterparts, Al would take occasional trips east for key races, including Sturgis, Dodge City, and Daytona among others. Proving his versatility, of his 7 AMA National victories, 6 were on Half-Mile dirt tracks, one at the Peoria TT and in 1957 he finished 2^nd in the Daytona 200 roadrace. His finish there that year is even more impressive by the fact that Al and teammate Dick Mann were both arrested and jailed the day before for road testing their race bikes on a back road in the Daytona Beach area. They had to be bailed out by BSA’s Ted Hodgson in order to race on Sunday.

Gunter invented and/or developed many innovative products to help him improve his perfomance on the race track. In the mid-1960s he worked with the Bell Helmets company to design the Bell Star, the first-ever full face motorcycle helmet. The full coverage design very much the standard today and through the years played a significant role in improved safety for racing and road use in all forms of motorsports.

Gunter’s helmet design was barely onto the market for sale before he had taken it a step farther and had installed a one-way radio communication unit. For about a year, his mechanic Hardy Allen could be seen in the pits at Ascot standing on a milk crate giving Al updates on the action behind him. The AMA eventually banned Al from using it feeling it may be giving him too much of an advantage. He went on to win many events afterwards nonetheless.

Showing his “vision,” another Gunter innovation that went on to become an industry standard were disc brakes. When all motorcycle manufacturers were supplying drum brakes front and rear, Al was manufacturing and selling the Gunter Spot-Disc brake system for roadrace bikes. Not only were his brake units self-adjusting and permitted faster stopping, they reduced un-sprung weight on a motorcycle by 20 pounds.

By the late-1960s, Al was not actively racing any longer, then in 1971 he decided to attempt a come back. Unfortunately he suffered a crash that resulted in full paralysis, a condition he could not endure and in despair he eventually took his own life.

Don Spargur

District 37 produced many great TT and Scrambles riders in the early 1960s… Eddie Mulder, Skip Van Leeuwen, Jim Hunter to name a few. That list is incomplete, however, without Don Spargur. Like Hunter, Spargur rode primarily BSA Gold Stars at Perris, Prado Park and all the other TT tracks of Southern California.

In District 37, he was ranked 4^th in the Heavyweight TT class in 1960, then #1 in 1961 and #2 in 1962. In 1963 he won the 500cc Expert Class race at the National TT Scrambles televised by ABC Sports. He was also the District 37 Scrambles Champion that year.

Larry Wilburn

Larry Wilburn’s oldest motorcycling memories are of riding his 350cc Velocette out in the desert with his friend “Wild Bill” Hannah, the father of future Supercross legend Bob Hannah. Larry went through a few other motorcycles in his efforts to keep up with Hannah until finally settling on a Triumph, the brand he would stick with the rest of his racing years.

Two other friends with great motorcycle credentials were Jim Hunter and Steve Scott. Both were talented TT riders, which helped lead Larry into that direction in racing. While still holding down a day job at Edwards Air Force Base, Wilburn raced TT events up and down the west coast, including Ascot locally and as far north as Sidewinders in Oregon, Castle Rock in Washington and Boise, Idaho.

While Larry never won an AMA National against full time “Pros” of his era, he came close in 1969 when he placed 2^nd to Mark Brelsford at the 50-lap Ascot TT National. His success at Ascot motivated Larry to take a shot at racing the full AMA National schedule in 1970. That plan was cut short however at the opening race of the season at the Houston Astrodome. Larry made it successfully through qualifying and the Heat Race and started the Main Event from the front row, but he crashed into the bike of a fallen rider in the early laps severely breaking some ribs and ending his career.

When Larry could no long race, he switched to the next thing he knew best, and that was building Triumph race engines. He worked with Skip Van Leeuwen, Eddie Mulder, Dusty Coppage, Tom Horton and the famous Love Brothers and became well known as one of the best Triumph engine builders in the sport.

Larry Wilburn never got away from his passion and today at age 72 is still active.

DAN GURNEY

2010 Dick Hammer Award Recipient

Dan Gurney has had a legendary career in auto racing, both as a driver, team owner and builder. He scored four career wins in Formula One racing and was the first driver to win races in Formula One (1962), NASCAR (1963) and Indy Car (1967). He and co-driver A.J. Foyt were also the winners of the 24 Hours of LeMans in 1967. As a builder, Dan saw numerous racing drivers succeed in his Gurney Eagles.

It would be fair to ask, “What does this have to do with the Trailblazers and motorcycling?” What some may not know is that while Dan was carving out a career on four wheels, motorcycles have always been a part of his life. Back in the late 1950s Dan was competing in off-road events like Big Bear and finishing right up there with many top names of our sport.

When Motocross came to the United States in the late-1960s, it was Dan Gurney who not only rode Montesa motorcycles, but he was a strong backer of Kim Kimball’s efforts to promote the brands.

And lastly, for at least the last dozen or so years, Dan has been developing his own motorcycle, named the Alligator, a totally new concept that adopts many of the handling fundamentals from the auto racing world, primarily weight distribution. There have been different motor packages as part of the R&D process, with the current models featuring S&S v-twin power plants.

Yes, it’s taken Dan over a dozen years to get the Alligator where it is today. Many would have given up a long time ago. But not Dan Gurney. Now that’s what we’d call “Desire, Determination and Dedication!” And we know Dick Hammer would approve of that.