Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128121
lfllME RJEMEMBIEIRJEID Joe Leonard single-season win record - it is easy enough for some to forget the man who won the first AMA Grand National Championship series, who went on to become the first threetime AMA Grand National Champion, who still ranks 10th in all-time Grand National victories, seventh in all-time mile wins and fifth on the all-time IT winner's lists. It would also be a simple slip to forget that after accomplishing all of this, he went on to become the first Nation- single day by scoring confirmed kills on five enemy aircraft over STORY BY SCOTT ROUSSEAU PHOTOS BY DAN MAHONY Bremen, Germany, in 1945. He reatness must rank among the most fickle of honors in that it usually only bodes well for the individual upon which the rank is bestowed so long as no one else comes along to reset the proverbial bar. Of course, the natural progression of things dictates that it will be reset again and again. Take the history of aviation for instance: Air Force test pilot Chuck Yeager constantly pushed the envelope in the air, becoming the first man to land the credentia I of "Ace" in a G 36 SEPTEMBER 12.2001 • cue went on to become the first man . to fly faster than the speed of sound in 1947, and faster than Forgotten Hero?: Joe Leonard was the first man ever to win an AMA Grand National Championship series, winning the inaugural set of races In 1954. He would also go on to become the first man to win back-to-back titles in 1956 and '57. one and a half times the speed of sound in 1953. Yet for all of this, he did not receive a Conrgressional Medal of Honor until 1976. different. While we celebrate the Why? Because while Yeager was heroic deeds of Carroll Resweber - doing his thing, America was infatuated with the deeds of seven the first man to win four-straight Grand National titles [1958-61] - or other "pilots" who were making I It would seem that Grand National dirt track motorcycle racing is no Scott Parker - the winningest dirt headlines as astronauts in the NASA space race. n __ • _ Graham - the man who holds the track racer of all time - or Ricky al Championship motorcycle racer to earn a National Championship in the automobile racing world as well. Did Joe Leonard have the right stuff? Damned right he did. He was born in San Diego, California, August 4, 1932, the oldest child of William Leonard, a secondgeneration railroad engineer. The elder Leonard's day revolved around the hustling of a steam engine up and down the fabled "Gorge Run," a perilous 95-mile line between San Diego and El Centro that included 21 tunnels and skyscraper-like trestles to span the gorges for which the line was named. "I can remember when I was a kid one time, riding with him on the train," Leonard recalls. ·What they did was they would dynamite through the mountain to make the tunnel and, right on the other side to cross the gorge, they'd build a bridge. Those bridges seemed like they were 10,000 feet high. And those steam trains were so wide. I remember thinking that I didn't know if I liked that ride or not." No, Bill Leonard's boy would not go on to become a third-generation railroader. Rather his destiny would include steaming around half-mile ovals, spanning air gorges over TT jumps and freight-training around big mile tracks, his wheels driving in rhythmic cadence with those of his competitors. It was to be quite a leap of faith, however, as there were no motorcyclists in the Leonard clan, save one.