Unknown Industries Hits the 76th Sturgis Bike Rally.
The City of Sturgis South Dakota annual motorcycle rally.
San Diego motorcycle stunt rider
Sturgis Bike Rally – From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is an American motorcycle rally held annually in Sturgis, South Dakota, usually during the first full week of August. It was begun in 1938 by a group of Indian Motorcycle riders and was originally held for stunts and races, but it has evolved into being a meeting for motorcycle enthusiasts from around the world. It brings significant income to the citizens of Sturgis, a town of only 6,627 people. It is one of the largest motorcycle rallies in the world.
The City of Sturgis has calculated that the Rally brings over $800 million to South Dakota annually. The City of Sturgis earned almost $270,000 in 2011 from selling event guides and sponsorships. The rally makes up 95% of the city’s annual revenue.
There were 405 individuals jailed at the 2004 rally, and approximately $250,000 worth of motorcycles stolen annually. Rally-goers are a mix of white-collar and blue-collar workers and are generally welcomed as an important source of income for Sturgis and surrounding areas. The rally turns local roads into “parking lots”, and draws local law enforcement away from routine patrols.
The Lakota Indian tribe in coalition with other tribes has protested the large amount of alcohol distributed at the event so close to the sacred Bear Butte, but also acknowledged that income from the event was important to the region and also benefits some members of the tribes.
A wheelie on a motorized vehicle is nothing new. In drag racing they are considered a problem, robbing power that could be used to accelerate the vehicle faster, and many classes of drag racing use wheelie bars to prevent them.
But those are for vehicles specifically built for drag racing, which rarely are street-legal, or unmodified from stock. In contrast, since at least the 1970s, some motorcycles straight from the showroom floor were able to be wheelied.
In the late 1980s and continuing today, motorcycles, and especially sportbikes, have become lighter and more powerful, and have therefore become easier to wheelie. Other stunts have also become possible if not easy with the advancement of motorcycle technology. As Martin Child wrote in Bike, “With lighter, shorter, better-braked bikes on the market, the stoppie has never been so easy for so many.” But at the same time, the cost of a motorcycle has remained relatively low compared to other street-legal vehicles with similar power-to-weight ratios.
In the 1990s some riders made performing stunts the primary focus of their riding. A wheelie or other stunt was not just something to do while riding, it became the main goal in riding.
