Harley-Davidson's Golden Age Of Racing

Although I spoke to Leo a few times, I was formally introduced to him only once. It was in '71 or '72 at Jerry Branch's head porting company in Long Beach, California. Jerry had a place on the second floor of the Wixom Brothers Fairing building. One Saturday I stopped by and Jerry introduced me to Leo. At the time, Leo and Mel Disharoon were busy fussing around on the Long Beach hills, playing with an aircraft altimeter that Leo used for tuning his fuel bike.

The summers of '68 and '69 were hotbeds of exciting Harley drag racing activity east of the Mississippi, particularly Atco Raceway in New Jersey where records were made and broken. One of the more exciting races took place at Atco on October 26, 1969, a race I happened to attend. Many of the top fuel riders were there. The "Top Eight" Top Fuel qualifying positions were as follows: Larry Welsh on Sonny Routts' new twin-engine Triumph was qualified first at 9.12 E.T; Jim De Salvo at 9.23 on his Harley; Larry Welsh at 9.28 on his Sportster; Guy Leaming at 9.30 on his Harley; Leo Payne 9.30 on his Sportster; defending 1968 champion Bob Barker at 9.37 on his Sportster; Walter Yee on his Harley at 9.40; and Gary Ackermans at 9.42 on his Harley. Since Larry Welsh was riding two bikes, Routts' Triumph and his own Sportster, after qualifying, he turned over the riding duties of his Sportster to Cook Nielson. When the smoke cleared at the end of the day, Guy Leaming took home all the marbles with a hole-shot 9.61 over Bob Barker's faster but losing 9.51.

For me, the '60s were the golden age of Harley performance and racing. High-dollar, button-start crate engines and rear-wheel dynos were nonexistent, and kick-start was the name of the game. Performance kits were in their infancy, requiring lots of trial-and-error engine building and testing. And most performance gurus built their own engines. The bikes may not have gone as fast as they do today, or had as much bling, but the times were simpler, the hype was subdued, and the air was filled with a long-lost innocence.

Sources

Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum
13515 Yarmouth Dr.
Pickerington, Ohio 43147
614-856-2222
www.motorcyclemuseum.org