Gil Vaillancourt: 2016 Posthumous Inductee to Trailblazers Hall of Fame

The late-Gilles Vaillancourt, founder of Works Performance, will be one of two posthumous Trailblazers Hall of Fame inductees to be honored at the sold out 72nd annual banquet on April 23rd.

Vaillancourt was born in 1940 in Montreal, Canada. Always interested in machines, Gil got hooked on motorcycling as a teen and started working in a local shop. When he was 20 years old his family moved to Santa Monica, California, and he chose to ride his Royal Enfield twin the entire way from Canada. He worked for Triangle Motorcycles while studying welding, tool and die, and pattern making at Santa Monica City College. Among his other skills, he was a concert violinist and played in the Santa Monica City College Orchestra.

Gil loved off-road and motocross riding in the 1960’s, but was disappointed with the performance of stock suspension systems. His welding, tool and die background combined with motorcycle mechanics skills came together as he began experimenting with his own shock pistons and relief valves. He soon incorporated multi-stage damping on his suspension, a big improvement over the single-stage dampers of the time. Vaillancourt soon had one of the best-suspended motorcycles in California and often allowed friends to ride the bikes outfitted with his modified shocks. It wasn’t long before those friends asked him to modify the shocks on their bikes. This was the beginning of Works Performance.

Gil opened Works Performance Products in Chatsworth, California in 1973 and the company quickly became the go-to place for superior suspension systems for racers all over the world. Champions across almost all race disciplines soon became his customers: Kenny Roberts, Bubba Shobert, Eddie Lawson, Wayne Rainey, Chris Carr, Scott Parker, Dick Mann, Brad Lackey, Jim Pomeroy, Eddie Mulder and Gary Nixon all used Works Performance suspension components during their careers.

Works Performance became a success thanks to Gil’s personal genius with suspension, quality materials, workmanship and innovation. And as the industry progressed, so did his designs. The latter half of the 1970’s brought the advent of long-travel, lay-down shocks. Works Performance shocks debuted bolt-on, piggyback, bladder-style gas shocks in 1976, which used an innovative check ball and orifice valve systems that provided superior control. Works Performance shocks also featured sand-cast fins, which provided better cooling in high-leverage applications. These shocks evolved into the Magna Crosser off-road and Racer road-race models, which remained as standards of form and function for the next two decades.

Always a genius with suspension Vaillancourt was also a sought-after as a consultant for the design of dampers, shocks and suspension systems for amusement park rides, military and commercial aircraft landing gear, mobile camera platforms, bicycles and race cars. But his first love remained motorcycles and he was happy to be inducted into the AMA Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 2009.

Vaillancourt left us on June 2nd, 2015. He was a genuine pioneer in the development of modern-day motorcycle suspension systems, his revolutionary work led to leaps in performance, quality, customization and style. His company, Works Performance Products, continues to serve motorcycle riders around the world and Gil will be remembered for his many contributions to the sport. The Trailblazers proudly welcome Gilles Vaillancourt to the 2016 Hall of Fame.

More info about the banquet can be found at: www.trailblazersmc.com or email: mctrailblazers01@gmail.com

STEVE STORZ: 2016 TRAILBLAZERS HALL OF FAME INDUCTEE

 Steve Storz was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1950. As a youngster, he was always interested in high performance machines, particularly hot rods. Then his best friend in High School bought a Triumph 650 and let Steve ride it. That's all it took to get Steve hooked! He immediately purchased his own motorcycle. As much as he loved riding his Triumph, Steve enjoyed tinkering with it even more. Soon he was working on his friend’s bikes and he got the idea that being a mechanic could lead to a career in motorcycling.

In 1970 Steve moved to southern California, to attend Dale Martin’s Motorcycle Mechanic’s School. He then got a part time job at Triumph of Burbank working as an apprentice mechanic for Jack Hateley.

After seeing his first dirt track race at Ascot Steve knew he wanted to be involved in the sport. He volunteered to help Al Baker and Lloyd Houchins Friday nights at Ascot to begin learning the job of a race bike mechanic. Steve would eventually build and tune race bikes for other great riders like Terry Dorsch, John Hateley, Ted Boody, and Steve Morehead.

After working with privateers Steve was hired in 1974 as a factory mechanic for the Norton-Triumph Dirt Track Team. Steve poured hours into trying to make the Norton’s competitive and still reliable. Just when he finally began to make some progress, Norton shut the team down for financial reasons in the middle of the 1975 season. It was a big disappointment for all of the riders and mechanics.

Next, Steve got a call from Dick O'Brien offering him a spot on the Harley-Davidson team. For a dirt track mechanic it was the top of the pyramid in the mid-1970’s. Steve said “Yes!” grabbed his tool box and moved to Milwaukee.

He’d built his career making British twins go faster.  But he soon came to love working on the Harley XR750 for its dedicated design, made for the sole purpose of dirt track racing.

1977 was his favorite season on the H-D Factory Dirt track team working with rider Ted Boody. Jay Springsteen was the dominant rider at the time, but Boody, riding the Storz XR750 was actually leading the Championship points at mid-season. Their first National win together was the Harrington Delaware Half Mile. Although they ultimately finished second to Springsteen in the Championship, it was a really something special to be in the hunt for the #1 plate week after week.

Steve’s career thrived at Harley-Davidson; they had the best riders, the best facilities, and the biggest budget. As a race mechanic he was well paid and flown to all the races. He also enjoyed working with legendary tuners like Dick O'Brien, Carrol Resweber, Babe De May, Bill Werner, Clyde Denzer, Brent Thompson, and Ronnie Alexander.

As much as he loved being a factory wrench, he had enough of the Milwaukee winters at the end of the 1979 season and returned to Southern California and started his own business. He began building XR750 race engines and doing bike preparation for privateer racers. This was the birth of Storz Performance.

Storz Performance has evolved over the decades into the place to go for performance parts and suspension. Storz Performance is also known for their Dirt Track Style Street Tracker Conversion Kits for Evo Sportsters. Steve built the company’s first show bike in 1990 and took it to the Cincinnati Trade show where it was a hit.

Steve also fostered an association with Enrico Ceriani in Italy and the wonderful forks he produced. It was a perfect partnership because Steve knew what the American racing and street markets needed and Ceriani had the technical expertise to design and produce the forks and steering dampers for Storz applications. Storz Performance continues to manufacture Storz/Ceriani Inverted forks for Harleys in the USA to this day.

Today Steve considers himself very fortunate to have worked exclusively in the motorcycle industry for the past 45 years. As the saying goes “if you love what you do, you will never work a day in your life.”  It has certainly been true for Steve Storz. He has a wonderful wife, Joanie, and two terrific sons, Neil and Eric. Both boys love motorcycle Trials competition and travel all over the U.S. and Europe. Eric Storz has represented the USA as three time member of the Trials Des Nations team. As for Steve, he can still be found doing what he loves, coaxing more power out of new and old motorcycles at Storz Performance in Ventura California.

The Trailblazers proudly welcome Steve Storz to the 2016 Hall of Fame!