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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1164303
VOLUME 56 ISSUE 36 SEPTEMBER 10, 2019 P117 quickly, especially when his poster hit social media. Amazingly motorcycle racing at Nelson Ledges goes all the way back to the track's founding. Northern Ohio had a group of rac- ers, which included Ronnie Rall, John Penton, George Roeder, that formed an organization called the Competition Riders Associa- tion. It was that organization that first organized motorcycle races at Nelson Ledges in 1959. Nelson actually hosted an AMA National Road Race in 1964 and '65. It was an odd event that count- ed for AMA Grand National points but featured Lightweight class (250cc) bikes. The 24-hour started in 1968, and early on, it was just a small club affair, more akin to an endurance run than an actual race. In the early years, the 24-hour was lucky to draw a dozen entries, but then Cycle magazine coordinated a Triumph-mounted team that won the event in 1969, and the race's popularity exploded. Things started really getting serious in the late 1970s. Teams got more prepared, and the com- petition ratcheted up. Known as a real test of man and machine, the manufacturers and aftermarket race suppliers began advertising accomplishments in the 24-Hour. It was so popular that organiz- ers started limiting the number of entries to 50 teams. The cost was more than reasonable. In 1978 the race entry fee was $75 per team, and that included admission for four riders and up to nine crew members! That included scorers who manually kept track of the race on long sheets of paper. Teams like Lester Wheels, Road and Trail, GT Racing/Group Four, Northridge Yamaha, Hes- chimura Racing and others made the race much more important than it had been in its early years. Then the race became part of the WERA National Endurance Championship, which gave it even more importance. Team Ham- mer, with its roster loaded with big-name road racers, The Human Race Team, Cycle Tech Rac- ing (that featured John Kocinski and David Aldana), Team Pearls, Virginia Breeze Racing, Force Racing, and more poured tons of resources in the race. Then there were the legends of the race. Motorcycle gang mem- bers being chased out of the pits by non-other than Bart Markel, frogs were coming onto the track in the middle of the night from the nearby swamp, and motorcycles ending up in said swamp. Racers faced rain, fog, smoke from camp- fires, sometimes all at once. Fans built multi-level platforms to watch the race, that often leaned under the strain of too many people. While big teams brought big names and bigger budgets, the bulk of Nelson 24-Hour field was always groups of buddies who got together and pitched in to race. Bikes rarely came out unscathed and often were write-offs after- ward. One team entered and won the Lightweight class on a Ya- maha FZR400. The bike refused to start after the race was over, so the dealer warrantied the engine and sold the FZR on the show- room as a new bike! At the reunion, Smith said the reunion attendees brought out 16 old race bikes featured in the reunion tent—everything from old air-cooled two-strokes on up to superbikes of the 1980s. Well over a 100 attended the event. Among the number were many who raced Nelson in the early days, like John Samways, who was once referred to as Mr. Nel- son Ledges for his success at the track, including being the long- time lap record holder. "Everyone just loved getting back together after all this time. For many people it had been 40 years since they'd had contact," Smith said. "After the racing, ev- erybody just went their own way." Smith said the hardest part of putting things together was finding out about the ex-Nelson racers who had passed away. Smith himself was facing health issues and was released from the hos- pital with just days to spare in the preparation of the reunion. At one point the old race bikes and a few of the former racers took to the track for what was supposed to be display laps. "But racers be- ing racers, before you knew it, they were going at it like the old days," Smith laughed. "They were only supposed to go around for a couple of laps. Finally, the flagman had to wave them after eight laps!" CN Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives