Art, craft and storytelling runs in my family. Despite the proliferation of modern content and media filling our small and large screens as a society, sometimes something new comes along that harkens back to the old, prompting a warm feeling cascading up from the belly to form a smile on my face.

I became aware of Indiana native Chris Sickels of Red Nose Studio and his throw-back 3D illustration and stop-motion animation craft 11 or so years ago after watching this video, and have followed his journey on Instagram and in print and digital interviews.

The stars aligned last week when my friend Dave McLaughlin texted to coordinate a spirited ride from Livermore to Mines Road and up and over Mt Hamilton through San Jose with our pal Ross Shafer. My schedule was open and the roads were calling.

The late-summer heat hadn’t returned to Livermore yet, so our ride through the San Antonio Valley was crisp and fun, with a quick stop at the newly-renovated Junction at Del Puerto Canyon Road. We met several old timers on bikes, and after some BSing climbed the same switchbacks ridden by Lycra-clad Tour of California pros to the Lick Observatory before descending 19 miles into San Jose and back to our respective homes. Last Thursday also happened to be Ross’s 62nd birthday.

Belgian motorcyclist Kim Tiebergyn has accomplished quite a bit in the 11 years since getting his M1 class license. The 32-year-old has become a regular fixture on the professional international bicycle racing circuit, piloting the likes of world-class photographer Tim De Waele. Tiebergyn has racked up an impressive race resume: nine times Tour of Flanders, eight times Paris-Roubaix, seven times Tour de France, seven times Giro d'Italia, seven times Milan-San Remo, and six times La Vuelta a España, to name a few.

Syracuse native Peter Jones still receives correspondence from folks who enjoyed his Cycle World feature story about Sturgis last fall, and that surprises him. I contacted Jones recently to talk motorcycles, and thought it would be fun to interview someone who’s typically doing the interviewing.

What was your upbringing like?

My upbringing was unconventional. We lived in the city until I was 11, and there were no motorcycles in my family until my brothers and I each left home.

Who or what influenced you to become a motorcyclist?

I was 21 when I first got a motorcycle. I was attending college in Florida and it seemed an easy, economical means of transportation. I bought a Kawasaki 175 two-stroke. It had many issues.

In Part 1 of "How Would You Resurrect A 1953 Norton Dominator 88?", California bicycle framebuilder Todd Ingermanson described how he obtained a basket case from New Zealand and the steps he's taken over the past 18 years to breathe new life into a highly desirable machine. Here's Part 2.

“While this list might seem fairly short, all these disparate parts needed one, two, three, or a half dozen parts made to have them mate up to the other parts they were attaching to,” Ingermanson explained. “I became a one-man adapter-making machine. There was a lot of re-doing things that a step or two after completion were found to be in the way of—or somehow otherwise interfering with—another part. It took four attempts to get the rearset placement correct. It took three rebuilds of the gearbox to figure out that a re-pop kickstart pinion was made incorrectly and was locking up the gearbox.”

The bike had been raced. The frame was stripped to the bare minimum. No brackets, centerstand lugs removed, extra holes for rearsets drilled in the frame’s webbing for mounting the swingarm, etc. The frame—one of the first-generation Norton featherbed frames—had a bolt-up subframe (exactly what BMW did on its boxers from the ’70s) and was the year before the British company braced and gusseted the headstock on the road-going bikes.

Not only had this frame been raced, it appeared to have been crashed a time or two. The subframe was twisted, as was the swingarm, and there were a few small scattered dents. In the crate with the frame was a 500cc iron head motor from a Dominator 77, an AMC gearbox, some mismatched wheels, a Lucas magneto, a pair of rusty Roadholder forks, and a handful of parts for Todd Ingermanson to try and make a motorbike out of. Of all the contents of that crate, only the front half of the frame remains on the bike.

On a clear June morning, I rode 150 miles to Sea Ranch, California, to interview a vacationing rock guitarist. He's 62 years old, lives in Los Angeles, and a few days prior, rode a loaner Scrambler Ducati 1100 Sport from Foothill College in Los Altos Hills. His pal Jason had arranged to hand off the Sport for a week of riding in western Mendocino County, where Jonesy often vacations to clear his head from the craziness of LA.

Steve Jones is the host of "Jonesy's Jukebox," a popular radio show on 95.5 KLOS in Los Angeles. The former Sex Pistols guitarist is considering a major move to northern California if he can find the right property. I rode a Scrambler Ducati 1100 Special three hours north to meet Jonesy, who was funny, relaxed, and more keen to talk about bikes than music.

We recently reconnected with Lindsay and his wife Estelle at their home on Skyline Boulevard just north of Alice’s Restaurant in Woodside, about 30 minutes from our place here in Silicon Valley. They just celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary, and it was lovely catching up. I’ve shared many glorious pedal strokes on memorable group rides with Lindsay, and my recent return to cycling reawakened fond memories of our long chats about Eddy Merckx, Greg LeMond and European cycling.

When Joe Parkin launched Paved Magazine in 2010, he asked if I had any article ideas to contribute. Without hesitation I pitched him two stories: one about the luminaries of American cycling (Ben Serotta, Gary Erickson, Steve Hed and Jim Ochowicz), and another about the legend of former United Airlines pilot Lindsay Crawford. The former appeared in Volume 1, the latter Volume 2, in the spring of 2011. 

In Part One, I spoke with Maynard Hershon about his early motorcycle days, racing hare scrambles and doing hill climbs. We touched on several interesting historical facts, and due to our continued friendship and his legacy, I’m republishing Part Two of my interview with him from August 2017 here.

How and when did you start piloting motorcycles during domestic bicycle races? How many years did you do that?

I was working for Winning Magazine in the ‘80s when the Coors Classic stage race came to California (from Colorado). Because I was a “bicycle media hotshot” and could ride a motorcycle, when I asked if I could help with the race, I got a flattering yes.

The name Maynard Hershon is familiar to avid bicyclists and motorcyclists. For years the Midwest native’s byline appeared in several cycling publications, including Winning and VeloNews. His books Tales From The Bike Shop and Half-Wheel Hell are both dog-eared best sellers. But Hershon has lived a double life for decades, also writing for a handful of motorcycle publications, namely CityBike.