Evolution Of Hodaka Racing

[hodakamax]

I'm still sorting out my newly inherited picture find. These are dated September 1969 and April 1970. Tom Tredway #22 was a kid who came to my shop on his 16th birthday with a hard-earned stack of $100 bills and shakily rode off on a new Ace 100 and sporting a new Bell TX-500. He quickly became so rapid that I began to take him to races with us and finally sponsored him and declared him teammate on the Good's Cycle Shop racing team. He became a best friend and funny talented guy who I had some of the best times of my life with. We raced, built racing things and above all had many great funny adventures in life.

The first shot shows us #11 and #22 early on September 1969 with stock wheels and forks, and the second one shows us the next year with the first of many modifications like Ceriani forks and 21" front wheels and the new Bell Star full face helmets.

Racing bikes of the day had somewhat of a blurred multi-purpose use. MX was new and TT Scrambles was still hot along with various length oval track Racing. You might be racing the same bike at all events. Only when the Model 93 Super Rat came out did we split paths and our earlier bikes became dedicated Short Trackers.

All fun history!

Maxie

[motovate]

Very Cool story - a good candidate for the Resonator!!

LBM

[hodakamax]

Thanks LBM! Yes this could be a good story for the Resonator and I've already written one along these lines for the upcoming issue. This new find of pictures and memories along with reminding of all the fun we had in those days have me started on yet another article hopefully the next issue after the upcoming one. Bob Whitman always demands at least one article per issue or I'm fired he said. At least I'm starting to get some new materials for upcoming issues as I would hate to be unemployed. I'm still sorting through the pictures that I thought were long gone. It's reminding of a really good part of my life. What fun!

Maxie

[bobwhitman]

I really need to keep the pressure on Max, gotta be sure he doesn't slack off!

Bob