Once again, Tommy Bolton was recently featured in DragBike.com, who included a story about Tommy building and racing his own motorcycle after 20 years of building motorcycles for others.
Tommy spent the COVID-19 lockdown building his own turbo Hayabusa no-bar bike to compete at the drag strip. When asked about why Tommy is now back riding rather than just building race bikes, he says “I have been racing motorcycles all my life. I am like a motorcycle decathlete. I have raced dirt bikes, TT bikes, I was the only guy at Ascot flat track races back in the ’80s, and often the only guy at Willow Springs back in the day.
Even though I was the first person to go 190 mph on a non-wheelie bar bike in the quarter-mile, the fourth person to go 200 mph in the quarter, and the first African American to go over 200 mph in the quarter, I have never been able to run in the 7’s on a non-wheelie bar bike. I have built a lot of pro-mod bikes that other people have put in the 7’s, and have built nearly a dozen wheelie-bar bikes that others have put in the 6’s, and lots of people now going over 200 mph with bikes I have built.
Now I want to do two things – get into the 7’s on a no-bar bike, and get into the 6’s on a wheelie-bar bike. I am 61 years old so now is the time to finally reach for those goals myself. I am chasing the carrot again!”