Ron Bishop: 2015 Trailblazers Hall of Fame Inductee

2015 BANQUET UPDATE

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As we have been doing in recent weeks, here is another of our Hall of Fame inductees to be honored this year. The Trailblazers were saddened to hear the news last September that Ron Bishop had passed, but we are moving along just the same to properly credit him for his many great motorcycling accomplishments.

Ron Bishop was born in Woodland, Washington, in 1943. His family moved to Southern California when he was 10 and settled in Escondido. Escondido was a hub of motorcycling activity and it wasn’t long before little Ron was blazing around on a Cushman Eagle scooter, which he naturally took off-road. He rapidly moved from the scooter to a Mustang and eventually to his first real motorcycle, a Zundapp 250cc Super Sabre.

In 1960, at age 17, he started racing TTs and scrambles aboard the Zundapp, but waiting around between races was excruciating for the energetic teen. Soon he discovered there was no waiting around when he entered enduros, hare scrambles and long-distance desert races, just hours of wide-open racing.

Ron began an off-road racing career that took him all over the world. Bishop rode many of the major off-road races of his era: the Greenhorn Enduro, Barstow to Vegas and the grueling long-distance races such as the Mint 400 and the Baja 1,000. Ron raced the Baja 1,000 starting with the first event in 1967 to a record of forty consecutive years! He was also a front-runner in the Baja 500, the Mexicali 300, and the Tecate Enduro.

Bishop earned a factory Kawasaki ride in 1973. That year he qualified for the ISDT, held in the United States for the first time in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. He came back and qualified again for the ISDT in 1975, riding for the factory Rokon squad. That year, the prestigious “Six Days” event was held on the Isle of Man. Bishop always said representing his country in two ISDT appearances was among the most memorable episodes of his racing career.

During his years of off-road racing, Bishop became a self-taught electrical engineer and began developing more powerful lighting for his motorcycles. He was the first to figure out how to power halogen lights on his bikes.

In the early 1980s, Bishop opened his own motorcycle shop, dealing exclusively in off-road motorcycles. Through his shop, Bishop worked with many of the leading off-road and motocross riders of the greater San Diego area.

Ron Bishop was inducted into the AMA Hall of Fame in 2001 for his many accomplishments in off-road racing. In September 2014, he passed away due to natural causes, not long after his seventieth birthday.

The Trailblazers welcome Ron Bishop to the 2015 Hall of Fame.

Mel Dinesen: 2015 Trailblazers Posthumous Hall of Fame Inductee

Mel Dinesen, who passed away in 2006 at the age of 93, had been a motorcycle dealer in Bakersfield, CA. dating back to 1950 where he sold Indian into the 1980s with Yamaha, Hodaka and other brands.

He first made headlines as a race tuner in 1960 when 16-year old Eddie Mulder won the famed Big Bear Grand Prix on one of his Royal Enfields. Dinesen went on to sponsor numerous riders from central and southern California in dirt track racing and roadracing with Ron Pierce, a young Bakersfield rider. Ron won numerous AFM and AMA races for Mel which earned him a spot on the Yamaha factory team beginning in 1968.

Trailblazers President Don Emde took over the saddles of Mel Dinesen’s race bikes in 1969. That summer Emde won the AMA Novice National race at Indianapolis, Indiana as well as winning the overall AFM #1 plate. In 1970 Emde won the 100-mile 250cc National race at Talladega, Alabama, and in 1972, history was made when he won the Daytona 200 on the Mel Dinesen-sponsored and tuned 350cc Yamaha. It was the first time that a two-stroke had ever won the 200, as well as a first for Yamaha. It was also the smallest engine size to ever win the event, beating private and factory entered machines up to 750cc. All this was achieved on a motorcycle that was privately entered and tuned by a motorcycle dealer.

The Trailblazers remember Mel Dinesen and welcome him into our Hall of Fame.

Chris Carter: 2015 Trailblazers Hall of Fame Inductee

Chris Carter was born in Palo Alto, California on April 23, 1951. His life on two wheels began, like many others, with a Schwinn Stingray bicycle which he used for his paper route. Every day he’d pedal by some neighborhood kids riding dirt bikes in a vacant lot. After hanging around long enough the boys let him have a turn and Chris was hooked on dirt bike riding.

Saving his money allowed Chris to buy his own bike in 1965, a Honda Scrambler, which he used to trail ride around the open lands of his northern California home. Soon the paper route was replaced by a job as a “Gunk brush” at a local dealership, A & A Motors. At the time future great riders like Kenny Roberts, Jim Odom and Mark Brelsford were launching their careers out of the same shop. Still a teenager, Chris used to cut school on Fridays to drive these riders’ bikes down south so they could race Friday nights at Ascot.

Soon the Honda Scrambler was replaced by a Greeves and Chris began racing in local off-road and motocross events. By 1970 he was racing in the Trans-Am Series on a pre-production Yamaha DT2MX which had been supplied to A&A. Traveling with Gary Jones, Chris got to see a lot of the country and hone his riding skills. Soon Yamaha hired Chris as a test rider for their off-road development program. Next Chris qualified for the International Six Day Trials (ISDT), an event he would compete in until 1977. He won a Gold Medal in Austria in 1976 and won the final motocross special test.

By this time he was working at Rocky Cycle where he would eventually become the West Coast Sales Manager. In 1984 a Taiwan-based cable company asked Chris if he would be interested in representing its brand in the United States. He decided that if he were ever to start his own business, this was his opportunity. Chris suggested he become their exclusive distributor rather than agent. They agreed, and Motion Pro was born. Cables were a problem for most dealers back then with multiple part numbers for the same cable, discontinued part numbers, poor packaging, etc. Chris redesigned the whole business making the packaging and identification of his product easier for distributors and dealers to inventory, use and determine correct application, even color coding them red for Honda, green for Kawasaki, and so on. This was just the beginning of the many innovations in products, parts, specialty tools, etc. that have made Motion Pro one of the most successful aftermarket companies in the world today, celebrating more than 30 years in business.

But Chris’s involvement with the sport and the industry goes far beyond his business. He simply loves motorcycles and everything about the sport, the people, and the whole culture. He still rides and tests new products, and gives back in every phase of motorcycling. For example, Motion Pro is the official tool sponsor for the American World Trophy and Junior World Trophy Teams. Motion Pro supports virtually every professional Dirt Track racer in the USA, and also works with Supercross, Road Racing, Motocross and off-road racing teams.

Chris is a historian of the sport, sponsoring a book on Honda’s Dirt Track history, as well as collecting many important vintage motorcycles once ridden by Hall-of-Famers like Don Emde, Bubba Shobert, and Preston Petty. He also serves on the AMA Hall of Fame Museum Board of Directors and supports many charitable and nonprofit organizations like the Blue Ribbon Coalition, the California Off-Road Vehicle Association, CRISTA Camps, the Trail Preservation Alliance, and Riders for Health, Oasis for Kids and many more.

Truly, Chris Carter is an inspiration to the sport and the industry he loves. The TrailBlazers proudly welcomes Chris Carter to the 2015 Hall of Fame!

Lucile Flanders Award

Because of his lifetime dedication to the sport, industry, culture, and history of almost every aspect of motorcycling Chris Carter is also receiving the inaugural “Lucile Flanders Award,” named after the late-Lucile Flanders, matriarch of the Flanders Company for many years after the passing of her husband Earl Flanders. Lucile’s involvement in the motorcycle industry and also the Trailblazers dated back to the early days of motorcycling. She was a great supporter of the sport throughout her life. The TrailBlazers proudly honor Chris with this award for his outstanding efforts as a rider, sponsor, businessman, historian, and philanthropist.