Rennie Scaysbrook | September 27, 2017
There’s a new kind of racing in town and it’s filled with the kind of people your mom warned you about.
Joe Kopp (3) on the gas in the A Main Final at Costa Mesa. He took the lead at turn one and never looked back.
In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you’ve surely seen a bunch of mad dudes racing motorcycles that really have no business being anywhere near a checkered flag.
Super Hooligan dirt-track racing has quite literally taken the country by storm as bikes like the Indian Scout, Harley-Davidson Sportster and Triumph Bonneville smash and bash their way from Daytona to Costa Mesa. And on board are some of the most famous riders in the U.S., ranging from AMA Superbike legends Ben Bostrom and Jake Zemke to former GNC number-one Joe Kopp, battling it out with any amateurs willing to show up and throw down on whatever bike they have, as long as it’s a street bike above 750cc.
Click here to read this in the Cycle News Digital Edition Magazine.
Photography by Max Mandell, Taiki Murayama
It’s becoming big business, too. This year is the first for the Super Hooligan National Championship and the grand prize is nothing less than a $50,000 Indian FTR750 flat-track racer. Not bad for a bunch of guys who only a few years ago were chasing each other in circles in front of screaming drunks at Costa Mesa speedway.
“It all started out of the Costa Mesa Speedway Harley night,” says Super Hooligans founder Roland Sands. Harley night runs a couple of times a year, where regular riders on Harley-Davidsons turn up to Costa Mesa’s tiny speedway oval and bash bars, sometimes with as many as 12 riders on a track that seems packed with four speedway bikes.
“This type of racing has been going about 10 years, but it’s only recently that we’ve started getting it out into the wider public,” Sands says. “It’s crazy. We’ve been all over the place. To have our series that we have, and have it in so many different places, from Portland to South Dakota to Milwaukee, to California, it’s the real deal.”
Have you ever seen a more perfectly groomed racetrack?
The 2017 series started in Oregon, before trekking to Wisconsin, Georgia, California, Washington, South Dakota, and back to California for the final four rounds of the championship at Santa Maria, Costa Mesa, Perris again and the jewel in the series, Bolsa Chica State Beach at Huntington Beach.
“We’ve had weekends where it’s been BMW, Ducati, Harley-Davidson, Indian,” says Sands. “We got the factories that want to help out. I want as many OEMs involved as possible, because if the OEMs are getting involved, then they’re promoting it. And if they’re promoting Super Hooligan racing, guess what? They’re promoting flat track! We’re all promoting flat track. If you get into flat-track racing, I think you’re a motorcyclist for life. It’s the motorcycle gateway drug.”
What an absolute laugh this kind of racing is!
Super Hooligan racing struck while the flat-track iron was hot and is still riding the crest of a wave that’s seen an explosion of popularity for one of the oldest forms of motorcycle sport. There’s something anti-establishment about the Hooligans that’s completely addictive, almost like the surf counter culture of the 1970s. Guys and girls are racing purely for the fun of it, never mind the chance to win a $50K Indian at the end of the year.
“They’re putting us on a bike that’s not made to dirt track—it kind of brings out the fun in it again,” says 2000 AMA Pro Grand National Champion Joe Kopp. “The crowds we have been getting around the country have been crazy! And it’s a totally different group. I’ll go through the stands and listen to the crowd, and it’s neat because I’ve heard quite a few times some lady who drove with her husband or her boyfriend say, ‘Honey, you need to get your bike and go do this.’ When you go to a supercross or an AMA flat track, you don’t get that.
“This is the fun stuff and people are like, ‘I can do that!’ It’s neat seeing that part of it because that’s some new blood in our sport and it’s opening flat track up to people that have never seen it before.”
One of those latter riders has been Huntington Beach local Rob Dixon, who got his Hooligan start by winning the Harley nights on his bagger.
“I’ve raced moto my whole life but lately I’ve really been getting into the Harley stuff,” he says. “Once I won my first Harley night here at Costa Mesa I thought I should have a go at this. I want to get a proper tracker, so we’ll see how I go.”
Rob and his road-registered Dyna ended up being one of the stars of the show, as the local turned it on with a bunch of seat standing wheelies and a gigantic burnout at the end of the meeting that had the capacity Costa Mesa crowd in raptures.
Rob Dixon rode his H-D Dyna to the SH event, raced it, did a massive smoky burnout and rode home. Respect.
Let’s Get It!
Super Hooligan racing has always appealed to me, because I like doing things a bit left of field. I also love the fact that here is a race series that doesn’t take itself too seriously—if at all.
I must admit this is not the first time I’ve raced a Hooligan event, having taken the start at the 2016 Austin MotoGP event as a guest of Indian Motorcycle in a converted car park (yes, it was as mental as it sounds and you can read all about that by clicking here).
Costa Mesa Speedway is about two miles from where I used to live so this hallowed venue that has hosted speedway racing for the past 49 years is absolutely my home track, and once I got wind there was a Hooligan race happening there, I bugged Sands’ buddy and workmate Cameron Brewer non-stop until he finally relented and handed me an Indian.
“Dude, this is the best dirt in Southern California, you’ll love it,” Brewer told me. He wasn’t wrong.
It’s all about to go pear-shaped.
Costa Mesa Speedway might be short by international speedway standards at just 185 yards, or 1/10th of a mile round, but when its clay/decomposed granite surface chimes in after a couple of races, it’s like a perfect 12-foot barrel for dirt trackers. The tackiness of the clay also makes for a safer ride as it allows the rider to back the bike in seamlessly while having somewhat of a safety net and the opportunity to explore different lines without losing time.
My ride for the meeting would, once again, be an RSD-built Indian Scout, a bike that’s had plenty of race miles, crashes, wins and general heroics under its Dunlop tires. It was a tried and tested race steed, code-named “Raw Dog,” which would later come back to bite me in the B Main final.
Costa Mesa would see me race against the best Hooligan riders in the country—Kopp, former road racer-turned Hooligan front runner Andy DiBrino, RSD’s Jordan Graham and Brad Spencer, an amateur racer who’s taken to SH racing like a duck to water.
Not your average kind of flat track race start! Check out the old-school open face on #106!
With no practice at all except for one sighting lap, racing a Hooligan event at Costa Mesa is a sink or swim kind of deal. Thankfully for me, even though I was up against Kopp in my first race, I took a fourth out of six after I screwed up a pass for second on the penultimate lap that dropped me back two places when Suicide Machine’s Aaron Guardado snuck up the inside with two corners to go.
Across the remainder of the night, the results started to come with another fourth and two thirds, the last while holding second behind DiBrino right up to the last lap when I got done by an unknown rider on a Harley on the final corner.
The Indian was feeling good and by race three I was finally comfortable to throw the thing in on the rear brake and rely on the grip from the Dunlops and the track surface to hold me upright. But what’s even more fun about riding such an animal is opening the gas—there’s butt-loads of torque that kicks the back-end loose immediately, so even with Costa Mesa’s tacky surface it’s a battle to keep the bike turning but still driving and keep the pace up.
Dixon lets rip on the Dyna to the delight of the Costa Mesa masses.
I was never going to make the A final after my two thirds. If I held that second place I might have had a chance, but I didn’t care as I lined up for the B Final, sixth out of 12 riders.
Four laps. Twelve bikes. The tapes went up and I got my worst start of the night, dropping down to eighth place and one ahead of Eric Bostrom on a Ducati Scrambler. Catching fifth place, though, I ended up eating it right in front of the main grandstand when the back end kicked out too far and threw me over the high side, straight onto my left shoulder. The race was immediately red-flagged and Bostrom was the first on the scene—I was fine, damaged pride is all, but the great thing about Hooligan racing is if you cause the red flag, no problem, if you or your bike are not too bashed up you’re free to join the restart!
AMA Superbike great Eric Bostrom was first on the scene of Rennie’s crash. What a nice young man, Mr. Bostrom is!
That meant I had to make race two count, and I managed to get up to fourth off the line and hold it to the flag in a tiny two-lap race. Not bad for crashing while in sixth place!
I reckon I’m properly addicted to this kind of racing. It’s filled with the kind of guys you want to hang out with, everyone having a competitive laugh and a beer at the end. Kopp ended up taking the honors in both the $1000 Dash For Cash and A Main, extending his lead in the points over Spencer as he tries to win the FTR750.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do with it. My boy is 12 and he wants it badly, so I guess I have to win it for him!” Kopp said afterward.
The next time a Super Hooligan event is on near you, go and check it out. Who knows, you might even want to have a go yourself? CN
Building a Super Hooligan Indian Scout
My ride for the Costa Mesa Super Hooligan race was a 2016 Indian Scout, modified extensively by the crew at Roland Sands Design in Los Alamitos, California.
The beauty about Hooligan racing is you can go as hard or as soft as you want on the build—the rules are relaxed at best, which enables not just a lower cost of entry but potentially more riders to play with.
Here’s what’s been done to my Costa Mesa racer:
|
Engine:
|
Stock
|
|
Exhaust:
|
RSD custom stainless steel slant 2-into-1 high pipe conversion
|
|
Belt tensioner:
|
Free Spirits XR1200, RSD custom mount
|
|
Main chassis:
|
Stock
|
|
Subframe:
|
RSD aluminum
|
|
Front suspension:
|
GP Suspension fully adjustable fork cartridge kit, RSD Tracker fork brace, RSD-modified stock for increased steering angle
|
|
Rear suspension:
|
Progressive Suspension 970 Series 13.0″ shocks / V-rod Spec, RSD multi-angle shock mounts.
|
|
Handlebars:
|
RSD custom 1″-to-7/8″ Flat Track Bars on 1” RSD risers with Renthal MX grips
|
|
Controls:
|
ASV billet folding clutch lever & perch, RSD prototype billet foot control relocation plates
|
|
Front wheel and tire:
|
Indian Aftermarket Hubs with 19 x 3.0in Sun Rim by Buchannan’s, 130/80-19 Dunlop DT3 Flat Track race tire
|
|
Rear wheel and tire:
|
Indian Aftermarket Hubs with 19 x 3.0in Sun Rim by Buchannan’s, 140/80-19 Dunlop DT3 Flat Track race tire
|
