Custom Chopper Motorcycle at West Coast Thunder motorcycle ride
Custom chopper motorcycle interview at the West Coast Thunder motorcycle ride set up area.
For all those bikers who appreciate a good-looking custom motorcycle, hopefully this video with Mike a great looking custom chopper owner, will satisfy your interest.
West Coast Thunder is an annual motorcycle ride honoring our fallen military heroes on Memorial Day.
“It is not about having barbecues out in the back yard. First, we need to honor our fallen warriors. They sacrificed their lives so we could have freedom, so everyone could have a barbecue today,” said Joe Ruiz of Riverside.
West Coast Thunder sets up in Riverside California right in front of Riverside Harley-Davidson. The actual ride is about 10 miles and goes through and has a stop at the Riverside National Cemetery and ends that the Soboba Casino, San Jacinto, California. At the Soboba Casino’s outdoor arena participants enjoy live entertainment, food, beverage and product vendors.
The millennium began with the cable TV network The Discovery Channel creating a number of television shows around several custom bike builders who built choppers. The first, the 2000 special Motorcycle Mania, followed builder Jesse James of Long Beach, California, and is credited with creating “a new genre of reality TV” around choppers.
The celebrity builders featured on the cable shows enjoyed a large following. Companies like Jesse James’ West Coast Choppers have been successful in producing expensive choppers, and a wide range of chopper-themed brands of merchandise such as clothing, automobile accessories and stickers.
The American Chopper reality television series featuring Paul Teutul Sr, and his sons Paul Jr. and Mike, ran six years starting in 2003, and featured bike building at Orange County Choppers (OCC).
An “old school” styled chopper or custom motorcycle, photographed at the Portland Roadster Show in 2010
This led to a backlash, and a renewed interest in home garage fabricated bikes built on a budget with available materials. Many builders eschewed Harley “pattern” motors and frames and started building choppers out of neglected bikes like Yamaha XS-650 twins, old Harley Sportsters, and various 1980’s so called UJM bikes.
