This month marks my 30th Anniversary of being a full-time motorsports editor. Happy Pearl Anniversary to me! My writing about motorcycles goes even farther back, starting with a piece on speedway racing in my high school newspaper. It might amuse you to know that I got kicked off the school paper my senior year, as advisor Mrs. Farnsworth and I didn’t see eye to eye on much. Of course, I’m probably the only Journalism student she had who went on to make it a profession.
In the interim, I contributed to Cycle News, which I always enjoyed doing. I was spending my weekdays working for Norman Lear’s Embassy Communications in Hollywood, writing periodic stories on motorcycle racing. At lunch, I would drive from Hollywood to Long Beach to deliver a roll of film and a story on a floppy disc. While you can’t do that in 2025 due to Los Angeles traffic, thanks to Al Gore’s Information Superhighway, you don’t have to.
My friend Lyndon Luhmann launched Feet Up!, a magazine dedicated to observed trials. After a couple of editors didn’t work out, he asked me to take on the position, and I eagerly accepted the opportunity. It was an evenings and weekends effort, as it wasn’t a full-time job.
Shortly after that, Team Dual Dogs’ Damon Powell founded Dual Sporter Magazine, and I don’t think I need to tell you what that was about. He had also gone through a couple of editors before giving me a shot. Like Feet Up!, Dual Sporter was a small publication. Both were labors of love, but even together, they didn’t cover all the bills.
I eventually jettisoned the Hollywood portion of my life to figure out what I’d rather do on weekdays. An attempt at substitute teaching dissuaded me from following that profession.
Out of the blue, in June 1995, I saw a job listing on America Online. It said that a motorsports editor position was open, but not much else. I contacted the person who posted, and he introduced himself as Bill Lanphier.
The job was working with him at Hi-Torque Publications’ 3&4 Wheel Action magazine. Hi-Torque was legendary to me, as it published Dirt Bike and Motocross Action magazines. However, I explained to Bill that there was a tiny problem—I knew nothing about three-wheelers or four-wheelers. I would see them riding around in circles on vacant lots, and that was about it.
Undaunted, and perhaps a bit desperate, Bill didn’t give up on me. He saw that I was doing two magazines, and he needed help. So, he asked me if I wanted to take a quad out for a ride and see what I thought.
A few minutes later, a highly modified Yamaha Banshee was in the back of my Toyota—he was impressed that I knew the motor came from the RZ350 street bike. If you’re familiar with ATVs, this was the equivalent of getting interviewed at Road & Track, admitting I only have a learner’s permit to drive, and being handed a Lamborghini.
Bill didn’t tell me where to ride or how to ride it. He just gave it to me!
My first ride was at the nearby San Gabriel Canyon OHV Area—a rocky sandwash in the Angeles National Forest famous for its mud-bogging opportunities. I rode it up and down the non-muddy area several times and wasn’t too excited. The two-stroke twin was incredibly peaky, and the suspension was not suited to rocky terrain with sand and water mixed in.
Still, before I took a pass on the idea, I decided to go to Hungry Valley State Vehicle Recreation Area in Gorman to see if the Banshee worked there. Well, it did.
The smoother dirt roads allowed me to pitch the Banshee sideways and let the motor sing. The suspension made more sense when it wasn’t hitting embedded rocks, and it was pretty fun. It was nothing like what I thought quads were about.
After almost crashing big-time on a hillclimb, I took the Yamaha into the wash that runs along Gold Hill Road and Hungry Valley Road. While it wasn’t the dunes of Glamis or Pismo, the experience in the sand on the Banshee sealed that deal. It was an amazing feeling, and I was up for giving 3&4 Wheel Action a shot.
Bill couldn’t hire me without running me by Hi-Torque owner Roland Hinz and his trusted adviser, Jody Wiesel, who was the editor of Motocross Action. Jody was a legend to me, as I had read MXA and his column Jody’s Box since I was a teenager.
I went into Hi-Torque and met with Roland and Jody. One of the first things they did was snort at my BA in Journalism from California State University, Fullerton. That didn’t bother me. However, they were impressed enough by Feet Up! and Dual Sporter to offer me the job at 3&4 Wheel Action. I asked them if I could continue with those niche publications, as I didn’t want to leave Lyndon and Damon high and dry, and they agreed.
So, I had a full-time job at a Hi-Torque Publications magazine. It may not have been my dream job, but it was close enough, and I still had Feet Up! and Dual Sporter to keep me busy on motorcycles.
My time at 3&4 Wheel Action (later ATV Action) was a priceless education and highly entertaining. I had a great time almost every day—trips to the hospital after getting crushed by ATVs excluded, of course. I worked with great people who are still valued friends, though I miss Bill, who died in 2021.
After 10 years, I left the rough-and-ready world of Hi-Torque for the champagne wishes and caviar dreams of street bikes at Robb Report MotorCycling. That is another story, which I wrote about for Ultimate Motorcycling’s 20th Anniversary, so I won’t recount that again. If you haven’t read it, you’ll enjoy that memory as much as this one.
So, here I am, 30 years after escaping Hollywood and 50 years clear of getting kicked out of Journalism class. Do I have another 30 years in me? Probably not, but as much fun as it is looking back, I love looking ahead.
2026 beckons.
