that came in the door at
Bellflower Triumph. It was
Gold over White and rode
even better than his 1963.
It was a keeper!
In 1965 George became
interested in Bonneville
racing when his friend,
Danny Macias took his
1957 Triumph 350cc to
the salt and had turned a
remarkable 120+ MPH!
That was when he decided
to build his own Bonneville
Land Speed race bike.
He started the design by
constructing a hand built
all-aluminum frame into
which he mounted an early
1950’s all alloy close finned TR5 500cc engine. He completed
the bike and was able to run it at El Mirage Dry Lake, Lions
Drag Strip, Orange County International Raceway (OCIR)
and the Fontana Drag Strip and won many races but never
made it to Bonneville with that motorcycle.
In 1971 he quit his good paying job as a machinist for
Douglas Aircraft Company to follow his dream and opened a
motorcycle shop on Pioneer Blvd. in Norwalk, CA - “George’s
Custom Cycle”. At the shop he and his employees built every
make and model of custom bike, Triumph, Honda, Suzuki,
Harley, Yamaha and more, doing everything from extended
front ends with “tweak bars” to full on frame-up customs,
chrome, paint, molded frames, custom upholstery, custom
wheels. He did back then what Jesse James and the Orange
County Choppers do today.
In 1976 one of his employees approached him about
buying the shop. Since the shop had become a gathering
place for the Vago’s, Galloping Goose’s, Devils Henchmen,
Hells Angels and the like, by that time George had tired of
it and took him up on the offer and went back to working as
a machinist in aerospace. He continued to play with bikes,
racing the aluminum framed Triumph and doing some desert
racing until he moved to the Denver area in 1987 and opened
his own machine shop in Englewood, CO.
Since He had liquidated his bike collection, he didn’t end
up getting back in Ѽ