Transcript

THIS TRANSCRIPTION WAS DONE BY OTTER AI. THE AUDIO QUALITY WAS LOW ON THIS EPISODE SO THERE ARE MANY ERRORS. WE DO PLAN TO COME BACK AND CORRECT THEM, BUT IF THIS MESSAGE IS STILL HERE WE HAVE NOT DONE SO YET.

Roy Merritt 0:00
Oh shit.

I don’t know. I kind of liked that one.

Unknown Speaker 0:23
Hell yeah.

Roy Merritt 0:26
kind of got the right flat track but you know that one I actually got legally to I didn’t just rip it off the YouTube.

Unknown Speaker 0:34
Oh no shit. Yeah, I kind

Roy Merritt 0:36
of like it. That’s cool. Come get us accelerator band I guess it’s pretty cool yeah you know seems kind of old school. Anyways, welcome to talking crap Episode Four. Roy, Mike I Aaron errands here again.

Unknown Speaker 1:01
I always forget his name. Yes,

Unknown Speaker 1:03
man he’s not Aaron

Unknown Speaker 1:05
It’s me. I’m over here

Roy Merritt 1:11
he’s eating a bowl of rice. I mean so

Unknown Speaker 1:18
you don’t know is Yeah, we get served like some badass food every time we come

Unknown Speaker 1:21
out here.

Roy Merritt 1:22
Thank you Good time. Yeah, so anyways I just got back a couple days ago from the flat track races. I know you guys didn’t actually make it out there but it’s been a really good topic that we’ve been talking about a lot in the shop. There’s a lot of really cool stuff going on at these flat track races that I don’t think people know about, you know, the turnout there wasn’t amazing or anything but the people that were there running were super cool. There were so many cool things going on so many cool bikes. I was a little bit overwhelmed. I got a lot of videos. We went with a couple of guys from the shop who were running street bikes. And these straight up street bike Yes, street tires street DT tire Yes, street tires not meant in any kind of way for off road. Yep. on a dirt track oval. Yes, a dirt track, flat track, a Dyna a Road Glide and a Sportster. A Road

Unknown Speaker 2:24
Glide? Yeah,

Roy Merritt 2:26
with the bags on it bags, everything so I’m gonna I’m gonna try to jump right into this and see if I can’t give Nick a call. Nick had his dine out there. And I don’t know how long we’re going to be able to get him on the phone for but we are going to try anyways.

Unknown Speaker 2:43
And Nick’s a shredder and cut it.

Roy Merritt 2:45
Yeah, Nick. If you go on or or Instagram, check out our website. talking crap, calm I forgot. Just do my plug. There’s feeds for my Instagram. There’s you know, videos, things like that. Our Youtube everything’s on there. We put out I’ve put out some videos on Instagram of Nick who are trying to call here. He doing some wheelies out in front of the shop. He can really is by pretty much on command. It’s set up pretty well for it. And he can he can do it. Well, he tore up his back Fender on that thing. So apparently here, let’s try this.

Unknown Speaker 3:31
So while you’re doing that, let me just throw out some statistics on motorcycling and gentlemen flat track racing.

Unknown Speaker 3:40
So, in 2006, what’s going on?

Roy Merritt 3:44
What’s up, man? How you doing? I’m good. I do. We just cut my coughing thing here cuz I just called you. Yeah, one ring unscripted. So, you know, we were just talking about the flat track races and everything. What’s going on? I don’t know. Can you hear the ship’s being crunched in the background as well? Yeah. Okay, good. And so you can hear everything well. So you are a Tennessee transplant? Correct. You are from California originally? Is that right? Yep. Bryson a long time. And I can barely hear you guys right now. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 4:22
All right. Turn the volume up on your phone.

Roy Merritt 4:25
So how’s that is a little bit better.

Unknown Speaker 4:33
So make it def Yeah. Can you hear us now?

Roy Merritt 4:38
Are you there?

Unknown Speaker 4:41
Maybe you heard his little West Coast feelings. I don’t

Roy Merritt 4:45
know. Here we go. He’s good.

Unknown Speaker 4:47
Oh, he’s calling back in.

Roy Merritt 4:49
Hello. Are you there?

Unknown Speaker 4:52
I can barely hear you guys.

Roy Merritt 4:53
Are you can you hear us better now?

Unknown Speaker 4:56
How about now?

Unknown Speaker 5:01
You’re cutting.

Unknown Speaker 5:02
You guys are not new. Could it be your phone connection?

Roy Merritt 5:08
Well, I just lost. Yeah. I mean, he’s down south down there where cell phones are not going so well. God. But yeah, let’s see. I don’t know. He talked to him. Just before we started. He’s like, Man, I’ve been drinking. And I was like, it’s all right.

Unknown Speaker 5:28
JACK Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Roy Merritt 5:30
All right, man.

Unknown Speaker 5:33
Call me on my phone. So.

Roy Merritt 5:36
Yeah, but I won’t have the audio. Can’t put my phone in. You don’t have a headphone jack. Oh, yes. True. So anyways, we’ll get into it. Because we can talk about it. I was there. You know, Nick in his buddy Ty, and I’m going to get them on here. If I can’t do it tonight. We’re going to do it in another episode for sure. They both ran professionally, semi professionally in motocross when they were younger. This part of the reason why they ride Harley’s the way they do now. Yeah. You know, which is like mad men. They it showed on the track. I can tell you that right off the bat. They got out there around guys that have you know, tracker bikes. And both Nick on his Dinah and tie on his road guide placed in a main Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 6:30
I transferred in like how many how many heats they run before they got in? They ran

Roy Merritt 6:35
two heats, I think.

Unknown Speaker 6:37
Yeah. And so there are definitely bikes that got dropped. Like they’re guys that did their show. Right. Well,

Roy Merritt 6:41
I think I think the guys that really didn’t make it ended up in the remains. Yeah, and they had to split it into two earlier so they had a meaning to be made. And they made the a main the two of them did. Yeah. The other guy Justin on the Sportster made to be main, but he was running some pretty tough competition out there. You You know, all the guys in that competition were pretty good. So, you know, it really didn’t, where he placed in really place how well he did. His Sportster is also really built up and sounded amazing on that track. When he jumped on it. It sounded louder than everything else. It was like it seemed like a VA car run around with four cylinders. You know what I mean? And he get it get on it. It was just like, holy cow. But there’s videos I put out there of Thai wrestling this Road Glide around the track.

Unknown Speaker 7:31
Yeah, it was cool. To watch man,

Roy Merritt 7:32
the story is great, because literally all these guys just loaded up their bikes in the back of their trucks and trailers and whatnot, and said, We’re going flat track racing, and showed up at these flat track races with headlights and turn signals, and license plates and DOT tires. And everyone kind of just stopped when when, you know, we got in there. And they were just looking at us. Like, are you guys for real? After they went out there and ran, you know, in the practices. There around one o’clock. People kind of stopped, you know, like lifting their eyebrows so much and more being curious as to like what was going on. And they were like, man, we’re just here to have some fun. You know, this is hooligan racing. This is what it’s supposed to be all about. And it is. I think it really touches on something in the hooligan racing circuit that is not touched on very often. I don’t think you find very many guys that are young and have the motocross experience, have the stunt bike experience, if you will. And the ability to ride a bike like that around a track and own a Road Glide and be willing to do that rather the shit out of it. Yeah. So it’s a very, very rare thing to find. I noticed that you know, the couple hundred people or whatever they were in the stands, all cheered win that race each time he went out there and got done. Everyone cheered because it was so much fun. And so the first heat for the first practice he went out and dug his floorboard in his left floorboard in and it damn near threw him off a bike I mean, it was it was pretty good. So I believe he ripped that off like during the race in the middle of the in the middle of the race and had no floorboards and nowhere to put his foot. He was lifting his leg the whole time. After he got that around the track a few times the I think he ended up in the first he was digging his legs are engine guard. Yeah. into the dirt is he’s getting around these turns and it was bugging him. And after the one time he ran, I turned around and said to some of the people that were watching there with me, I said, Man, it looks like he’s riding a bucking bronco around. Yep, that arena and we were in a rodeo arena if you will. Anyway, so it’s kind of funny. And it was just something really exciting about watching these guys. Nick Nick came to the shop and he goes using the pits were like that guy’s an animal like what in the hell man? And then he comes in the pits I guess and it goes

Unknown Speaker 9:59
yet Ty comes in and says yeah, my road guard is arranging guard brothers hitting the ground. Anybody got a sauce all

Unknown Speaker 10:07
Yeah, and I guess he saws all the Engine

Unknown Speaker 10:09
Yard he says I don’t give a fuck. I’m gonna I’ll sleep it back together. I’ll build it back up together when I’m done but

Roy Merritt 10:16
I want to win man well and as also for those that don’t know, those of you that are listening to own road glides you probably completely understand but you can’t just remove the card on a Road Glide because the fact that fairing is mounted to that engine guard so and and I in fact while we were there I didn’t really think about it because I was like Why don’t you just rip it off? And he’s like, well, I gotta have something to put my support my fairing and I was like, Well yeah, you’re right you do you know, I was like, I didn’t even think of that. And so he went out there and I believe with the grinder or some his cousin showed up. They they cut it off and unbolted at the bottom cut it cut it there near where it mounts to the fairing. And he kept running no footboard no nothing just holding this leg up there wrestling this thing around the track. And it was really cool because it was a kind of a family affair, if you will. There was a lot of kids. A lot of families a lot of families of like multiples children running you know, the bump his family who own dealerships in the area. They were like all their you know that they had three to three generations of people running races there, which was cool, you know, it’s a nice little thing now. Are they? Are they probably making a bunch of money off of doing these races? No, you know, there, it wasn’t like there was 10,000 people in the crowd. So, you know, it’s kind of more of a grassroots making money back home type thing, you know, yeah.

Unknown Speaker 11:42
But that’s, that’s why it’s so successful in you know, especially in today’s atmosphere where everything is about sponsorship. Everything’s about money. Everything’s about superstardom. Yeah, and then here’s this motorcycle racing, that is just about people going out having fun, it doesn’t even know that even matters,

Unknown Speaker 12:01
man, to be really honest. It brings it back to where I think some of you know original racing came from it was like bootleggers and shit that would go out and run their cars you know, as far as NASCAR’s Yeah, that’s what made NASCAR possible yeah or popular whether it was like stock cars out there running I don’t know if you watch lately is not stock anymore and nothing stock about it.

Unknown Speaker 12:21
Oh absolutely know about this

Unknown Speaker 12:22
is these two guys came out with some stock stuff. And that’s what was so impressive. I’d like to see more of that. Just like yeah, 10 Dinah’s out there and St. Tires just mobbing Oh yeah, combat as

Roy Merritt 12:34
well. And that was one of the things I really wanted to talk to Nick about, you know, being a motocross rider, and then getting on something like a Dyna, when he was the only dine out there. The other bikes biggest bikes out there might have been, you know, the 450 dirt bikes, if you you know, aside from a 1200 sporty, you know, the 1200 sporty is there running out there, carb rated 1200 you know, pro for sport ease, with 19 inch front and rear wheels, you know, front wheels were in for and we’re so the real skinny, and they’re lightweight, there’s nothing on them, you know, you get rid of all the

Unknown Speaker 13:06
they don’t even have a front brake most of time. You they don’t know that those guys might run them because they were all amateur. But

Roy Merritt 13:12
yeah, and a lot of it was amateur. I mean, you know, it was kind of one of those things where we joked about, you know, some of the nicer looking bikes were, you know, laid down and maybe not written as well as some of the ratty are looking bikes are written really hard. And well, you know, right. And it goes in any sport or anything you get you get a lot of the people, I think, I think that’s what maybe is what’s helping flat track racing is, is realistically, you can find a pre Oh for sporty for a couple of grand, yep, in decent shape. And put maybe another grand into it,

Unknown Speaker 13:50
and have a legitimate race. Yeah, and have a

Roy Merritt 13:52
legitimate flat track racer, something that you could actually, if you knew how to ride, you could go out and ride and compete with

Unknown Speaker 13:59
well, that track is small, right? You’re not you’re not jumping it in, you know, suspension circle. So really, you just have to have tires, decent enough to grip or have enough skill to, to run a slide and just have enough power to make the thing go around in the circle. And Nicholas and he ran the whole thing and first gear. Oh, yeah.

Roy Merritt 14:20
Yeah. And I don’t think any of them are shifting. Well, yeah.

Unknown Speaker 14:23
That and you’re not you’re not putting a bunch of engine work into these things mean, they’re going 30 miles an hour and see it’s funny you say that? Because so I got the bug. You know, I got a Sportster sitting in my garage.

Roy Merritt 14:32
And I’m like, I could do this. No, do I want to do this, like do a race winner or anything? Absolutely not. I just want to say I’ve done this, you know, people talk about flat track racing. I want to be able to be like, Yeah, dude, I used to flat track resize sporty Hell yeah. You know what, I’m an old man. Right now. Right? I’m just sandbagging shit. For one. I’m an old man. But I, you know, I want to do it. And I was, you know, looking into all the stuff. And so you know, you Google it, right? That’d be that’s what anybody does. Nowadays, you want to learn about something, you Google it. So I googled it. And I was reading a bunch of articles. And like, this really good article popped up. And that was one of the first things they said was, Do not go and build a big motor for flat track racer. It is counterintuitive, right? It is not what you want, what you’re really looking for, is something lightweight, you know, that has bottom and power, you know, and and we seen I saw this at the track with the team running the street 750, they had an XG 750 with the inverted forks. And all that was really cool bike chain conversion, exhaust, things like that. It was a river, but it had power and all the wrong places, they you know, they would come out of the turn and nail it. But it wouldn’t come on the power until the end of the turn. And by then it was just screaming. And you could tell it was hard for them to get in it early enough in the turn, that they could use the power and the straightaway, you know, and I don’t think it was really set up. I don’t know if the weight wise or whatever, I don’t think they were really good at sliding it because I think that’s where the sliding comes in, is getting your wheel and your engine wound up enough as you’re going around that turn so that when you hit the straightaway, you’re in the power already. Yeah. You know, and I think that’s kind of, I didn’t see a lot of sliding going on out there. You know what I mean? Not like the real dirt track racers. There was a couple of those real dirt track with the like the little front tire and the real long and skinny but he was like the big tire on the back if you will. And those guys drift all the way around. You know, don’t think like, yeah, yeah. Real flat track racers. Yeah. At least the way I think of it, like a single cylinder

Unknown Speaker 16:43
was and stuff like that. Yeah, like pitch him completely sideways.

Roy Merritt 16:46
Yeah. And they’re and they’re cool, man. They’re really cool. Of course, they all had for sale signs on. You know, because I think everything out there is for sale. You get those guys they show up with a pocket full of money. And they’re like,

Unknown Speaker 16:58
Oh, no, you know what, dude, I’m serious. The probably got a lot of money in those bundles. Yeah, probably not too fun. I mean, coming from where I came from run an oval track. And after a while, I literally get to not be too much fun anymore. Because you’re chasing the dollar. You’re spending so much money to try to be competitive. So yeah, I mean, ultimately, I man, I hope these guys keep it simple. Yeah, seriously, keep this sport simple. Keep it about stock bikes, keep the cost low. Keep the involvement high. And that’s what

Unknown Speaker 17:23
I think it will look at some of these statistics here. I got it. This is really interesting. So we’re going to go back to where I started 2006 there are 1.1 million motorcycles sold. In 2018. There were just over 470,000 motorcycles sold. Yeah. So the motorcycle manufacturers are all struggling, because they’re all trying to figure out how to lower more people in the motorcycles because just more people just less people are riding motorcycles all together. However, from that same time period.

Unknown Speaker 18:01
In

Unknown Speaker 18:03
2006, it was still called ama Pro, flat track racing. It was about at its lowest point because flat track racing was really huge way back in the day when it started as a grassroots movement where people just go on Hey, let’s, let’s race these in a controlled environment. Oh, look, there’s a horse crack. Let’s run around that horse track and see who can go around at 10 times the fastest. That kind of thing is what started it. So with Moto GP, all the AMA sanction events motocross, super strong Supercross, it just kind of lowered trials, all that lowered everybody away from flat track racing. So that same time period in 2006. There were 193,000 total season fans that actually bought tickets to flat track racing events. In 2018, there were 2.6 million people that went to watch flat track racing nice. And 30% of the first time attendees to a flat track race in America were between the ages of 25 and 34, which is the opposite of the people purchasing motorcycles. Yeah, as a total demographic. Yeah. So flat track racing, because I think of it’s, it’s loosely run, it’s grassroots. It’s stuff like, well, I’m gonna go run my bike in there. And they went and like he went in route races for a seat before he even registered as a racer. Yeah, he just went on the traveling. I mean, like, lined up in

Unknown Speaker 19:33
a different in the factory supported stuff that you see from the AMA flat track, right? Like we got Indian, and Harley Davidson,

Unknown Speaker 19:39
paddling it out,

Unknown Speaker 19:40
write it out. And that’s sharing. It’s like it always was Sunday. So on Monday kind of mentality, right.

Unknown Speaker 19:45
But, but

Unknown Speaker 19:47
that’s this as simpler. We’re seeing was,

Roy Merritt 19:50
that was definitely much more grassroots. Yep. Yeah. And it was awesome.

Unknown Speaker 19:55
Well, that, but so that’s where those guys start, though. Yeah, you know, I mean, it’s no different than when, you know, any, any professional motocross racer, was seven years old, and they went out on their 50 of their 80. And they went out to local track and started racing on, you know what I mean, going going against all the little other few weeks, but this is not so regimented. yet. Yeah. And I think I think the hope I have for the sport, and Aaron and I were talking about this earlier today, is that it won’t become regimented. Because it’s already gone through that whole phase. Yeah. And then basically, they learned their lesson, it’s run out, you ran out of steam. And then, you know, I think when Harley tried to bring it back with the XR 1200, and they started their teams, and they started going around. And basically, I don’t think anybody else is even racing, like that was like four or five years ago. I mean, it was just basically Harley had a flat track, it was arguing that

Roy Merritt 20:54
they only ran what know nine to 12,

Unknown Speaker 20:57
something like that. And they ran around. They just raced each other and they were all like factory Harley. So I don’t understand understand how that really

Roy Merritt 21:04
works. And you can only run if you did like the 1500 dollar Vance and Hines kit. And it was like exhaust a tuner, an intake, and like some shocks or something stupid. I don’t remember what it was. But it was like the case at rules that was here. Everyone ran that same kid and everyone ran that. But yeah, you’re right at the time, the sport had no traction whatsoever, right?

Unknown Speaker 21:27
There was more of an expression. I mean,

Roy Merritt 21:28
I loved motorcycles had no interest in watching it. I hope

Unknown Speaker 21:31
that we learn from the mistakes that we’ve seen, like from other forms of racing NASCAR, specifically, because like when I started racing back in 1996 1997, look, I watched it happen. Yeah, we had 30 or more street stocks when I started racing on a quarter mile oval. When I will quit racing. Step back for a couple years. I went back to the track, I started and I became tech director at that track. Wonder how many street stocks we had the year I came back to that track. Okay, five,

Roy Merritt 22:03
yeah,

Unknown Speaker 22:03
five. Yeah, the sport just suffered. And it suffered because of the influx of cash because of big shops that build cars. And the only way you could be competitive was to spend, you know, 15 $20,000 on a street stock. Yeah, that’s ridiculous. Yeah, when it gets to that point, people go just unplug. Yeah, like I have no interest. I can’t get into it if it feels like you can’t compete. And that’s why I was really hoping we could talk to Nick because I wanted to have him kind of even walk us through Yeah, what it’s like to show up at the gate, what it’s like to pay your past what it’s like to go through tech, what it’s like to go through this stuff and try to make it accessible for people. So I think once you figure out what can do it, you can show up with something off the street and be competitive. That’s badass and

Roy Merritt 22:45
that to be honest with you is exactly what my goal was in this is that I think there’s a lot of people out there that would be interested in something like this and just have no idea how how exactly and and I can break it down pretty easy for you for the most part to show. I mean I was there I pulled in behind them. I mean they pre registered online, you know for the most part and showed up. I don’t even think that attack. I really don’t

Unknown Speaker 23:18
I asked him if they had a safety wire. No,

Unknown Speaker 23:23
no, nothing. They

Roy Merritt 23:23
got a bike. It’s got air in the tires will go for it. First practice, they were out there. And I took a lap before I noticed it. But they’re all they’re all running headlights. So like as they come around the track, you can spot them because it’s like, oh, there’s one of them. They got a headlight on and you know, so they ended up coming back in and tape it up some headlights still. Yes,

Unknown Speaker 23:42
the old days like in the 60s with like black tape across the head,

Roy Merritt 23:45
zip tie and paper plates to the headlights and right numbers on with marker. Yeah, it was it was like totally legit. I had some really good video of it too. But, you know, I think what we have here is is like a I said that, you know, they kind of showed up? I think it was kind of if you’re willing to put it out on the track and sign a waiver that you’re willing to let you have you know and that’s what it kind of boiled down to me and and and what I think is going to change the future if you will. And I think what what what really sets this apart from a lot of other things. And I found this in the BMX world as well. And I think it kind of relates because it is the motorcycle world is that this really was a family event. They had you know, the Strider bikes. The kids were out running the Strider bikes on the track, which is you know, pretty much if you can walk you can you can ride a Strider bike. There was a kid out on a stay sick, which we’ll talk about a little bit tonight. Yeah, before it’s all said and done, because there’s been some big news about to stay sick today. The there was kids running 50 cc’s. There was kids running 75, CCS 125, you know, and then they had like the amateur Pro. And what I saw out there was, the kids were probably equal numbers to the eggs in the adults. And that’s what’s going to change the sport is that these kids that are growing up doing this, are going to do this the rest of their lives, not necessarily flat track racing, where they grow up, they have the bug is our cycles. Yeah, they have the bug, they are going to be our future customers. Were there any of those little grams out there. That’s what I learned

Unknown Speaker 25:36
there had to have a bunch of their men on grams riding a dirt track,

Roy Merritt 25:40
I was a bit overloaded, if you will, because I had I had my camera and I had everything there. And I was I kind of wanted to soak everything up. But I had so much going on, everything went by really quick. I kind of would like to have just been there, like spectating if you will. But I was trying to catch some content for the website and whatnot. It was it was really cool. The says I walked around and talk to people and pass out business cards and stuff and told them about the you know, the podcast, and I’m going to put a bunch of pictures and videos and stuff up on the website that I took there, and kind of just let everybody have at it. That was there. So I pass out a bunch of business cards. I was like, give me a few weeks, you know, I’ll get it up on the website. And I’m going to put I have GoPro of almost all of it. And I’m going to put it all up there and just let you know, let people have at it. Whatever I you know, I told him I was like, I’m not trying to sell you nothing or you know, right. I was like I just you know, especially with the kids is cool, and it’s how often

Unknown Speaker 26:32
they do this. So they’re going to have like a schedule.

Roy Merritt 26:34
There’s another one I told there’s another one in September. I haven’t really looked at it it’s Lynchburg flat rate flat track racing, I believe is the like the race down there then race more often it was in Shelbyville. I don’t know. I haven’t looked into this. So I talked

Unknown Speaker 26:49
to Jordan about that. Yeah, it’s not like why that’s such an odd venue. Yeah, apparently.

Unknown Speaker 26:57
If you have some history in this area, maybe it’s not so odd. I guess they built that. Out Casey, uh, whatever. Calcium Cal

Roy Merritt 27:06
sauna. Yeah, Cal Sonic arena.

Unknown Speaker 27:09
They built that for horsemanship for doing shows with the Tennessee walkers. Oh, yeah. But apparently, there was a bit of scuttlebutt about that, because the way they train those Tennessee walkers is with mustard powder, behind their heels, so burns their heels. And that’s how they learn to prance like that. Oh, so I guess there was some huge it’s evolved. And yeah, so I guess there was like some huge animal cruelty, who blew about 15 or 10, or 15 years ago, right after they built that arena, specifically for this. And a bunch of the stuff got shut down for animal cruelty. So that arena has been struggling ever since to try to get people seats. And like, here’s this brand new motor sport, basically. I mean, you just need that perfect setting of it was a perfect venue. Um, yeah,

Roy Merritt 28:05
aside from the ins and outs, the logistics, if you will, of getting people in and out and what kind of area where all the racers were kind of staged, and everything was set up inside there was very limited. So if you got enough racers, I think to fill those stands. You probably be you know, at its limit, for sure. And you’d be looking for a bigger venue. But you know, in the meantime until you get there, it’s great. Right? And there are horse stables. I seems like four miles But seriously, there’s 2030 at least rows of horse stables there. They’re all labeled different.

Unknown Speaker 28:44
Yeah, and I don’t I don’t know for sure. I mean, I look it up. But yeah, Jordan said that there was that that’s why they built the arena. And then with all when the big stink came with how they the animal cruelty involved in how they train those horses and all that it just kind of brought to a grinding halt.

Roy Merritt 29:01
Yeah, it was definitely built for horses without Yeah, sure. Yeah. So they’re kind of like an open venue, Miller Coliseum and went saw the tractor poles and stuff. Yeah, that’ll be another great spot to go man. Yeah, indoor, you know, rain or shine, man, there’s been a dream of mine for a long time to be an attractive, you know, to like, own a piece of property and build a track on it. That would, whether it be you know, started with like a flat track, if you will, you know, like something like that. And run that until you can do whatever and then build something bigger. I mean, I would like to have a real track something you could run something for real

Unknown Speaker 29:36
like a one mile it Yeah,

Roy Merritt 29:38
like at least a one mile something with a long straightaway. I think that’s the biggest they get. I don’t think they get any bigger than one mile. I think that’s a one mile flat track, I think is well, I don’t necessarily mean for like sanction racing. I mean, like, you know, build a, like a scaled down Laguna Seca or something, if you will, and charge people just to come out and run their bikes, you know, cuz you know, how many people would come up if I could, if I could run my bike on like a track without a bunch of bullshit, it just, you know, on a private property, my bike would look like shit. Seriously, I would have that thing. That thing would look like shit. I’d lay down all the time. But, you know, it’s because you can’t really do that out on the road. Right? it you have to think about Okay, well, if I go through this tournament, I lay down yeah, screw up my bike, but then I screw up somebody’s car. I screw it. You know, I could get a car somewhere else. Right? Yeah, there’s other team on the track. All of that is controlled. You know. So it’s you in the bike. And for the most part, you get hurt. It’s you in the bike. You know, and I can deal with that.

Unknown Speaker 30:43
Well, I think one of the one of the coolest things about flat track racing is the speeds are so incredible that Yeah, you know, I mean, like Moto GP, you know, those guys go down. I mean, they’re going down. 150 miles an hour. Yeah. flat track racing. I mean, they’re in second gear. So

Roy Merritt 31:01
yeah, yeah. And that was another thing I you know, like I said, we got to get them on, because most of them said they were running in first gear. But I don’t want to see I’ve heard guys like to run a second from like old racers. You know, maybe that was different power bands or whatever. But I feel like second gear was the gear was always the gear of choice for that kind of racing. I could be wrong. Well, I don’t know. I suppose

Unknown Speaker 31:26
it it. It would depend because, you know, like, you’re at the garage that that second year, your second gear? first gear? Yeah, probably fairly similar. I mean, he does have a lot of power. So first year probably only really needs

Roy Merritt 31:42
Yeah. Oh, and it was getting it I mean, you know, when he could kick catch a little bit and go you know, if that bike would have had the right tires on it, even I think it would have been a different story. You know, if ties bike

Unknown Speaker 32:00
buttery Oh,

Unknown Speaker 32:00
seven man, you should have put 40 pounds a lead in the saddle bag. That’s a frickin real vitamin set.

Roy Merritt 32:06
I want to say it’s like, no two are like, No, no, it’s because it’s carb rated still. So it’s so you know, to I mean, it has this whole that horrible front end that that wobble from day one. You know what I mean? And he’s out there beating that thing up on a track, let alone what he does do it on the street. You know, he beats the hell out of that thing. And and you know that that’s a testament to what barley really makes is you watch your tie, ride his bike around, and you’re like, Okay, yeah, the laws that those bikes are pretty tough. Because he

Unknown Speaker 32:38
Yeah, he does everybody so all the shop, it’s a rev limiter tests, are you there?

Roy Merritt 32:45
He’s got he takes, I don’t know if he’s a tour pack, but he’s got this like big wood platform that he built. That goes where a tour pack would go. And his dog rides on the back with him. And that’s cool. I was like, UE pull up. And I was like, you know how fast you go with her. And he’s like, oh, man, I had it pegged. And I was like, he’s like, Yeah, he’s like, I reached back and I tapped her on the chest and he said, she scooted you know, real close to his back. And he’s like, yes, I’ve got the sport bike was messing with me. He’s like, so I had it pegged on the way here he’s like she’s right Apollo back. I was like, dude, you’re an animal you’re gonna you’re gonna freakin animal and a dog was I swear to God, it was happiest I’ve ever seen in my life when she got off the bike he’s like yeah, it’s been you know, it’s been a winner you know? He said she hasn’t written in a long time and he’s like she’s just happy to be on the bike and you could tell that dog was happy never leaves his side I mean, that dog is like the a typical dog that you would you know picture especially I mean, we were out at the track and he the dog wasn’t allowed inside so dog stayed in the trailer and he had it plugged into the wall there and had like a little fan and everything going in there and whatnot and he get back but open the door don’t just sit there and be like yeah what’s up what are we doing you know God’s stay right next to him I never ran off never nothing but you know it the whole the whole scene there i think is something special if you will. It’s you know guys taken like we were saying a couple grand and throwing them into a sporty and you know, throwing them around a track

Unknown Speaker 34:20
that’s what I remember from when I was little you know, yeah, is like guys building stuff in their garage, ham build stuff. Go out and race it. And you know, Craftsman is guys with their hands making stuff race. That’s frickin cool.

Roy Merritt 34:34
Yeah, absolutely. You know, that’s kind of one of the things I put on our website was you know, we like people doing cool stuff. You know, I don’t necessarily always know what that is sometimes cool stuff is so stuff I’ve never seen before. That’s what makes it cool. Right? You know so you there’s so many cool things going on out there and and picking stuff out of a catalog and putting it on your bike isn’t always it. You know what I mean? That there’s there’s other things that we don’t see that I would love to see so many things going on behind the scenes and so many of these shops that doesn’t get noticed that should you know that that’s going on little things that are there so cool.

Unknown Speaker 35:14
And well. Well look at that. So check this out. So I’ve looked at the schedule. Okay, for the flat track racing. Nice. Sorry, sorry to like break it off. But this is this is badass. So the next one is March 14 to Daytona it totally Ouch. Then March 23 at Dixie Speedway. Woodstock, Georgia. April 20. at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas. It’s a half mile. Well, here’s where it gets super cool. One Not this one because it’s Arizona but April 27. Wild Horse past Motorsports Park jail, Arizona, which may coincide with Arizona bye bye week, probably because I think that’s right around that time. The reason that one’s going on

Unknown Speaker 35:57
right now. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 35:58
so then may 11, the Southern California half mile at Paris auto Speedway.

Unknown Speaker 36:03
Nice track.

Unknown Speaker 36:04
May 18. The cow Expo fair in Sacramento, California for the Sacramento mile. Springfield Illinois at the Springfield State Fair may 26. So like 10 years ago, we would never think state fair and flat track racing right you know what I mean? So this is this super cool just that this division like the same kind

Unknown Speaker 36:29
of organization or

Unknown Speaker 36:31
American flat track

Unknown Speaker 36:32
Well, there must be another division there must be another circuit as well got to be Yeah, cuz like the ones I saw at Pomona in California just before I moved they ran at what was there was some horse track out there and there was a bit I mean, dude the big bikes like the guys the Crossley sponsored a bike, and you know Harley was there and Indian was there, all this stuff. And it was like big money. I mean, haulers here. I mean, like semi haulers and links, all that stuff.

Roy Merritt 37:00
When I was when I was at this race here in Shelbyville, are shovel shovel shovel, as they say. They I spoke with a family there and they had two or three sons, I think, all running three, because he said the one kid had started writing to and I was like, Why can’t my kids for I feel like an idiot in the oldest kid started at four. And I think as they went on, they started younger and younger. And the youngest one is started around two. But they were all out there running. And they were from somewhere else. They weren’t from around here. They were from they said like six and a half hours away. And they said they were on their way to Daytona because as soon as you said that, I was like, Oh, yeah, it makes sense. But they said they were going to run in Savannah, just before they went down to Daytona. So there must be another circuit or something going on there. Probably you know, they’re probably run into circuits. That’s what you do. Well, yeah. So the piece of data head said, Man, this gets really expensive. You know, you’re talking about it. He’s got three kids running. He’s running around the country. That’s got to get expensive.

Unknown Speaker 38:10
Well, so that circuit the American flat track circuit, the ones that I was just reading the deals Yeah. is six mile races, five half miles five TT, and for short tracks.

Roy Merritt 38:23
So Oh, to mix

Unknown Speaker 38:25
it up. Yeah, they mix of races. So that’s the actual Semi Pro pro circuit. So some of those may or may not coincide with some of the ones like Shelbyville. Oh, like hooligan racing.

Roy Merritt 38:39
Maybe they don’t all do hooligan racing.

Unknown Speaker 38:41
Yeah. You know what I mean? So so like Shelbyville? These guys weren’t at Shelbyville, like the pro Indian team. Yeah. Pro Harley TO they were those guys are going to be at these big events. Yeah. But there’s also different classes at those events. And there are other on high end professional races in between all those you know, regionals? And all that I don’t know that this was was this one ama? No, it doesn’t. It actually does not look

Roy Merritt 39:09
like I don’t think it was. The FT is part of the AMA at all. It is I didn’t see anything. I

Unknown Speaker 39:15
think I think the reason that it’s getting gaining so much traction, because it’s not me. Yeah. And I agree.

Roy Merritt 39:21
So you don’t have to get one of these $4 and $60 for to run or wash. It didn’t matter what you’re doing is $15. I showed up, I was like, I want to do videos of 3020 $15 was like, that’s fine. I just want to know where I go what I gotta do to take video, you know, but it was, yeah, I had said something to my wife when I was there. That it reminded me of back when I was younger, doing stuff like that, and racing and everything else when the rules were a little looser, if you will, it wasn’t so, you know, I don’t want to say safety or because it sounds bad, but it wasn’t. So you know, you can’t do this, you can’t do that you can’t do it was well, if you’re willing to do it, and you’re dumb enough to do that, then you’re on your own and and I think that’s the way it should be, you know, if I’m dumb enough to go out there and run this thing around, attract and kill myself. Go for it. And yeah, let me and don’t don’t be mad about it. You know, it is what it is.

Unknown Speaker 40:23
What I think I think like the races like Shelbyville are popping up all over the place. Because it’s super fun. And I mean, how do you get into becoming a full time flat track? Yeah. You know, like, so you take somebody like James Stewart, it there’s a very clear and defined path in motocross. Yeah, you know what I mean, you you need to run, you need to do this, you need to go down these regional tracks,

Unknown Speaker 40:47
you want to win a championship find sponsor, and

Unknown Speaker 40:50
you know, you go on to 50s. And then you work your way through and you start when you’re young. And you you go to like this clear, defined path. I don’t think there’s really a like, a way to get from point A to point I think you just if you’re fast, you just try to raise bigger races.

Roy Merritt 41:07
Now on the flip side of that, is there is there the payoff in flat track racing, that there is a motocross? I doubt it. I doubt anybody, I don’t think I don’t think it’s and I think that’s what makes this special is that I don’t think that’s the end game. You know what to do, but I don’t think you go out to a BMX track. Because I’ve done this with my son. There are people out there that are that are like, you know, are on the path and dad and everybody there. Hi, Max, and they are they are their kid is going to be in the X Games. You know what I mean? And they’re not taking no for an answer. I don’t think that there is that end game in flat track racing? I don’t think it’s going to be Oh, my kids going to be the next. Well, there is there is.

Unknown Speaker 41:58
There may be there may be that element. But it’s super small. Because I mean, like, Did anybody dominate that race?

Roy Merritt 42:07
Oh, there was some kids that were going pro the some there was one kid that went step. He wasn’t pro yet. But he was like, he was about to step up. And so like before the race, they were like, Look, this kid’s about to go pro. He’s going to run the amateur and a pro class class. Does anybody have a problem with that? And nobody had a problem with it. You’re like, whatever. Yeah, everybody was like, whatever. That’s fine. Yeah. I mean, a lot of the people there was only you know, if there was eight people on the track, there was two or three of them that were out there, like dead serious about winning, is the way I saw you know, everybody was out there wanting to run hard, sir. And and everybody wants to win. I mean, if you’re not there to win, you know, everybody wants to win, of course. But they don’t

Unknown Speaker 42:49
tell the youth of today that

Roy Merritt 42:51
Yeah, I felt like that, you know, there was only a handful of people out there that were taking this like a profession serious, you know what I mean? Sure. They were they were trying to harder, I felt like everybody else there. There was large groups of people you know, working together like one guy fell down out there, broke his handlebars and shit. And rolled back over with his crew of six or eight bikes that were there and within an hour so how to ride a bike again. You know, I didn’t really look at it before and after to see what all they did. Because you know where I come from on racing. You don’t just walk over like look at people shit. You don’t have to say on in Yeah, yeah, you know, you don’t you don’t go over there and ask a bunch of questions. You know, you’re out there to race. So I tried not to be nosy. Like, oh, what you got in this? would you do this? Would you you know, to me, because sometimes she gets annoying.

Unknown Speaker 43:38
Yeah, but you know what, I’ll bet you in that setting, it wouldn’t matter. Because it’s probably like, land speed racing. Yeah. So you know, like, if you if you ever go land speed racing and go out to Bonneville to the salt flats, or to any of those events, there’s absolutely no money in that sport. Yeah, by the way, you don’t, if you break a world record, you get a little piece of paper that says that you ran this speed, and you get like your name on a little plaque that you’re presented to with the hundred and 20 other people that are there. And that’s it. Nobody gives a rat’s ass here in a minute, that’s a super expensive to even to even compete. I mean, you’ve got to build a machine that is absolutely purpose built, you’ve got to register, you got to become part of the AMA, you got to get there. And then you’ve got to spend the four days while you’re there, running. But on the flip side of that, I’ve never ever done any kind of a sport motorsport or otherwise, where everyone was so involved. Yeah, because everybody spent a shitload of money to be there.

Roy Merritt 44:47
You know, they all want to help each other and

Unknown Speaker 44:48
yeah, and and nobody wants to not be able to ride it doesn’t even matter if you win. Of course, like you said, you want to win but really all that matters is that you go and you can run. So if something happens and your motorcycle breaks down everybody chips in. It’s crazy. I mean, even your competitors will be like I have this part will this help you and and they will told teams will get together to get a bike back so that it can run again. And maybe you’ll get the record with your with some other guy in the same classes us parts. Yeah. And he helped it happen. And all they do is you drink old style beer. And it old stop. Here’s disgusting. By the way for everyone in Chicago. It’s gross. But I don’t know how that came about. But when when we go to race, this there’s this team then they race a lot of deals. And they they come down from Chicago and they bring a pallet of it.

Unknown Speaker 45:46
So you treat golds to help us career. It’s like It’s like the thing you go to Wendover when you go out to eat, and you drink

Unknown Speaker 45:56
style beer. Nice and it’s disgusting, but it is super good that week, especially

Unknown Speaker 46:02
to people who are listening that aren’t racers that don’t know that is a racers mentality. I mean seriously and all my children’s money.

Unknown Speaker 46:09
Yes, yeah. Yeah. You know what, when you’re running for a purse, yeah,

Roy Merritt 46:14
then know. And maybe that’s the difference here but I don’t think there needs no money. I don’t think there was no money in this either. I don’t think there was any person in the flat track racing. think anybody got a trophy?

Unknown Speaker 46:23
Well, there’s no money in professional either. Otherwise Harley wouldn’t have a team anymore. Yeah. Well,

Unknown Speaker 46:29
because Indians quit smoking the shit out of them. Yeah, cuz. I mean, they did.

Roy Merritt 46:33
It’s true, though. lady lady hooligans racing, which was cool. I saw those pictures. Yeah, there was only there was only two ladies running. I did get to meet the one girl Alex, who’s part of the buffets family, she heard her husband and kids were all running. They, you know, she was she was running that race and 50 we’re talking about? And I think that’s really cool. I mean, I’m all about putting women on bikes about you think you can handle it? Right? Absolutely. You know, nothing hotter than a chick on a bike. I mean, come on, you know, it’s got to be like two points on the scale, right? If you’re, if you’re a six, and you get on a bike, you’re an eight, instantly, you know. And if you’re an eight year, you’re a dime, once you get on that bike,

Unknown Speaker 47:17
that’s it, you’re done.

Roy Merritt 47:19
You know, I kind of always thought that way. But, you know, in the end, it’s better for the sport. And I think if you if you enjoy riding, and you actually do love motorcycles, and the sport, they’re there, everybody should ride there shouldn’t be noble, that person shouldn’t ride. And we all like to hate on people, like hipsters, and, you know, anybody younger than us. But

Unknown Speaker 47:42
I think that I think the people that shouldn’t ride simply are people that try to ride outside of their ability to impress other people.

Unknown Speaker 47:52
That’s, that’s fair.

Unknown Speaker 47:54
That’s the only category that really annoys the shit out of me.

Roy Merritt 47:58
Yeah, well, you know, we talked about this because I said I, you know, I’ve got the dirt flat track thing on my mind. You know, I’m up there with with Nick and Ty and those guys and they like I said, they ran motocross professionally, not, I wrote dirt bikes. When I was a kid, it was no motocross rider, you know what I mean? So, you know, we talked about and I was like, I’ll put my bike out there Out Run. I’m like, my goal will be to finish the race, not to win that one. And I’ll be happy with finishing the races. Even if it is last place. I don’t care. That doesn’t bother me. You know, I can handle that. But I said, there’s no way I’m putting my bike on that track without getting some practice in first. He got me because it’s been 10 years since I wrote a dirt bike, you know what I mean? So we talked about this and and some friends have property and you know, places where they train horses and like you said, that’s how it starts. Right? And they say, Hey, we got horses later. Right? So we’re talking about you know, maybe getting together and doing that. I think all of us would I Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 48:59
I know. It’s been a Saturday out there. run around and

Roy Merritt 49:01
just drink some beer run around the track. I mean, people were like well, you know, you might you might bang up your bike was kind of give a shit.

Unknown Speaker 49:08
He races long as I can ride it to work and back home. Good.

Roy Merritt 49:11
Oh, yeah. Well,

Unknown Speaker 49:12
you run a heat you you got like every lap you gotta stop and pound one.

Unknown Speaker 49:17
Dude, I like to

Unknown Speaker 49:21
play golf. I’m not even kidding. Oh, yeah, we call it nine for nine. Yeah, you start the golf game. You have to have a beer in your hand at all times. For the first nine holes. You drink an Irish car bomb. By the time you get to the ninth hole. You’re pretty shit faced Let’s be honest. We’ve been tossed off a couple of golf courses doing that

Roy Merritt 49:39
so there was a to get my brother’s iron it back

Unknown Speaker 49:44
on that shit. Yeah,

Roy Merritt 49:46
they So speaking of this, and then I’m going to do this real quick. But there was a golf tournament in Orlando. Back in the day that was run by a strip club. And they had like strippers on each hole. like like like dislike doing their stuff. Oh, yeah. Yeah, okay, so anyways, but at the end of the naked class, the end of the round. You got a stroke off for every beer drink. Let’s go I bet you did you take you know you shot a 72 I drank you know 12 beers I got a 60 Yeah, so you know and and the kind of buddy that played and he would get better the drunker he got so it was like it was an unfair advantage. You know, he was a scratch golfer as it was but anyways,

Unknown Speaker 50:34
it’s actually more calculation than we even ever did. Yeah, well that’s a good idea. I’m even incorporate that. For this summer.

Roy Merritt 50:40
We talked about this with the racing we were going to do it to shop I said we need to do what we’re gonna do the crazy kart racing.

Unknown Speaker 50:45
You know, we still do that. We still gotta do that Jamie fucking room. Burn the wheels off the crazy carts. Yeah, we need to do the heat races. Yes.

Roy Merritt 50:53
No, I think we need to start our own flat track league. And we incorporate the pound of lab. Yeah, and we grass roots the fuck out. And we started in somebody’s house in a fucking callback.

Unknown Speaker 51:08
Well, hey, you know, really crazy. Run figure eight while you’re at it.

Unknown Speaker 51:13
Did you guys ever been to a rodeo? Oh, yeah. Motorcycle rodeo. No, no.

Roy Merritt 51:17
Well, yes.

Unknown Speaker 51:18
So that’s kind of what they are. I mean, they have like crazy crazy shit. Yeah, you got the slow race. So you so yeah, you can’t touch the ground. Oh, yeah. First one to cross the finish line loses and you’re on somebody’s ass grass or something like that they have Yeah, it’s all out there it’s all i canna field. So so like they used to, like motorcycle rallies used to have all this stuff. But you know, as the doctors and lawyers and and the motor, motorcycling became more white collar. The blue collar fun kind of went away because you know, everybody get mad

Roy Merritt 51:51
barrel racing. They do that on motorcycles, too.

Unknown Speaker 51:53
Yeah. And they would do you would do like a, he dropped the golf ball in the pipe. Yeah. And then, so you got to have somebody on the back, right? So your passenger drops a golf ball down a pipe, and then you gotta write up and time it so that when the golf ball pops out of the pipe, they can catch the golf ball. Yeah. And then you win that they’d have the hotdog. The

Unknown Speaker 52:13
road wins. That was always fun to watch. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 52:15
where somebody always falls off. Like,

Unknown Speaker 52:20
I don’t know, sometimes I’m like, Why do girls do the shit that they do the best

Unknown Speaker 52:26
does the back of the seat and try to grab a hotdog hanging on a string out of there with their mountain. It’s all covered mustard. And

Roy Merritt 52:33
so there’s very few places that do this kind of stuff anymore. And you’re right. It’s like Roscoe chili cook off in Florida and a couple other little things that still do this kind of, of, you know, real motorcycle rodeo, if you will, or games, the motorcycle games are a thing of the past. There is a place and I’m going to give them a shout out because the place is super cool. Right outside of Orlando, there’s place called Leesburg. And they do Leesburg bike fest. It’s usually naval, probably coming up real soon. It is for people who live in Central Florida. It is the more fun bike rally than Daytona. Sure. It’s not all the idiots from out of town wanting to flex their muscles. It’s all the locals and and the really cool part about Leesburg and at least years ago or a few years ago, the business and the town actually like once the rally there. So every business is like happy that you’re there. And it shows as you go around. They’re also in water or something outside there. They’re making their money off of it. Yeah, but the people are like happy that you’re there. So anyways, great rally. If you get a chance to go go. It’s absolutely worth it. eight miles outside of downtown Leesburg there. There’s a place called windy acres farms. And they are the local rodeo arena. Outdoor rodeo arena happens that every little country town there’s somebody who’s got the rodeo arena. Well they have it. They have concession stands and all that they have a pretty decent sized little piece of property there. And they set up RV tents. All these people come out. They do vendors tattoos, food and their concessions open all night day. So you camp on their property. And there is food and beer. You know, vendors tattoos, patches, and they do motorcycle games. The hot

Unknown Speaker 54:34
Oh, that’s a rodeo.

Roy Merritt 54:36
Yes, it is a real bike rally of like mentality. And the owners of the property. Love it. You know, obviously they’re making money off of it. So they’re all about it. And they they I mean, you get wasted at this place and you wake up in the morning, and there’s somebody there smiling making eggs for you in the freakin session. It’s amazing. You know, you’re so

Unknown Speaker 54:56
so they used to have those all the time. Yeah, they’re just gone. You know, I mean, all of the all of the big motorcycle rallies have now are just like this farce of a rip off. Yeah, you know, and it used to be so cool. And and most of these, most of these events used to be sanctioned by one or more of the one percenters depending on what where you’re at in the country. Yeah. And they provided security, they made sure that everything was cool. And you know, they were sometimes you’d have disagreements and you know, guys would fight or whatever. And you whatever. I mean, you just yeah, there was a winner loser and then everybody drinks beer and moves on to the next day. Nobody even remembers and nobody’s gonna sue somebody. Yeah. Now and now everything’s about litigation and about, you know, like, you’ve got to wear pasties, paste these whatever the hell those things are, as you

Roy Merritt 55:48
go, yeah. Oh, are you could be like, what the 90s YY toda. It was a friggin free for all and this is after MTV. I can’t imagine how was when MTV was out there. Because when you know, by time I made it, MTV was gone. And they were already starting to crack down. But it was still, you know, walk around with a video camera. Show me your tickets. Yeah, you know, and that was like part of the part of the deal. Yeah. Was now No, it is not that way. Right. All and

Unknown Speaker 56:17
you know, what? If you don’t like it, don’t go?

Roy Merritt 56:21
Yeah. Well, it’s sad because like you said, even then it’s weird cuz even in the 90s when I remember going to like Bike Week and stuff. I just remember the bikes being like custom bikes being so much more of a thing. If that makes sense. Oh, yeah, it was Yeah, they were real custom bikes. They were you know, this fucking dickhead bought a bunch of bad dad shit and had it painted by his fucking buddy. And now he’s, you know, got the coolest bike around. You know? Yeah, it was guys actually buildings, cool shit in their garage, and painting it and doing six stuff that nobody else had done before. And showing up on the strip and parking their bike and just, you know, talking to people and it was cool, man, you know, you

Unknown Speaker 57:10
know that’s what Arlen ness did. Yeah. I mean, everybody thinks that are unnecessary. Like this bike builder. He was a painter. Yeah. I mean, I was a kid. He was a painter. He painted motorcycles. That’s how he did it. And then you know, he got a good design, but I mean, now now they’re just like arlan NIST air cleaners and I kind of buy an arlan NES performance party you fucking kidding me? Yeah.

Roy Merritt 57:35
I you know I’m picky about a lot of parts weird about a lot of that shit. Oh, I don’t really care for name brand shit. Like as soon as you start putting their fucking logos and shit on it I’m like I don’t know

Unknown Speaker 57:46
but you know what I will put I will put a performance part from a company that’s been making performance parts yeah 5060 years I’ll put all run their stuff not a guy that I remember or some new Yeah, it just works but even though just flat when that’s what they’re that’s what they’re doing. Yeah, not doing they’re not like well look at this week we made these cool graphics and made a bunch of money so now we’re into the performance world Yeah.

Roy Merritt 58:12
Well, you know, the customer bases was super cool for a long time. I think OCC killed that if you ask me

Unknown Speaker 58:23
jumped the shark at I think it was the Santa bike

Unknown Speaker 58:28
wasn’t totally

Roy Merritt 58:29
yeah I don’t blame them for this I don’t get me wrong. I believe the Discovery Channel more than them I think it but cake decorating it’s frickin cake decorating. I motorcycle what happened here was all the fucking people that you know didn’t ride or those guys it was though they didn’t really either. But they all of a sudden want a chopper so all of a sudden all these shoppers are worth you know fucking stupid amounts of money. They’re selling their choppers for hundreds of thousands of it only took a couple of years before all those bikes were were 15 grand max.

Unknown Speaker 59:06
But it’s still it’s still happening. Yeah, but date I think the days of buying $100,000 chopper are all but gone. I don’t think so.

Roy Merritt 59:18
I don’t think there’s that many people out there building building it like that.

Unknown Speaker 59:22
Well, but there but I don’t think there were that many people then building them like that?

Roy Merritt 59:27
No, but they would. And this is my mean they

Unknown Speaker 59:29
were so

Roy Merritt 59:31
big boat dogs, the pit bulls. You know, the the chopper manufacturers popped up in the front. Yeah, that were that were selling 50 $60,000 bikes that were 15 $20,000 bikes.

Unknown Speaker 59:47
Well, they had they were doomed to fail because they were pieces of shit. You know,

Roy Merritt 59:51
I actually know somebody worked for a guy that think it was big dog he worked for and he said that’s all running a shop. That’s all he ever really did was wine and dine rich guys to come by fuck yeah, way overpriced bikes. That’s all it’s all he ever did. You know. And he’s, you know, lots of party and you know, they would expect you know, sex, drugs, rock and roll. But, you know, he said, That’s mainly what he did. It was just one of those rich guys that were willing to spend 50 grand on a bike? Because nobody nobody is you know, nobody’s willing to buy that. So keep it simple. Yeah, and those bikes those all those bikes, pit bulls, big dogs all those are $10,000 bikes max. Now, for the most part unless you have one that is

Unknown Speaker 1:00:38
well that pretty well now. I mean, I don’t even know that the Pro Stock look that was so big when those bikes around that look has gone. Oh, yeah. And and yeah, I’m not too upset about that, because it’s, it’s a real analysis. It’s an unbalanced look. And it said to ride

Roy Merritt 1:00:55
that was one of the things that I really liked about Jesse James. And they did I think it was when they did that build off after everything. It went to shit. And they were trying to like get some ratings back and they thought they brought was a Paul Jr. and Paul senior and Jesse James. Yeah. And I want to say that was there another person now it was just the three of them.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:15
And then Paul senior built that track vehicle.

Roy Merritt 1:01:18
Yeah. And and Jesse James is like, Look, man, you guys can build whatever the fuck you want. I’m gonna build a bike that you ride. You know, he was like, I’m not looking to have the best looking bike. You know, I’m not trying to make a fancy bike. I’m trying to make something people ride.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:32
And I think that show was biased against him anyway. Oh, I agree. I mean, he he forged his own kickstand.

Roy Merritt 1:01:43
Like his skill level is so far above. Yeah. So far above.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:48
Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, a student of like, that kind of stuff. Metal or metal or Yeah, yeah. He is a lifelong student. So it’s not even in the same caliber. Yeah. Although I do I do have to say he’s, he’s like talking about to smack. And then he went to ride his motorcycle in the gas tank was so high, you had to look to the side to see.

Unknown Speaker 1:02:09
You’re not writing that to Stewart?

Roy Merritt 1:02:11
Well, yeah, and I think those are the things you got to look. In the end, I have always had a bit of respect for him. Me to what he’s done to me. I thought monster garage was like one of my favorite shows, I fucking love the idea of just taking a bunch of people and be like, hey, go build this, you know that the whole idea of that show is amazing. And there’s always been something I take from that show. And he’ll walk up to people. And he used to talk about all the time to walk up to the guys when they’re doing something and be like, hey, do you know what you’re doing? And he said, if they turned around and said, Yeah, I know what I’m doing. He’s like, they don’t know what to say. But if they turn around and go, nope, he’s like, I know, they’re fine. And I leave him alone. So I’ve always kept that you have always kept that in mind. You know, people like you know what you’re doing. I’m like, Nope, I don’t know shit. It’s always my answer. But it’s true. You know? If you if you go talk to somebody, hey, you do what you’re doing over there. They’re like, Oh, yeah, I know what I’m doing. I’ve done this before. They probably have no fucking idea what. But,

Unknown Speaker 1:03:11
but you know, the other motorcycles like even even in that same series. The bike that Paul Jr. Made was badass. I mean, had airplane pillars, four wheels. Oh, his creativity.

Roy Merritt 1:03:25
I mean,

Unknown Speaker 1:03:27
they’re they’re so beautiful. I mean, you might not you might not want to ride it across the country but

Roy Merritt 1:03:32
that isn’t what they’re making them No, he’s not making bikes to ride he’s making bikes to show and and i will say without question there. Dude has had some really cool fucking ideas. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:03:42
I mean, those guys are.

Roy Merritt 1:03:44
watch that show. And you know when he starts you know, take it weird shit and turn it into something else. You’re like, What the fuck are you doing? But damn near everything. He did look good. Yeah, you know, when it was all said and done. It looked good. You know, he did let the you know the infamous Black Widow bike. You know what he did with the webbing and everything on there was so goddamn popular after that. Everybody was fucking doing it, sir. You know what I mean? everybody at home was talking cut little goddamn thing. Just make a webs on their shit. Yeah. So in Orlando, we’re going down on my, I guarantee you Well, maybe not so much now. But 10 years ago, you could walk into that parking lot at any given time. And there was at least two or three bikes with the stupid fucking hand. Well, it was all over on like, the biggest piece of shit. You know? shadow 650 with you know, like a six foot tall shitty ass welded fucking rebar goddamn sissy bar on it. And you know, but look back

Unknown Speaker 1:04:45
at look back in the 70s those bikes were piles of crap. Oh, yeah. I mean, they did the same thing. They took these whoop Dee ass motorcycles welded a bunch of fucking weird ass shit on them and wrote them around. And then like, it’s kind of like the old west now, you know? I mean, you guys all this stuff on your like, That was when it was awesome. No, it was not yet he’ll be. You know, Denver’s choppers was like the epitome and nobody had those bikes is too expensive. So those guys were wining and dining guys that could afford a $10,000 motorcycle when all the bikes were too

Roy Merritt 1:05:17
Yeah. What a chopper those Denver that that one that Sam’s got

Unknown Speaker 1:05:22
that one in Sam’s is. I mean, it’s great.

Roy Merritt 1:05:24
You know, somebody was giving him shit. I don’t know if you heard about that. But somehow, some guy on the internet was giving him shit about showing a bike that he didn’t build. It was like, Oh, so people are just buying bikes now and show them and getting awards for him. The fuck seems like, What the fuck are you talking about? He’s like, this is a survivor bike. It’s like he hasn’t been seen in a show in 20 fucking years or more. You know, he’s like, I’m not showing it as I built it. I’m showing you as the Deborah’s Chopra is its original that has original paint that is in original condition that nobody seen in 20 plus years, you know, this is a big deal. And for somebody not to understand that you’re obviously you obviously don’t get it, you know, and

Unknown Speaker 1:06:11
that’s gonna happen 20 years from now with Jesse bikes, and with Brooke by Yeah, otherwise,

Roy Merritt 1:06:15
anything. I mean, well, and that’s what the guy said, Well, I build my chopper in my you know, in myself, and I show it so you know, of course,

Unknown Speaker 1:06:23
you didn’t get an award. So don’t

Roy Merritt 1:06:24
be sold. That was my first response was OK. So in 20 years, is somebody going to fucking show one of your survivors because how awesome it is.

Unknown Speaker 1:06:31
Yeah. Because your name is so

Roy Merritt 1:06:32
well known? Yeah. No, they’re not.

Unknown Speaker 1:06:35
john smith. Yeah.

Roy Merritt 1:06:36
And so you know, he, Sam seems like, you know, Facebook, Instagram, stalking the guy, of course. Pictures and he’s like, motherfucker, look at this. This is where he got his fucking frame from the guy that made it. He’s like, Look, here. He’s picking his shit up from the fucking painter. Oh, yeah. you built your fucking bike? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like, dude, calm down, calm down. He’s like, this motherfucker says he built his like, you didn’t build shit. And that’s the problem. That’s That’s the difference. People were like, Oh, I built my bike. Will you put it together? Or you built it? Because there’s a difference? You know? So

Unknown Speaker 1:07:10
I think I think the real difference now is

Unknown Speaker 1:07:15
there are so many manufacturers of parts. Yeah. Like 30 years ago, there weren’t Yeah, you know what I mean, there wasn’t this huge Chinese market or manufacturing facilities that somebody could just go I think I want to make coffin fuel tanks today that there wasn’t a machine learning.

Unknown Speaker 1:07:36
Technology just wasn’t there.

Unknown Speaker 1:07:38
You know, I have an original coffin gas tank from like 1968 that I had on on one of my old iron heads. And I have a s&s dual throat carburetor I kept those you heard the rest of the bike was a death trap. So I sold that bitch and let somebody else die but I kept the God of the coffin gas tank, IZ bars that were like from the 50s sometimes I made them I didn’t trust them. I thought they’re gonna break but you know now you can just go to 10 cycling. Yeah by repub shit. And it’s all you know, made in Malaysia or whatever. But back then you somebody made that they didn’t have like a company that made coffin fuel tanks, or like those alien gas tanks now. I mean, you have like, built well, master craftsman lowbrow Ted cycle. I mean, there’s like 15 or 20 different manufacturers now that all make repub shit in some and that’s what I think makes the difference in like Bike Week. And you know, where I was saying where back in the day when you would show up. Everything was so interesting and so cool, because guys were doing it themselves. And now as you go, it’s just a few seed already in the catalog. That’s Yeah, and they do.

Roy Merritt 1:08:49
Yeah, they do. It all Yeah. But you know, I bet you when you go to the backer show, if there’s 12 bikes there, seven of them are bad. It’s like no real backers. Okay, so if you have

Unknown Speaker 1:09:07
a West Coast

Unknown Speaker 1:09:10
backer nation or

Roy Merritt 1:09:12
Paul UF dirty bird, dirty bird dirty bird. Okay. Yeah. But like the baggers with the back ends and all that so much of that stuff I good and they do great work. Don’t get me wrong.

Unknown Speaker 1:09:22
Now, honestly, they like the whole, like super hot rod performance bagger thing is becoming a we’re making it a thing.

Unknown Speaker 1:09:32
But I think that the old choppers are coming back again, which is cool. You know, I mean, shovel heads and old choppers never go away. Well, yeah, but you know, they they kind of lose their fervor for and then when you actually have to ride one for an extended period of time to ride. No, I mean, I mean, like they just like they were there was a pretty good especially with, like, right around when the MH came out. And someone has sort that worked out much money. I mean, nobody wanted them. You know, they they’re just coming to investors got a hold of them.

Unknown Speaker 1:10:02
Well, yeah, the hipsters like everything. That

Roy Merritt 1:10:04
was cool. That’s, that’s always I laugh about this all the time. Like fucking goddamn hipsters. What are you talking about? I’m like, a fucking like all the cool shit. It’s like they keep taking all my cool shit and fucking Rooney now. Yeah. And I’m one of those guys that like, I could fucking Leah. I love PB.

Unknown Speaker 1:10:24
fucking hate that. God damn it. That’s the grossest beer I

Roy Merritt 1:10:27
ever drank. I drank so drunk off PBR. And it was because

Unknown Speaker 1:10:31
you couldn’t afford

Roy Merritt 1:10:32
to good beer. Oh, you’re right. It was because it was $2

Unknown Speaker 1:10:37
and now now, now they’re like, you know, can I get a talk at a PBR? They’re like, that’ll be 950 I’m like are you kidding me? Yeah 30 fucking pack DVR for 950 that’s the only reason we drink it the ship made you sick your stomach Yeah,

Roy Merritt 1:10:50
but no you and it’s like that with anything you know the what is it the cage fighter bars that you like? Yeah, and I like we like I should say, you know it’s like damn it dude. I can’t put them on my bike because of the setup. I’m gonna have everything long story blah blah blah can’t run them but I want them so bad. I know what’s gonna happen these fuckers are going to pop up on everything and then I’m going to get something I can put them on and I’m not gonna want to get everybody else’s got it now I don’t want that shit. So I do that all the time. But that was cool. Dixon flannels a perfect fucking example. Great product. Like nothing bad to say about it. It makes great look at shirts. You haven’t seen me in idiom? Because everybody else in the fucking shop? Where’s that?

Unknown Speaker 1:11:40
I don’t

Unknown Speaker 1:11:41
know. Why mine Yeah, I’m like fuck it I’m not wear it yet.

Unknown Speaker 1:11:47
But yet, I only got the socks. Yeah.

Roy Merritt 1:11:51
I agree. I would wear it. And they are really good. They’re really good shirts. They’re little pricey for me but again, good quality everything but nope, everybody else is wearing I’m not gonna happen.

Unknown Speaker 1:12:06
I’m gonna get you a free one and then you’ll wear it.

Roy Merritt 1:12:07
Oh, I’ll wear a free one. But yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:12:09
but they all say something. You know, like, like I want a la choppers one I’m gonna hit Marshall for the after I make the video because those are those are like red and then they have their in the now I’m like you know what I just want to I just want Dixon’s that all the from the internet from the other manufacturers selection, so I can collect

Roy Merritt 1:12:27
like the prediction finals with other people shit on me. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 1:12:32
Fuck all the regular Dixon’s I just want la choppers and s&s cycles and and this you know, this one’s a what the upcountry red dragon was called

Roy Merritt 1:12:40
totally run looking at embroidery machines How odd is this? But for this reason like like like you have their that Embroidered Shirt and I want to make patches

Unknown Speaker 1:12:51
if you do that we should make super badass patches associate like you’re a fucking cock sucker. Oh yeah, so people look out they’ll be like God damn.

Roy Merritt 1:13:02
For those who

Unknown Speaker 1:13:03
don’t know

Unknown Speaker 1:13:06
what is your shirts?

Unknown Speaker 1:13:07
Yeah, read it. Well,

Roy Merritt 1:13:09
you know what I said for those that don’t know my work jacket says smart ass white black. And almost nobody can see it and not say anything. People are like, Oh, I love your passionately fake you. You know, I had a guy in a gas station one day was like, oh, smart ass white boy. Oh, no, it Nope. And handed me my car. And he just kind of looked perplexed and I was like, I don’t think he got it. He got it. Yeah, I was trying to be funny just having a good time with the guy but you can’t laugh when you do that you’re gonna play it straight. So I was like, nope, give him my card and he was like but you know, that’s the way it works. But yeah, you know, people my wife had asked something was talking about doing a talk in burlap patch and I was gonna put it because I have a Harley tech shirt if you will one of their you know orange and black and white shirts with my patches and everything on it and I was like all man I put it in put it right over here and put it on my Harley shirt be cool, you know, mix it with everything else.

And she’s like, well, we really let you do that at work. And I was like, first off it’s my fucking shirt.

Unknown Speaker 1:14:35
And I was like secondary

Unknown Speaker 1:14:36
laws illegal things like I got smart

Roy Merritt 1:14:38
ass white boy on my fucking jacket. I’m pretty sure talking baffled be okay with that. I don’t even wear work anyways. You don’t I mean, so. You know, not a big deal. We got to talk about it a little because we said next time we get together we’re gonna we’re going to get back on the subject that we the last episode. Yeah, the last episode, which was electric bikes. We had a big announcement today from Harley and they bought a company called stay sick. Stay sick makes if you haven’t seen him, it’s sta si si y si si si. Si y si. sta si yc. It’s looks like a Strider or balanced bike with a DL battery strapped on the front of it. And it’s a little electric bike and these things cook. They do man I

Unknown Speaker 1:15:28
burn donuts in the showroom with it. Yeah, I leaned it over on its side twisted to throw I have pictures

Roy Merritt 1:15:33
on my Instagram of a grown man riding one around the flat track he made four or five laps on and I think at least a couple. He was much slower than everything else now. I watched there’s an event above his family’s daughter who couldn’t have been bored maybe three or four ride that thing around the pits and in the back the whole time we were there loving it. It’s something I’m probably going to end up getting for my kid. It’s something that we sell in our shop. Yeah, and we kind of maybe had a little foresight on to the product and what it what it could mean for the brand and we were kind of ready trying to do this already you know before Harley jumped on board so it’s really cool check it out. They say third quarter will will get our Harley branded little bikes and this fits right in with Harley’s announcements that they were going to put out you know, however many bikes it was in the next 10 years. This makes five electric bikes if you count the stay sick is to David 12 inches 16 so you count that as two you got the scooter scooter bike you got the Live Wire that’s five electric bikes in the last what four or five bumps

Unknown Speaker 1:16:49
I’m not sure when the when the mountain bike associate but I think the scooter is like you know this year

Roy Merritt 1:16:57
yeah, I don’t remember what they said about that.

Unknown Speaker 1:16:59
And it’s gonna be for thousand bucks.

Roy Merritt 1:17:00
Yeah, they did. They said we were all four grand which is about right. Oh, another really good one that we seen today. fuel.

Unknown Speaker 1:17:08
Oh, yeah. By DO

Roy Merritt 1:17:10
Yeah. Eric. was supposedly I will now maybe I got spooked. Maybe I got spooked or something on RT. Bruce. I’ll read

Unknown Speaker 1:17:18
it. I showed you all of the A Well, I don’t see how it can be 30 $200

Roy Merritt 1:17:22
Yeah, the price point seems ridiculous.

Unknown Speaker 1:17:24
Especially the way it looked. Yeah, it looks

Roy Merritt 1:17:27
kind of like a if you were to the best way I could describe this as if you were to take an electric bike that was designed in the 50s and somewhat modern it is it that’s what I picture because it’s a very

Unknown Speaker 1:17:45
like thin, narrow,

Roy Merritt 1:17:47
there’s very narrow and long and solid.

Unknown Speaker 1:17:49
It looks to me like a house packed. You know those you know those bikes they have that they do like the speed racing. And they have like the weird long comical helmets and stuff. Yeah. And they’re all they’re all a couple of springs on the front. It looks like one of the Tron motorcycles aspect. One of those at like

Roy Merritt 1:18:06
200 miles an hour. Yeah, it’s very interesting to look at real flight features. I definitely want to do some more research digital before we do our next episode. See if it’s real. Yeah, yeah, just to see what the real legit is because you know, Bo likes to flex fuel. He likes to run his mouth a lot. He’s kind of like, he reminds me of the guy from Tesla. What’s his name? Ilan. Ilan musk. He likes to run his mouth. He likes to like tell people how cool he is. You know what I mean? And how smart he is and how already works.

Unknown Speaker 1:18:40
So should have taken that job with Bombardier. Yeah, he would have been designing Indians, and they probably wouldn’t have looked so shitty how

Roy Merritt 1:18:49
Indian says he should feel sure. Yeah, I kid. I always kind of

Unknown Speaker 1:18:56
somebody looks at one of those chieftains and they’re like this. So great. I’m like the hand controls of the size of 16 ounce frickin mason jars. Yeah, I

Roy Merritt 1:19:04
always kind of liked everything that are your head of hands on. Pretty much when I find out my hobby. And I really like just regular people design that I’m like, What? The weirdest shit that I mean the guy tried for sure. Yeah, I mean he he innovated a lot of shit man the you know the oil in the swing arm and the good the are the gaps in the frame. Well, the downdraft exhaust that was all Yeah, I mean, but but you’re seeing other manufacturers, the again, the exhaust being the muffler sitting underneath of the bike in the center of mass Where should be almost all manufactured. It was parked on

Unknown Speaker 1:19:41
the dual sport touring bike, that BMW makeup wasn’t the first. Eric bill made that first. Yeah, the deal. Ulysses was the first one.

Roy Merritt 1:19:50
Yeah, and and, but like I said, there were so many little innovations on those bikes that get overlooked, that the guy definitely needs some credit on. But you know, apart from that, back on to kind of the electric bike thing. I think we all agree that there is a new segment of the market that is just opening up. That includes people that none of us considered before people that normally would consider a motorcycle, that are going to get on these electric mountain bikes and these electric scooters and things like that, and ride and get introduced to a brand that they would not normally have a personal introduction to like that. And we talked about it at work today, you know, the stay sick and the Harley thing and and one of the things I’ve been wanting to talk about on an episode was what do we do for the future of motorcycling. And to me that is Strider, stay sick. You know, bicycles, scooters, and you have to hit the kids. And the reason for that is the same reason that right now old Japanese bikes and old Harley’s are as popular as they are, is because the people buying those are the same people that when they were kids, or younger, had fun on those bikes and remember, or new people that had fun on those bikes. And remember that time and want to get back to that memory, if you will. And as Harley puts kids on these electric stay six, and all these strikers and all these other bikes with Harley’s brand on them, that’s what’s going to happen is they’re going to grow up on two wheels. They’re going to come back later in life and when they can afford to ride a big boy motorcycle, if you will. They’re going to come straight to Harley Davidson don’t think it’s a brand that once you’re introduced to his heart, easy to shake, you know?

Unknown Speaker 1:21:57
Well, I, they’re not that but

Unknown Speaker 1:22:02
my sister bought a car one time. She said it to me, and it’s stuck. She she was thinking about a Lexus, and Mercedes. Ok.

Unknown Speaker 1:22:15
So my sister makes a lot more money than me. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 1:22:21
And so she test drove the Lexus. And then she just drove the Mercedes. And she she said she couldn’t make up her mind. And the salesman said, Well, I never heard anyone say I wish I would have bought them Lexus when they were driving a Mercedes. And that is stuck with me, because that is absolutely 100% true. Yeah. No one has ever no one I’ve ever talked to had a Mercedes and said, I sure wish I would have bought a Toyota. Yeah. And I have never The only people I’ve ever heard talk shit about Harley Davidson. These are people that either I had no idea what they were getting involved in, or people that for some reason, feel like they can’t afford the name. You know, one of my favorite things in this business is the path as we call it, at my bio dealer, it was a poker run that we did, I do not understand how that can be your favorite thing.

Roy Merritt 1:23:20
And the reason I say this is as and for those out there that don’t know what this is, is it pretty much every viewer does this that I know of at least Harley. And when you buy a bike, you basically walk around and you’re introduced to each department and the people in those departments and how they work and what what kind of service they can provide to you. If you ride a metric bike, you’re probably very foreign to this because when you bought your bike, they probably kicked you out the door and said have a nice fucking life. For the for the most part, that was always my experience in the metric world was they pretty much didn’t give a shit after I signed the papers. And hardly, it’s not that way. And this is why this is part of my favorite, or one of the favorite parts of my job is because I get to talk to people who have never owned a Harley Davidson before and have owned other bikes. And I always get a smile on my face when I get to talk to him about that. And I say, Well, yeah, and you know, you pull up the p amp a book that’s like a freakin phone book. Yeah, you know, and immediately pop down on the counter and you go, how many times did you go into your Honda dealer and try to get cool shit for your bike. And you just see the look on their face and you go, yeah, you don’t do that. Shut it down to do or do anything. They’re always like, No, you don’t. You said Yeah. When you want to do cool shit to your bike, come talk to me, we’ll do it.

Unknown Speaker 1:24:46
Or try of

Roy Merritt 1:24:47
your Yama when you want to go find somebody to ride with or something to do. Did you go to your Honda dealer? Well, no. When you want somebody to ride with, you want something to do? Come up here. There’s always somebody here wants to ride. There’s always something going on up here. You know that the way Harley Davidson dealerships especially promote the culture and the atmosphere and if you’re doing it right as a dealer, this is what sets Harley Davidson apart from every other manufacturer it is a reason we sell more bikes is the reason that people come back bike after bike after bike is because it’s a family you know and then that’s the way it should be represented by a good dealer is you know and I tell people when they’re on the path man you’re going to come in even if you don’t have shit to do come in and bullshit with us you know get to know the guys over in parts of the people over in service we have a good fucking time when we’re here Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:25:47
we get guys come in every Saturday

Roy Merritt 1:25:48
yeah and and we and and the more you get to know us I was like dude, you might come in one day and we might just finished I know at 124 Motors something cool you never know what’s going on in here. And sometimes you walk in at the right time and we just opened a box of polished you know important polished heads that look you know like diamonds in and you’re standing there going oh, I want those I know a good look at those by the way. Yeah, I still haven’t either. I know

Unknown Speaker 1:26:17
Brian Brian said had

Unknown Speaker 1:26:21
yours. Okay, good. Oh, no.

Roy Merritt 1:26:23
Yeah. But you know, in the end we’re always doing cool shit in the shop. We have really cool people I think that work there. We have a really great atmosphere and we had to sit my last shop to and and I promote that to people is like, Look, you know, yeah, finally see you every four or five months would you need a service? You’re going to get that service and that’s that’s the quality of service. I only quality service I give you. I don’t know you. I don’t know anything about you. I barely know your name. I still last time I saw you was six months ago, you know? But if you come in every once in a while and Oh, hey, you know, Bob, blah, blah, and I know your name. The next time you come in, I’m going to be like, hey, Tony, how you doing? Man? You know, what are you doing today? Oh, how was your trip down to South Carolina? I can’t know these things unless you’re coming into the shop get into those you know, and those customers that do are the customers that you know, come back and spend money when it’s all said and done. Because they get to know you they said man these guys know what they’re doing. They know they’re going to treat me right they’re gonna give me a good deal. This is something I want you know, and I think it’s like I said it’s that’s the favorite part of my job is grabbing those people that rode metric bikes and other stuff and getting a taste for what it feels like your first entrance into this and I’ve so many times I’ve had people have been like, this has been amazing. You know, I never I bought a dozen bikes. And I’ve never had an experience like this before. And not just you know at our shop at other shops you know, that tried to do the same thing. I’ve heard it many times because I don’t care what anybody says totally true. The metric world and the Harley world when it comes to dealership life and going into buying stuff, two completely different animals without question.

Unknown Speaker 1:28:10
Oh yeah, for sure.

Roy Merritt 1:28:13
You know, just motor clothes. It’s in itself is something you don’t get for the most part. I mean, you might get a helmet rack you might get some dirt bike shit. You know what I mean? So

Unknown Speaker 1:28:24
most most of the metric shops have like they concentrate on you TVs a DVDs and dirt bikes. Yeah, so to larger you might you might have like four or five Joe rocket.

Roy Merritt 1:28:37
Yeah, jackets probably done your size.

Unknown Speaker 1:28:40
You know, whatever it may be at least in my size. Yeah. And a few helmets they’re gonna have like rack after rack after rack of dirt bike shit. Yeah, because it’s cheap. And that’s what everybody’s there to buy. I mean, come on. Know What was that? What was that that bike that Honda made the turn that there was a like a chopper looking at fury

Roy Merritt 1:29:01
fury here was like the ridiculous motorcycle. It’s actually you know, Jonas show my ass here because I actually thought it was a decent looking bike. It was underpowered and it handled like shit. That was a real problem.

Unknown Speaker 1:29:15
Well, he was like Honda’s version of the

Unknown Speaker 1:29:20
the soft tail. The rocker

Roy Merritt 1:29:24
OI fury before I bought a rock.

Unknown Speaker 1:29:30
But you know, you know what I you know, the thing that sucks? is it like? I remember back in the 80s when the metric bikes were metric, and they looked like that. I mean, they just looked Yeah, like a Yamaha. You know, I had a Yamaha 650 maximum. Yeah, I had a Honda v 65 Magna. You know, you had the Yamaha V max. I mean, those were super badass powerful cruising bikes, and for some reason, they’re so scared to do that. Yeah, they’re coming back, which is cool. If you see some of the new Yamazaki and Kawasaki that look is starting to come back and they’re starting to get back to their roots.

Unknown Speaker 1:30:10
Or something like that here pretty soon so

Unknown Speaker 1:30:11
just don’t understand why they why they

Roy Merritt 1:30:14
couldn’t reach your style bike. I don’t know why but to me,

Unknown Speaker 1:30:19
they’re trying

Roy Merritt 1:30:20
to really do factors cannot handle big disk. Big displacement v twins. I don’t know people talk about Harley’s big loud, but until you ride like a cow Saki motor noise Oh my god. Oh my god, dude account Saki McKerrow. I wrote one like a 12 or 13 was brand new demo rights. I got back and I was working at Harley at the time. And I got back from riding that and they got sick. What do you think it was agreed fucking kidding me. He’s like, what do you be? That was like I said, I work for Harley. And I hear people complain about motor noise. I said if this thing was a Harley, I would tear the motor down.

Unknown Speaker 1:30:58
Sounds like hell. I got the phone today complained to me. Like after writing several MH he’s like you find me to be a tricky motor. tricky. No. I’m like maybe it’s because everything else around the bike is so quiet. You’re hearing a little bit of our train noise Keep quiet.

Unknown Speaker 1:31:18
That’s the guy that you needed. Are you gonna give me the one that you like? Like say let me ask you a question, buddy. Yeah, are you buying something from me? Or do you want advice? Would you do since the YouTube videos

Roy Merritt 1:31:33
are getting a lot of a lot of hits. Merritt advice I’ve been

Unknown Speaker 1:31:36
buried is good. I’m Hey, man. I’m cool with it. Yeah, but yeah, a lot of if you haven’t checked out the YouTube channel, please do check it out. There’s a whole lot of good information there.

Roy Merritt 1:31:44
That’s HD cool springs will give them the shout out this time. They we do two cool videos Mike and Aaron. Mainly they do some cool videos that start starting to gain a lot of traction. A lot of people in the industry are noticing. We’re doing a lot of cool stuff. It’s interesting. It’s fun. We have we have a good time. When you get into this stuff you open up you always open up haters, you always open up the the lanes for people to critique and say what they want

Unknown Speaker 1:32:17
that to about the guy that left a comment. Does anybody else feel like they’re dumber after the first five minutes? Or no, he said, he said Am I the only one that feels like I’m dumber after watching the first five minutes of this? And I answered probably.

Unknown Speaker 1:32:31
Yeah,

Roy Merritt 1:32:32
well, you know, and I got you know, I got the the letters the first day, first day after you guys weren’t working. They thought it was terrible. So we gotta work on this in the future. Don’t fucking release videos on Saturday night. Okay, I’m not because no mother fuckers in there. And this guy calls me This is so great. The guy calls me He says, Yeah, he’s an old God. whole country gay. Yeah. Well, first off, I just want to thank you for that YouTube videos. Really good video, you know, blah, blah, blah. And I said, Okay, well, yeah, no problem. He says, Well, you know, I just wanted to send some suggestions and you know, had some critiques for the video. And I know that and 50 cents might get you a cup of coffee, but I figured I’d send it anyways. And you know, you guys being there in the heart of Nashville, I really would have thought you guys would have been playing country? Oh, yeah. Not horrible death metal, you know? And he starts going into it. He’s like, Well, is there somebody I can send this to? And I was like, Yes, there is. I said that directly to my email, which is my email. I was just I literally hung up the phone and looked up at the sky and said, Oh, God, please let this email come through.

Unknown Speaker 1:33:41
So How awesome would it be if he listens to this tonight? Well, that’d be great. Yeah.

Roy Merritt 1:33:46
It really wasn’t that bad.

Unknown Speaker 1:33:47
But nobody was super funny.

Roy Merritt 1:33:49
Yeah, no, it was great to get the feedback in there. And the guy you know, he sounded like at least either he read some really good for smart people for reviews or whatever, or the guy knew a lot a little bit about motor builds. Because you he wasn’t a complete idiot. But you’re in the end.

Unknown Speaker 1:34:05
forums. forum. Yeah. We got another one. I was waiting for you all to fall. I went first.

Unknown Speaker 1:34:12
What you’re dropping,

Unknown Speaker 1:34:14
man, man down to maybe errors. I knows.

Roy Merritt 1:34:18
Yeah. So anyways, you know, long story short. You know, we’re talking, we talked a little bit about the flat track racing, cool stuff going on. I’ve posted lots of pictures on Instagram of it. And I’m going to throw out to the future here. I try to keep the content fresh and clean on there. I have LinkedIn I have Facebook all those are on the website. Check about it’s talking rap calm. You give us a call. We have yet to get anybody leave us a good message yet. And it’s 30460272 to seven or 30460 burn app. You know, we’re waiting for the calls are waiting for the good messages. Haters will take a you know, especially if you’re funny. I’ll play that shit. No problem.

Unknown Speaker 1:35:13
I’ll read them will read it right back.

Roy Merritt 1:35:15
Yeah, absolutely. So

Unknown Speaker 1:35:17
tell it tell us what you hate.

Unknown Speaker 1:35:18
Yeah, hate hate, hate, hate, hate, hate. Hate. Give us your hair.

Roy Merritt 1:35:23
Yeah, it was a bit of you. Excuse me. I’m gonna go home and put some water but nasty is one of my favorite lines. That’s like, Oh, yeah, that’s nice. You know, in the end, we missed out on the guys from the flat track tonight. So I don’t know if that was a signal issue or what? They’re out there in the middle of nowhere, so I am not overly surprised. So I’m sorry, I’ve read messages here. The heck?

Unknown Speaker 1:36:00
No.

Roy Merritt 1:36:02
I got my phone’s been blowing up and I didn’t even I didn’t even listen to it, I guess. But

Unknown Speaker 1:36:13
where is the winner for tonight?

Roy Merritt 1:36:15
Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 1:36:16
I mean, I mean, all the way through made all the way I don’t know how you’re doing it. I’ve got a PI dude. Doing it. Yeah, guys, you have to understand he’s working the console over here. So pretty much if he doesn’t work it pretty much fucked

Roy Merritt 1:36:27
the. So we Yeah, we’re gonna we’re gonna wind this down. I think we killed enough time. Hoping my music starts up here again. cold outside. It is fucking cold outside. So I wrote it. I wrote in the other morning, it was 1715 to 17 degrees and I left the house on the bike. Yeah. Yeah, that was my coldest ride and yeah, for sure. And I regretted it.

Unknown Speaker 1:36:55
Here I got some music.

Unknown Speaker 1:37:00
Pleasure gays delivered to you their first

Unknown Speaker 1:37:04
game to present to you this most sacred of scripts. They offer their figurehead to address the flow. This is a weird shit.

Roy Merritt 1:37:21
gays fucking love their name do I can say the gays all day long. Just like over and over again. The gays. Hey, gays. I want to be their hype man. I mean the back leg again

Transcribed by https://otter.ai