Neil was born January 14th, 1929 in San Francisco, Cal. Within 1 year, his family moved to Sierra Madre, Cal. (Next door to Pasadena)
Early in his life, he was fascinated with machinery, cars, and motorcycles. He bought his first motorcycle at age 16, a Harley-Davidson V twin, and rode mostly off road in any vacant lot he could find. Soon he was taking the Harley out to the Mojave Desert to ride, and began participating in the organized desert races.
Neil was drafted into the Army in the early 50’s and was stationed at Fort Ord and Fort Baker, Cal. Since he was already an accomplished motorcycle rider, he was given the job of motorcycle police officer.
Upon his discharge, he moved back to his hometown and took a job as a Pasadena police department motorcycle officer. Although he rode a motorcycle all day 5 days a week, he couldn’t get enough riding time in and every weekend he was out in the Mojave desert campaigning his 200cc Dot in the weekly AMA District 37 desert races and enduro’s.
Neil relates a story about his possible contribution to the invention of the "blewie" pipe...
One year I was riding my Dot in the Greenhorn Enduro. The factory exhaust pipe consisted of a short header pipe which then connected to a two-piece "can" several inches in diameter with a bolt running through the can to hold it together, and then a tail pipe which took the exhaust out along the side of the bike. Somewhere along the course, the bolt vibrated out and the "can" came apart. I stopped to fix it, but having no spare bolt; I strapped the tailpiece on the back fender and continued riding. The overall power was improved, especially the torque. I was sailing along up a sandwash and I passed Nick Nicholson on his Greeves. Nick, of course was the West Coast Greeves distributor. At the end of the day I was in the pits cleaning up when I saw Nick walk up and just stare at my Dot for a long while and then walk away without saying anything to me. Strangely enough, the next year some of the Greeves models had this type of exhaust!
In 1960 Neil & Jack Gray opened Honda of Pasadena. In an effort to promote the new Japanese brand he was selling, Neil began to race a Honda 250 scrambler in the desert. He quickly found out the twin cylinder 250 was not meant to be seriously ridden off road in its showroom condition. It was heavy, ill handling and had street transmission ratios that were not compatible with the desert courses.
Neil began to study frame geometry and shock absorber theory and construction. He modified his Honda frame: increasing front fork rake, lengthening the swingarm, and moving the footpeg location to achieve a better balance. By machining a new snap ring groove in the fork tubes and modifying the damping assemblies, he increased front fork travel. He solved the transmission ratio problem by figuring out that he could disassemble the gearbox and then "cross" the gears. The stock Honda had a very high first, second and third gear, then 4th & 5th were close together. After modifying the trans, Neil reversed the ratios so that first, second and third were close, and 4th & 5th were far apart.
At the end of the 1962 desert racing season, Neil had earned the #12 250cc plate. During the 1963 Season, Neil won enough races so that all he had to do was finish the last race of the year and he would have earned the #1 250cc plate. Well, he rode through a bush and a stick knocked the chain off and it jammed in between the sprocket and case and he couldn’t get it un stuck! So he carried the #2 plate through out the 1964 season.
It was during this season that he set a record: He was the first person in AMA district 37 history to win "High Point Man of the Year" on a 250cc bike. This time he didn’t have any DNF’s and earned the #1 plate. By doing so, he became the first person in America- possibly in the world- to earn a #1 plate in organized off road competition on a Honda.
Neil was protested more than once, on the grounds that he was actually riding a 305 or 350cc, not a 250cc. Earl Flanders, then AMA District 37 referee, would stop by the Honda shop to share ideas with Neil, and one day Earl said he had developed a special tool and he wanted to try it out on a Honda to see if it worked. Earl put the device in the spark plug hole of Neil’s race bike and Neil asked what he was checking. Earl began to smile and admitted he was checking the engine displacement!
At the beginning of the 1965 racing season Neil was offered a full sponsorship by Bill Landefeld, the Southern California Dot distributor. At about the same time Neil had parted ways with his partner at Honda of Pasadena, and so he accepted the offer to race the Dot since there would be no conflict of interest. He set another record this year- The Dot broke down on every race for well over half the season! Neil said "No Thanks." and gave the Dot back.
Later that year Neil & Gary Griffin opened a Bultaco/Hodaka shop in Monrovia, Cal. Neil bolted his #1 plate on a brand new Bultaco/Metisse 250 (the yellow banana) and finished out the season as the first person in AMA district 37 (and possibly nationwide?) to carry an AMA #1 plate on a Bultaco.
After the ’65 season ended, Neil turned his attention to building up his dealership. He was becoming legendary as not only a rider, but also a tuner and frame & suspension expert. He began sponsoring several up & coming riders in the weekly district 37 desert races such as Jack Froelich and Eric Jensen.
In 1967, future "moto-journalist" Dave Holeman was working for Yamaha International at their Buena Park, Cal. location. He had convinced the head of R & D, Jack Hoel to go out to a desert race and see what fun everyone was having. (As you may remember, at that time Yamaha didn’t make a "real" dirt bike.) They returned and decided that Yamaha should introduce a bike that would work well in the dirt and also make it street legal. Dave & Jack set about to develop a prototype. Once they did, they called Neil because, as I mentioned before, he was known through out Southern Cal as a MOTORCYCLE GURU, and especially a frame and suspension expert. Neil helped them develop the bike through 3 or 4 prototype versions. After each prototype was shipped over from Japan, Neil would ride it and make recommendations on how to improve it. At one point, Neil thought the prototype handled so bad- it was going to kill someone, so he took a cutting torch and cut the steering head off so there was no way anyone could ride it! Evidently the factory was in a hurry to get the bike to market and released a production model to the public without implementing the recommended changes!
As you may remember, it was a scary handling bike and it took years for Yamaha to work out the problems with the frame & suspension. So now you know THE REST OF THE STORY- of how the Yamaha DT-1 came to be.
In 1968 Neil offered the extremely fast cross country racer, Larry Bergquist a Bultaco sponsorship; and he accepted. Bergquist promptly went out and grabbed the AMA district 37 desert 250cc #1 plate. This began a collaboration between Neil & Larry that would last for several more years. With Fergus as the builder/tuner and Bergquist as the rider, the team had many wins. In the long distance off road races such as the Baja’s and the Mint 400, Larry & his night time riding partner Gary Preston were always a threat to win.
Circa 1969, Kawasaki approached Neil about having Bergquist/Preston race one of Kawasaki’s new 350 Bighorn’s in the Baja. Neil prepared the bike as best as he could, Bergquist & Preston did some test riding in the desert and then they went to Baja. At the start line, Bergquist was drinking a cup of coffee. He handed the cup to Neil and told him to save it; he felt he would be back soon. Sure enough, the Kawasaki’s engine seized after six miles! Evidently Kawasaki was having some problems and it would be many years later before they would try racing in the desert again.
You may remember the Bultaco El Bandido. It was a very fast but heavy and bad handling bike. Since its introduction in 1968 Neil had been modifying his personal El Bandido to improve its handling. Working with the west coast Bultaco distributor, Doug Yerkes, Neil had gotten the factory in Spain to incorporate one of his modifications into the future production runs of the bike: move the footpegs forward.
As the Yamaha DT-1 went into production in 1968 the Yamaha factory wanted to begin race development with the bike. They asked Neil if he would like to be their sponsored rider. He was still considered one of the top desert racers, had held the #1 plate just 3 years earlier. But Neil was 38 years old then and had semi-retired from racing. He was trying to build up his Bultaco/Hodaka business, so he declined the offer. Instead, he recommended a younger rider who was winning a lot of races that year on a 750 Norton, Mike Patrick. Of course, I’m sure you remember that Patrick made the switch from the big Norton to the lightweight Yamaha with no problems, promptly snatched the #1 AMA Disrict 37 250cc plate away from defending champ Larry Bergquist, and he & co-rider Phil Bowers won most of the long distance off road races in the next couple of years.
For years the Ducati factory had been building "scrambler" type bikes. Circa 1969-1970 they decided to try their luck with a dedicated off road bike. When the factory in Italy contacted their American West Coast distributor, ZDS Motors in Glendale, Cal, owner Bob Blair said, "I have just the man to help us."
Bob contacted Neil about Ducati’s plans. Neil said he would love to be involved with the project and he was flown to Italy where he spent two weeks with the Ducati engineers developing the bike. The result was the RT 450. (You may remember it was the dirt bike with all yellow fiberglass fenders & tank with black striping) He was given only a small motocross/scrambles type track to test the bike on while at the factory in Italy. Although Neil was satisfied with the way the bike handled on the test track, he voiced his concern to the engineers that at higher speeds he felt it was unstable. The factory was in a hurry to get the bike to market, and the bike’s frame was left alone.
Once back home, Neil quickly found out that the fork rake indeed was too steep for the higher speeds encountered in cross country type riding. Neil modified his own bike by cutting the steering head off and cutting the upper frame tubes shorter, then dropping the steering head back and welding it in place. The difference was remarkable; the bike now handled very well. It was a heavy bike and was no threat to the open class racing bikes of the day, but it now had smooth, predictable handling traits. Although Neil & Bob Blair never did convince the factory to change the fork angle, word spread quickly through out Southern Ca. about Neil’s modification. Soon Neil’s shop was busy modifying the Ducati’s. Bob Blair was so impressed with the way the modified bike handled, that he would ship new RT 450’s still in the crate to Neil’s shop, and Neil and his son Doug would uncrate the bikes and promptly chop the steering heads off, finish the modifications, re-crate and ship the bikes back to ZDS Motors.
In the early 70’s Neil & Gary Griffin decided to close the Bultaco/Hodaka dealership. Within a few weeks, Neil had secured a position as head of R & D with Mike Harper’s Victor Products. You may remember Victor Products for their big bore kit- which punched out a Yamaha or Suzuki 250 to a 322cc. Most of the Yamaha Genuine Accessories you saw at a Yamaha dealership were developed & manufactured by Victor products. Neil’s job was to develop new accessories for the new Yamaha’s just before they were introduced to market. If you had a Yamaha in the 70’s, and you purchased any Genuine Yamaha Accessories for your bike such as a compression release, fork brace, high mount front fender, skid plate, or GYT kit, chances are that Neil designed it and developed the prototype for it.
Neil retired from the motorcycle industry in 1980. Since then he has maintained a fleet of street & dirt bikes, and to this day at 74 years old, he is “out in the garage” nearly every day getting an old Matchless or Panther ready for a vintage road rally or getting his Cagiva Elefant ready for a dual sport ride...