By Kenn Stamp

Being the two wheel freak that I am, I decided that I would break out of my comfortable shell of knee-dragging and minor hooligan escapades and go see the "other" side of riding a sportbike. Yes, I'm talking about stunt riding and stunters. Specifically, Stuntoberfest, which is held in Lakeland, FL. during the month of October. This is put on by the same people that put Stuntwars on in January.

Now I'll freely admit that while I enjoy the occasional hooligan moment of pulling a wheelie out on a public road, I also know that you have to know when to do it. Riding in traffic on a busy road is not the time nor the place to be showing off your mad skills. I decided to go see the "legitimate" side of stunting hoping to see an organization that was promoting safety, and responsibility,  to those that ride on the street. Is that what I found? If I told you the answer now there wouldn't be much of an article to read would there?

The show goes on for a few days but I could only attend the last day which was Sunday as I had other commitments that involved money and family, two things I happen to enjoy. So a bright Sunday morning found me cruising down a largely deserted I-4. Found the place without any trouble and realized that I was one of the first people there. Hmmm.....maybe I should have slept in more; Oh well, let's start looking around. The venue was held at USA Speedway, a 3/4 mile high banked oval more accustomed to seeing the go fast and turn left crowd rather than the go slow and turn in circles crowd. The stunt show was using one half of the track so actually seeing everything was very easy as I could stand in one place and see every stunt.

I went over to the vendor area first as I wanted to stop in and say hi to Mark, who is a stand-up guy and owns HAI bike shop. HAI is huge in the stunt world, even fielding their own team. My connection to them started when I first got my current bike and needed a new helmet. No shop on the Orlando area carried the helmet in the color I was looking for and nobody would order it without me paying for it first and them stipulating a no return policy. I called Mark and not only did he special order the color I wanted, but when I determined that it did indeed match the bike's color well enough (this is important), he also gave me a good discount on the price. Like I said, a stand-up guy. After stopping by his tent area and basically getting in everyone's way as they tried to set-up, I wandered down the row to see the rest of the vendors. The number of vendors seemed small and I am attributing this to the fact that this wasn't the BIG stunt venue of the year. Of course, since I've never been to ANY stunt event before, this could be the normal amount of vendors; I just don't know.

Anyway, back to the fun stuff. After perusing through the vendors area, rebuffing all efforts to get me to buy something; "but surely you need to have these new pig-spotter mirrors?" "no I don't and don't call me Shirley"; I wandered over to the pit area to see what was happening over there.

Pit areas at stunt shows are just like pit areas at races; very cliquish. I did find some riders that were more talkative (although I think I pissed one off - more on that in a minute) than others and that is where I spent some time.

One chap, Brian Bubash (pronounced "boo-bash") from Pittsburgh, PA., had Shift stickers on his bikes which immediately caught my attention. I wandered over take a closer look and wound up talking to him for a minute or two. Found out that Shift did indeed provide his jackets which he was very thankful for. Also found out that it was only 3 years ago that he started riding. Not stunting; RIDING. This kid was very good at throwing that bike around (in a controlled manner), at least to my obviously unexperienced eye. One of his yellow Yamahas had a beautiful full race fairing on it, and the other one, well, looked smashed. Apparently,  some "other" rider who goes by the nickname "T-Neck" (I didn't ask - sorry), decided to crash out at about 40 mph.

During our conversation, my being a Ridercoach came up. Brian said that he would like to be a Ridercoach but his MVR was less than perfect. I of course replied (why, I really don't know) "stop stunting on the street". Brian took that pretty well, much better in fact than he took my silent stare after his next comment of "I stopped street stunting about a year ago." "All I do now is just wheelies but I don't think they're dangerous as I keep up with the flow of traffic." This of course is where I think I pissed him off as the conversation kind of petered out. Oh well.

After wandering for a while, I watched a couple of dirt-bike riders sail through the air and land on a huge steel ramp. I think I had more fun watching this than I did most of the stunt rider's routines. There was also a guy there named Kyle Woods (who I talked to earlier in the HAI tent) who took the most beat-up, ragged out, sad looking excuse for a BMW this side of a junkyard and drove it around the entire track on two wheels. Even though this involved a car, it was on 2 wheels so I figured it could be included in the story.

So did I find an event that promoted safety and responsibility to those that ride on the street? Yes and no. Yes, due to the fact that they did require all entrants in the competition to wear either a jacket or a back protector (why not both?). Most competitors wore a jacket and jeans but a couple did wear a shirt with a back protector over it (or under it) and one competitor (and the Darwin award winner) wore no shirt, just shorts, knee pads, elbow pads, and a back protector. Why did he do this? I have no idea, unless it was to show off his "guns".

My biggest complaint was the announcer and the fact that he kept talking about how hard some of the stunts were and referring to how those that ride stunts on the street know this. He never came right out and said that he condoned street stunt riding (it was implied in his tone and comments), but he also never came right out and condemned it either. When you keep referencing street stunting to prove a point about how challenging a stunt is, you are glorifying the act. At least in my eyes.

I think those that can do the things that these stunt riders do are extremely talented. I also feel those that reach this level of competition owe their sport and their fans to represent themselves in the most socially responsible (riding wise) way that they can. If stunt riders and stunt riding organizations want to be taken seriously then they have to step up to the plate and be willing to take a lead in the stunting community.

Obviously there are not many places to legally stunt outside of these events but there are plenty of empty parking lots and other out of the way places that can be used. You'll still be breaking the law (but who doesn't do that at least once a week?) but at least you won't be endangering others and more importantly you won't be in the public eye giving the rest of us a bad name. I enjoyed the diversity of people at the event and enjoyed the talent exhibited there. Unfortunately, as long as the people involved in stunt riding think of themselves as rebels the sport itself will suffer. I think stunting has a long way to go, and an uphill battle in front of them before they are seen as a legitimate sport by the general public/motorcycling community at large unless the event organizers step-up their efforts to promote safe street riding.

Do you have an alternate view of stunting? Think my view is way off base? Or do you agree with my thoughts? Head on over to the Stunting Forum and express your views.