Steve Hamel

Steve’s Vincent was ten horses up on last year’s figure when he ran it on the Silverback dyno shortly before leaving for this year’s Bonneville event. Much of that power came about because of a major change in cam duration. Given the fact that this is a Vincent, Steve can’t just order a new camshaft from Crane or Andrews. Essentially he had to make his own camshafts, with individual cam lobes ordered from friends at Zipper’s performance. Now most people, even very talented people, would be intimidated by the idea of creating their own camshaft. First, you have to get the lobes indexed correctly so the timing is right, second you have to weld the lobes to the shaft without any warpage. And of course the lobes meant for Harleys come with pretty steep ramps, which is not a problem for the Harleys with their roller lifters. Before Steve could even use the cam profiles from Zipper’s he had to first locate a roller-follower set up designed for Vincents, from a company in Australia.

All of which goes to show just how tough it is to build a competitive race bike based on designs that are over 60 years old. Like any good racer, Steve is never satisfied. When I asked him what’s next, he said, “more RPM. We’re running to 8,000 now, next year I want to turn 9,000.” How do you make an old V-Twin turn 9,000 RPM? With a shorter stroke and bigger bore.

Stay tuned.

Look closely and you can see that this is a one-off, hand built camshaft. Underneath is the drawing for the roller cam follower.

A man in his element, Steve Hamel, surrounded by mills and lathes and exotic parts for old motorcycles.

Cannon Falls is just far enough out of the city to provide a nice low-stress, small town location for an eclectic and (in some cases) eccentric group of motorcycles riders. While most of us assume these bikes are too valuable to actually ride, many of the bikes at the rally did indeed get there without the benefit of a trailer.

Real bikers drink Leinenkugel beer – this is the parking lot at the Friday night barbecue.

The Black Shadow owned by Carl Hungness made it all the way from Madison, Indiana to Cannon Falls, a distance that Google calculates as just shy of 700 miles. Another Shadow carried its rider from Colorado. I stopped at the headquarters hotel on Thursday afternoon, and it was nice to see these very valuable motorcycles parked helter skelter under the canopy, covered in road grime and equipped with home-made saddle bags and tour pacs.

Carl Hungness, the man who rode his Vincent from the southeastern corner of Indiana, to Cannon Falls Minnesota, a distance or roughly 700 miles.

When it comes to riding Vincents, one member stands out head and shoulders above the rest. Marty Dickerson from California didn’t ride a Vincent to the rally. What Marty Dickerson did do is ride Steve Hamel’s Vincent to a one-way speed of 157.3 miles per hour at the Bonneville Salt Flats this year during the Bub event. Did I mention the fact that Marty is 83 years old, and has ridden at Bonneville almost every year since 1950.

Kind of gives the rest of us something to shoot for as the sand slips through the hour-glass.

Owned by Steve Hamel, this is the bike that Marty used to turn a one-way speed of 157.3.

Marty Dickerson, the man who first rode a bike at Bonneville in 1950, and has ridden almost every year since, including 2009.