Even though there are a handful of threads here like this, these are fun. What has turned into my small novel below...
I grew up riding cheap and affordable Japanese bikes since the age of four, and started racing dirt-track at the age of eight. I’ve been told since a very early age that I'm an old soul. I like heritage and evolution when it comes to any machines, though I also really appreciate newer tech.
My grandfather, my Mom’s Dad, was a commercial electrician by day at the local steel mill, yet a hard-core rider/wrench on the weekends and any time off he could make. He was a tinkerer and inventor which I’m proud to have in my DNA. He was also a founder of one of the motorcycle clubs in Baltimore (Ramblers), who mostly all rode Harleys of course. Except he (third from the right below) was always a bit different. I admired his style, though he was always quite gruff with me.
In his youth he rode and raced HDs, but by the time I was on this earth, only had BMWs (and a Wartburg two-stroke car that he was considering being the first dealer in MD). He used to ride with me (in diapers I'm told) on the tank for hours at a time, much to my Mom's upset. I recall holding onto that crossbar on the bottom pic below. I guess I was 2~3 years old. I loved it, and my parents tell me I cried when I had to get off the bike, even when we got home.
Godspeed "Grandpop" Bill Balsis. Thanks for smiling down and keeping a hand over me all of these years. I'm sure I'm still frustrating to keep an eye on.
His riding style is still vivid in my memory. He ran every gear out to redline, often holding higher RPMs at speed, and he enjoyed dragging hard parts on the ground, much to the anger of my Grandmother who used to hit his back when he did, so the story goes. I have great riding memories with him.
He passed away when I was just ten. But I loved hanging out in his garage torturing him on the weekends, I’m sure, while he worked on his and other people’s "motors" as he and my grandmom called them. He wrenched everything, and owned often rare and obscure bikes, some I still cannot identify. From his youth on HDs and Indians, to rare Euro machines, and even a Vincent Black Shadow. He always had engines apart, and I recall him lapping the valves on his BMW often. His wood-framed, slat board tar-roll shingled, dirt-floor garage that he built himself with a small machine shop (mill, lathe, etc), always had everything in it; HDs to Norton, BSA and Triumphs, including choppers, and many others riding in/out on the weekends.
However, there was one bike that I recall coming in and out and really admiring the look and sound of, and all I retained at the time was the motor layout and an eagle on the tank. Now knowing, that would have been an Ambassador or Eldorado.
As I grew, my parents who both rode until a few years ago, allowed my relentless passion of two wheels as a religion (on every Sunday!), and my financial upbringing kept me on two wheels only until I bought my first car at 19, a Porsche 924 Turbo. Something my (mostly Italian) Dad didn’t understand as a weekend muscle car illegal street and occasional track drag racer. However, I did ride on back with him on his UJMs, until I got my license. A few of his riding buddies had Guzzis.
Once I had financial freedom (as a very young home designer/builder), I was able to purchase some unique brands like BMW & Ducatis in the late 80s and early 90s a few HDs. However those were simple distractions as I was racing as well through those periods. Somehow I still managed to log 75k+ miles per year. Ah youth.
Moto Guzzi really surfaced for me in ‘93 with the Dr. John Daytona 1000. I think it made the Cycle World mag cover when launched. I rode to a Rider Magazine Rally in Pittsburgh, PA to see it. At this Rally I spent most of the afternoon test riding every Guzzi they had there to sample (except the Daytona of course!). Not shockingly, while every other OEM was booked solid, the Guzzi folks were standing around. They were thrilled to go out. Every time we got back, they asked if I wanted to ride another model. I of course obliged, every time until I had ridden them all. My favorite was the green-frame 1000S. While I liked the Daytona 1000 (a LOT), I knew by that point that it was nothing I could own (both financially and) as I felt that "sporting bikes" on the street were too frustrating to enjoy (and still do now) in the numerous "you're in a whole heap of trouble boy" speed-trap tiny towns of the Mid-Atlantic region.
At any early age, It was ingrained in me of how more standard twin cylinder bikes were so much better on the street, by two of my Dad’s riding friends, that became my street riding mentors. They both owned and introduced me to fun “odd” bikes like Yamaha’s XV920E, Honda VT500 Ascot and the Honda NT650 Hawk, which was my first road-racing bike. One of them, Ray, was an ex-factory Triumph trials rider. In 1986 he bought an FLH HD. I joked with him about buying it, but after one ride with him, I was speechless. He made that FLH do things that didn't seem possible. He put me on it many times at 16 yrs old, swapping mid-rides. I am forever grateful. They both really liked Guzzis, though never owned any.
Another good friend that I rode and traded bikes with often, Biff, bought a Sport 1100 that he fitted flat-slides too. That ride is burned into my memory bank.
In the mid 90’s, just before moving to Boston to go back to school for Architecture, I worked at my friend's Moto Shop in Falls Church, VA and did the service on a 1000SP. I offered to buy the bike from the owner, but he said he owned it since new, and would never sell it. Off to Boston I went with only a Buell X1 race bike.
While in Boston, I was only racing (sold the Buell, bought another Hawk GT), so with what little time I had outside of work and school, I rented the only thing easily accessible then (HDs) to explore most of New England... Realizing how much I really missed street riding for a few years. In ‘98, the Cal EV won Cycle World Mag’s (which I inhaled cover to cover from as long as I can remember) Ten Best for the Sport Touring category. What? A Guzzi took the spot from the Japanese that had held this one forever?! Seems the time had finally come for me to own one. But being 31, I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of a faired chrome bagger EV, but I had read the bones of the machine ran away and won an AMA Pro race (at my then home track in Loudon, NH) in the 70’s with Mike Baldwin piloting.
So the quest began. I joined the MGNOC and started bothering the (only local) NH Rep to narrow down my focus. He invited me up to the middle of NH to test ride his carb Sport. He had put handlebars on it, and removed the fairing. Early street fighter. He was way ahead of his time(!). He said to buy as new as I could, and a high-mile daily rider was a best bet, no matter which model it was.
In my local south shore neighborhood, I randomly stopped by a guitar shop to meet a Buell owner that clearly worked there, as the bike sat parked outside every day I went past. After some small talk, he asked me if I knew about the car dealer across the street, that the owner was a moto collector big into Vincents (another lure I had, because of my grandfather owning one). As I casually mentioned Guzzi, he told me that there was one on the floor there, but he couldn’t recall the model. I immediately went over. Sure enough, in the bikes lined the car showroom.. and there it sat, a pristine black ‘74 V7 Sport with 953 miles. It had spent it's life living in someone’s living room in NH. He was asking $9500. I went home considering the possibilities, but I really knew I had to buy a 'ride it far and fast immediately' bike... This one would need a lot of work to made roadworthy, I was told.
But then, days later, in an odd stroke of luck and timing, my good friend working at CW Mag, who knew I was looking for a Guzzi, emailed me an early release sales ad for new stripped down, de-chromed model called the Jackal with a $8495 price tag and a $500 cash back rebate with a 3-year unlimited mile warranty. I immediately printed it and took it to the dealer in Salem, MA. Three weeks later in September of ‘99, I brought it home... and the rest, as they say, is history.
I rode it all over New England and even led a MGNOC group trip to Nova Scotia as the Massachusetts Rep. It then took me literally from Boston to my permanent home here in SoCal in late 2000, logging in ~45k miles in the first year of ownership. I will never sell it.
Fast forward, gulp, ~19 years now, I’ve owned dozens of Guzzis, logging well over 500k+ miles on them. I’ve somehow evolved into building a small business around the brand including the rentals linked at the top of the page.
When asked why Guzzi, I mostly respond with if you merged BMW, Ducati and HD, you have a Guzzi. They get under your skin like no other, as they do everything just right as a street bike. I’ll never not own one (OK, well many).
Viva Guzzi!
) is that I don't have time to write much.
) seriously into pedal bikes. Even rode with a local Italian bunch, Veloce Club Thiene.
