Continued From Page 7
Text and photography by Frank Kaisler
Hey Bandit, I’m back from Daytona Bike Week. No, I’m not late with the story, you just forgot to extend the deadline. Obviously, you’ve forgotten, once again, how very sensitive I am . . .
As always, I really look forward to the first event of “the season”, specifically Daytona in March this year was no exception. After enduring countless days of snow and freezing rain, along with the misery and back pain that goes with it, the warm beaches and clear skies of Florida were calling. This year I teamed up with my associate, Hatchet Head, who met me in Orlando under the afternoon overcast sky.
The weather was balmy, in the high 60’s as we headed northeast to Daytona and ran into some liquid sunshine just south of the Daytona city limits. Undaunted, but damp, we looked for our base of operations, which was located at the Palm Plaza Hotel in Daytona Beach Shores. After a couple of spin cycles in the laundry room, we were out and about and looking for food. Once nourished, we headed for Main Street to check out the action.
Main St. was in full swing with wall-to-wall bikes, as in previous years, the first two days of the event were for bikes only no cars were allowed to cruise Main St. The sidewalks were walk able so we did a couple of laps on both sides of the street, stopping in various locations for refreshments, as needed. We figured we’d take it easy the first night since the rest of the week was shaping up to be a non-stop motorcycle odyssey.
The next day started like the previous one ended; overcast. Our first stop was the headquarters of AMI (American Motorcycle Institute), where tech inspection for the AHRMA road race bikes was underway. It’s unbelievable the quantity and quality of vintage race bikes that show up for the first race of the season.
That same evening we went up to the Adams Mark hotel for the unveiling of the new 145 cubic inch engine from S&S. To show off the new engine, S&S gave five builders an engine to construct a custom bike to be used as display models for Daytona and events around the country for the rest of the year. The bike builders are Arlen Ness, Roger Bourget, American Iron Horse, Pat Mathers and Ron Simms. All five bikes were unveiled at the coming out party and then moved over to Beach Street where they were put on display at the S&S truck, which was located over on Beach Street, (grass area), for the rest of the week. We caught up to Brett Smith the new COO at S&S, and a third generation Smith at their truck and spent some time trying to find out what’s coming next.
Continued On Page 9
