page120

"Our goal was to have the engine out within an hour," said AAIMC member and super wrench John Zelna…."but first we had to build a bench." Four cement blocks and a bike ramp later, the Sport Scout transmission rebuild was underway. AAIMC member Doug Horner had raced the bike the night before at Oglethorpe Speedway near Savannah, GA and had noticed that the bike seemed to have its brakes on in the Final. But Doug knew that couldn't be right…the Indian flattracker naturally has no brakes!

He almost made it back to the pits before it froze up. The rear wheel wouldn't budge. Apparently hundreds of dollars, dozens of late nights, and a year of hopeful dreams was all about to end in mechanical defeat. But a few beers later, Johnny said "we can rebuild it. All we gotta do is get some parts and fix it."

Now to average Joe, that might sound like a somewhat reasonable task. But we're talking about a 67 year old motorcycle with a seized transmission sitting in a non-equipped one car garage in Daytona Beach, Florida on Thursday night. Now as we all know, parts for a 67 year old motorcycle engine are difficult enough to find when you have all winter, let alone get them overnight. The next race was Sunday. And Johnny don't even know yet what parts they'll need yet!

That's when this author remembered that he had Rocky Halter's cell phone number in his pocket. A quick call later found Rocky hanging out over at his booth at the Eustis AMCA Meet. "Hey Rocky…this is Larry. Do you happen to have any Sport Scout transmissions with you?"

"What? No! Why do you need them?" asked Rocky? "Well, the tranny on Doug's flat tracker is messed up, and Johnny wants to fix it tomorrow so Doug can race on Sunday at Daytona Memorial Stadium," I said.

After the laughing died down from all those present, Rocky remembered that he did, indeed, have lots of Scout transmission parts. But they were in Massillon, Ohio. And that he and his partner, Toney Watson, were in Florida. "But 'Pudge' is up there to answer the phone. Maybe he can find the stuff and overnight it to you. What parts do you really need?" asked Rocky.

"We don't know! Send it all," said Doug. "We don't want to end up needing an unidentified part after tearing this thing all apart. So send it all! Everything you've got that you think we might even need." Apparently the hopes and dreams of Doug, the racer, had taken hold of Doug, the businessman, and overruled the sense of reason we all battle with once again. The race to make the race was on.

And that's when the story turns to Pudge, who's real name is Greg Hammond. Pudge would be the first to admit he's no Indian mechanic. And he's no Indian parts man. And if you've ever been to Rocky's Antique Cycle Parts, you know that there's no neatly marked bins of "Sport Scout Transmission Parts."

I don't think even Rocky or Toney have a list of what all is there. Or exactly where it is. Parts orders are miraculously filled every day by Rocky and Toney just by memory and gut feeling where they last saw it. Or maybe where they put it years ago. And they are really good at finding things. It's amazing.

But now Toney, who's standing in Florida, has to remember where this or that part actually is…and verbally describe it over the phone to Pudge in Massillon. And Pudge, who doesn't know parts, or even know the shop that well, has to interpret Toney's description of what he's supposed to be looking for, and where it might be!

Now I don't know about the reader, but this sounds like it could have been a complete (and very expensive) disaster. Toney and Rocky had to instinctively know what Doug and Johnny might need, then describe it to Pudge, who had to find it, then ship it overnight to Florida. And by the way, it's now noon on Friday. All this has to be accomplished within the next four hours for UPS pickup.

The race gods must have been smiling on this enterprise. Pudge actually found all the parts and sent everything that Johnny needed to fix Doug's bike. Plus a few spares, of course. But it got done. Johnny and Doug went to work: They removed the broken transmission from the bike on Friday night; tore it apart Saturday morning; replaced the broken parts on Saturday afternoon; and in time to go to dinner at "Down the Hatch" on Ponce Inlet on Saturday night. Absolutely amazing.

Adding to the drama of this whole account was the realization that this magnificent undertaking all took place within walking distance of the South Turn of the original Daytona Beach race course, back when they had it on the beach. I really think the great Indian race teams up in the sky were looking down and smiling on Team Slideways that night. And a few were probably thinking what they could have done back then with overnight shipping!

Doug Horner and Team Slideways made it to Daytona Memorial Stadium on Sunday and he finished second behind George Wills on Bob Nichol's Indian. And then he made it to Barberville and finished second to Wills again. Under the circumstances, the work performed by Johnny Zelna was truly exemplary! A job for Doug well done by Johnny Zelna