IN
THE
WIND
P20
Off-Road Hall Of Famer Passes
D
el Kuhn, one of the nation's
top off-road racers in the
1940s and '50s, passed away
peacefully, March 24. He was 95.
Born in Camp Douglas, Wis-
consin, in 1925, Kuhn settled in
the Los Angeles area after serv-
ing in the Navy during World War
II, where he joined the Compton
Roughriders Motorcycle Club and
started riding in off-road club rides.
He soon started racing and
competed on his Army surplus
45-inch (750cc) Harley-Davidson
that was stripped down for off-
road use despite trends at the
time favoring single-cylinder Brit-
ish off-road bikes.
To compete in the 1948 Green-
horn Enduro, Kuhn borrowed a
rigid-frame Matchless that he rode
to victory in the two-day event.
That performance earned him a
sponsorship from British motor-
cycle importer Frank Cooper.
During his career, Kuhn rode
against talented off-road riders
such as Ernie May and Hall of
Famers Aub LeBard, Max Bu-
beck and John McLaughlin.
Notably, he won the Greenhorn
again in 1950 and 1951. Because
the 1950 Greenhorn was awarded
the AMA sanction for that year's
national enduro title, Kuhn's victory
also earned him the 1950 AMA
National Enduro Championship.
That same year, Kuhn and LeB-
ard helped establish the Catalina
Grand Prix on Santa Catalina
Island off the coast of Southern
California. The Catalina Grand Prix
became one of the most popular
races of the 1950s. During the
1951 inaugural race, Kuhn charged
through the field to finish third.
Kuhn achieved an emotional
victory at the classic Big Bear En-
durance Run in 1952, where he
raced in a tribute to a close friend
who had died in that same race in
the mid-1940s.
In 1955, Kuhn retired from
racing to focus on his career as
a motorcycle patrol officer for
the California Highway Patrol, a
position he held until 1979. In his
nine-year span of racing, Kuhn
became one of the country's
best-known off-road racers.
Kuhn was inducted into the
AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in
2003.
CN
Off-Road Hall of Famer
Del Kuhn passed away
at the age of 95.
PHOTO: COURTESY OF THE AMA
