Hooligan family night at the races!

Hey fans! Wow, what a week. As you can tell this post is coming out much later than normal. To let you know how my week went, it involved an electrical transformer blowing up (I had to find a way to get it fixed) and a support contractor getting escorted off my base by security. I not going to say that they had orders to shoot, but they didn't NOT have orders to shoot. So hopefully you can forgive my tardiness in getting you this post. Its a shame actually since this post is about a great time watching some motorcycle races with the family. Lets get to it!

The races were held at Costa Mesa Speedway. As you can see it is a tiny track. Usually they race Speedway bikes here. For this race, one of the Roland Sands Super Hooligan series races, there were some Speedway bikes included as a support class. It was my first time to Costa Mesa and the whole family came with me. It is a great facility and has been around for 50 years hosting Speedway races. It is also the birthplace (I think) of Hooligan flat track racing. Costa Mesa would have Harley nights where in between races, guys that rode in on their Harley's could race each other around the track. Usually some kind of chaos ensued. Little by little guys would come with more appropriate bikes and Hooligan Flat Tracking was born. Roland Sands got into it and created his own race series. This was my first Roland Sands race and a good one to bring the family to.

Being a Roland Sands Design event, Roland had a couple of street bikes at the race to show off some of his work. I have been having a bit of a craving for muscle cruisers that handle as well as they look. The white bike to the left was kind of tasty looking. There was a very old school Indian at the event to help promote a vintage swap meet coming up in the L.A. area. I love getting to see the mechanical simplicity of these early year bikes. One of these days I'm going to replicate something like this in my own garage.

The foundation of Hooligan race is the venerable Harley Davidson Sportster. There were plenty at this event. The #963 bike of Mickey Virus of Rusty Butcher fame really stands out with its yellow painted frame. This looks like an awesome bike. Very purpose built and fun. There was one or two of the XG750 bikes here as well. When done up in flat track trim they look great. In stock trim they aren't my thing. If I could get one to convert for the right price, it might be worth it. Lots of work to get them to look right though.

The coolest part of the race was seeing all of the other types of bikes that are out there in the Hooligan flat track scene. Here we have a couple of Ducati Scramblers and an Indian Scout. The Ducati seems tailor made to chop into a flat tracker. The Scouts seem like they would be a good flat tracker on paper, but they have a strange cast aluminum frame that incorporates the radiator mounts into the front down tubes. They also have to work really hard to get the pegs back into a better race position. Maybe when the new Indian FTR1200 bike comes out we'll see more Indians do the Hooligan thing.

Another Indian Scout with a cool blue tank, but check out this rare gem. Yup, that is a Triumph hidden back in the shadows. The general requirements for a Hooligan class race bike are: No modifications to the main frame. Any suspension is OK. 750cc's or bigger with at least two cylinders. You don't have to have lights, but your bike should be able to get insured and registered. It is meant to be a working man's race class. With the Roland Sands races, the non-pro, working man aspect line gets pretty blurred. I enjoyed seeing the creativity of the racers as they worked within the rule set to put a bike out on the track. In all I saw Harley, Indian, Triumph, Ducati, Yamaha and at least one street bike that could have been ridden to the track. Nice!

How was the race action you ask? As you can tell by the smiles on my littlest one, it was pretty epic. You get a half a dozen overweight bike and their semi-pro riders on a track the size of a basketball court and the action can get pretty intense. Compared to the speedway bikes, the hooligans were very much point down the straight, and slow into the corners. The speedway riders just pitched their bikes in sideways for the whole lap. The inside line seemed to be the preferred choice and if you survived the first corner, you had a decent chance to get a good finish. The starts were the hairiest parts off the race as the whole pack of riders charged into the first corner. It was starting to get late and the kids were coming to the end of their ability to sit quietly. We left before the final, but I was able to watch it through social media the next day. All in all it was a great time at the races and  I was able to share it with family. I met a few friends from Milestone at the track to make the experience even better.

Well, better late than never in getting this post out the door. It  was a good event so I didn't want to let it go. Coming up I have some training that I'll be attending at a private flat track. I can't wait to get back out in the dirt. It has been a month plus since I last hit the flat track so I'm a bit nervous. Anyway, get out and ride while you can. Stay safe friends!

Blue