Cannonball Motorcycle Race (September 11, 2010)

A very unique motorcycle event made a stop on September 11 in Concord, NC. The Cannonball Motorcycle Race is being run from Kitty Hawk, NC to California on pre-1916 motorcycles, and they made a stop at Pat Rogers Speedway Harley-Davidson. I went to see them with my wife Patty following an earlier stop (on the way back from Richmond) at the Winston-Salem Air Show. More photos of that event can be found on my "Richmond and Me" blog, plus photos from both events can be found on my Photo Page (a link to that is on this page). The photo at left is of one of the riders coming in to the checkpoint; they came in at different periods, but most of them had arrived when I got to the event around 5:30PM. It was very unique to see 100 year old motorcycles and to hear them running engines that in many cases have long not been in production, or riding bikes that have not been made in decades. Not just taking about bike models not made, but also brands of motorcycles that were just history book items until I visited yesterday!

Here are a few of the bikes, seen lined up along the dealership. They had a real bicycle look to many of them, which is what early motorcycles were taken from. Mechanical breakdowns were common, and the bikes leaked a bit of oil, but they were remarkable to see run, and to hear them was really something. Many of the early features on modern motorcycles could be seen on some of them, and it was really cool to see and smell the engines running. Early engine technology was something to experience, and there were some unique engined on hand, especially the Henderson in-line four.

There was a very big crowd of people there, earlier there was a poker run held, and there had been a band playing. The bikes and the very interesting riders were fun to check out, I also enjoyed seeing the crowd; as typical of a motorcycle event, they were also interesting. Some friends of mine from Concord were also there, and it was good to meet up with them. This event had been in the news a bit, plus I had spread the word and it was good to enjoy it with my wife and some riding buddies along with some former co-workers in Concord. They also had a dinner for the teams which was really nice. Pat Rogers put on a great event.

It was a very fun time, and I was very glad that I made the trip there (the dealership is located near the giant Concord Mills Mall). As noted many more photos of the bikes; I got mostly Harley's on this page, but some of the other brands were even more interesting.
Speaking of interest, got a few more things of note to show, but will save that for the next post here.
I hope you enjoyed these photos of this very unique motorcycle event.