It’s the end of the road for American Chopper, so what were the top 10 best bikes?

Well that’s it folks, American Chopper on TLC is coming to an end this Thursday night with its series finale and it doesn’t surprise me at all. It’s been a long time coming for American Chopper to end.

As an American Chopper fan, every since the first episode premiered with the Jet bike (one of the best bikes OCC has built to date next to the Fire Bike of course), the building of Cody’s bike and Biketoberfest, I was hooked.

The show not only showcased father vs. son being either Paul Sr. the person who started the company, Orange County Choppers in his basement and grow it into small business in a single garage vs. his son Paul Jr., the master builder and designer. Paul Jr. designed and built the Jet Bike, Fire Bike and more. And then of course you have Mikey, the entertainer and worker, but more so, the show showcased the building of some of the most amazing bikes and work of arts I’ve ever seen.

By the way, Paul Sr. and Paul Jr. need each other, because Paul Sr. started and developed the company while Paul Jr. designed and built the bikes with the guys in the shop, without each other, there would be no successful OCC.

The building of the bikes and the shop life was what got my attention in the first place, it’s about how each bike or chopper went to together from the certified frame to the handmade gas tank, transmission, motor, handlebars right down to the wiring, the wheels and tires combo and more.

However since the show changed networks from the Discovery Channel to TLC, it became more about the people in the show, namely Paul Sr., Paul Jr., and Mikey’s lives in and outside the show. The builds because smaller and smaller with little detail of how it went together in the first place. Once on TLC, it was just another reality show gone back, sort of like John and Kate plus 8 with has also seen its series finale.

Take the latest season, each episode now showcases one bike with minimum design and building and more a little shop life, their personal life’s and really nothing to watch each week, where is excitement in the show? Where is the fun in the show? The design process and building the bike from scratch?

So it should be no surprise that the show is now all but a memory, but as I was once a fan of American Chopper and have the first three seasons on DVD, what I call “the real American Chopper” with Vinnie helping to build bikes, I figure as a send off to what was once a good show, I would leave with, what are the top 10 best OCC bikes? In no particular order:

1. I would have to start with the Jet Bike. The first bike built and it was a classic. The design was nothing like I had ever seen before from the hand-made gas tank that looked like a jet’s cockpit, the target on the handlebars, eight down to the two wings on the rear fender.

2. But nothing would beat the firebike, created to honor the firefighters in NYC who went through hell on 9/11. They are the true heros especially that day.

3. POW/MIA bike that was built by Paul Sr.,

4. Liberty chopper which ran on ethanol and gasoline.

5. Black Widow bike that had hand-made webbing covering the gas tank.

6. The E85 chopper for Iowa Farm Bureau

7. The Chesapeake Energy Chopper that is powered by Natural Gas

8. The Monster Diesel Chopper

9. Police Bike with side-car

10. Siemens Chopper (Electric-powered)

Well that’s all folks, good night.

Photos were taken by me (Brian Vermette)

Picture perfect: Mark Martin and Dale Earnhardt Jr. on the front row for the 2010 Daytona 500.

DAYTONA BEACH, FL - FEBRUARY 06: Dale Earnhardt Jr., driver of the #88 AMP Energy Chevrolet, and Mark Martin, driver of the #5 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet, poses after qualifying on the front row for the Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway on February 6, 2010 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by John Harrelson/Getty Images for NASCAR via Yahoo! Sports)

While Saturday qualifying for next Sunday’s Daytona 500 isn’t really important for most drivers considering NASCAR has the top 35 in owners points locked into the field and the Gatorade Duels next Thursday really set the starting lineup, qualifying does determine the front row. And today at Daytona International Speedway after a boring 3 hours of television coverage, NASCAR fans saw Mark Martin win the pole with a speed of 191.188 mph while Dale Earnhardt Jr. grabbed a front row starting spot with a speed of 190.913.

Qualifying is only the second step in getting ready for the Daytona 500, but right now Hendrick Motorsports with Stewart-Haas Racing are the ones to beat, however like so many fans have said, “It doesn't matter where you start for this race. You could come from last to first with 20 to go and win.” And that is exactly true, but it’s cool to see who does win the pole and is on the front row especially for the Daytona 500.

Drivers start your engines: Toyota All-Star Showdown and Rolex 24 at Daytona.

As I sit here watching Daytona Qualifying and waiting for the ARCA 200 from Daytona International Speedway, I want to look back to last weekend namely the Rolex 24 at Daytona and the Toyota All-Star Showdown at Irwindale Speedway.

December and January for a racing fan is boring, it’s the time where you have nothing racing wise on television to watch and enjoy, so when the end of January comes around, it’s a welcome treat to finally see some cars on the racetrack. The Rolex 24 at Daytona is one of the most anticipated races all season long, its falls in the same category as the Indianapolis 500, the Daytona 500, the 24 hours of LeMans, the Grand Prix of Monaco and of course the 12 hours of Sebring.

But the Rolex 24 for a NASCAR fan is big as well because over the years, the race has seen a pretty good amount of NASCAR drivers mixed with IRL drivers and the series regulars. I believe having other series drivers come in and take turns driving at the wheel for 24 hours is huge for the series. I mean you have the likes of Jimmie Johnson, Juan Montoya, A.J. Allmendinger, Casey Mears to Dario Franchitti and Scott Dixon just to name a few, however unlike in the past few years of running this race, the NASCAR drivers came up short in 2010 by one position.

In watching some of the Rolex 24 this year, I really didn’t have a particular team that I was watching, I just liked watching the race. But I have to say that I do like the underdogs or a team that hasn’t won in a while, that is cool to see when somebody breaks through into victory lane especially in this race. So that means the Ganassi Racing wouldn’t be on my list as they have won this race several times.

Although, I do particularly love watching the pit stops, changing tires, refueling, but for these types of races, they have one additional element, the driver changes. You have to be amazed with how fast a team can change drivers, refuel the car, change tires and get back on track and not miss a beat.

But in watching this race, I did notice a lot of mistakes, but more of damage that requires a trip to the garage area for repairs. I was even surprised that Bobby Labonte ran out of fuel in his Porsche coming off turn 2 and down the backstraightaway.

So it shouldn’t be a giant surprise that the race would come down to just one mistake and that would be within a few hours or less from the end when going down the backstraightaway into the interloop, the leader, the #01 DP car with Justin Wilson ran over something, heard a pop sound and said I need to pit. The crew said, take it to the garage where they lost two laps and found there was nothing wrong with the car, which lost the race to the newly formed or renamed Action Express Racing #9 DP car driven by Barbosa / Borcheller / Dalziel / Rockenfeller. What a good run by the #9 DP team, they beat the multi-winners #01 Ganassi Racing BMW driven by Papis / Pruett / Rojas / Wilson.

I always love seeing a race like this go for 23 and half hours and come down to two cars or more fighting for the lead and the win all is on the same lap and that’s what happened here. 24 hours, 755 laps.

Of course the #1 SpeedSource Mazda RX-8 driven by Bomarito / Ham / Haskell / Tremblay won in the GT class. Is anybody going to be able to catch the Mazda RX-8 this season?

Toyota All-Star Showdown

During the Rolex 24 at Daytona, there was another race that was taking place about 2,500 miles way in Southern California at the tight half mile Irwindale Speedway for the NASCAR K&N Pro Series with the East and West coming together for one huge event. I remember watching last year’s coverage where Kevin James, star of the movie Paul Blart: Mall Cop, drives the official pace Segway of the NASCAR Toyota All-Star Showdown prior to the Camping World race.

Or Joey Logano was disqualified for aggressive driving and taking out Peyton Sellers coming off turn 4 that handed and I mean handed the victory to Matt Kobyluck.

But 2010 saw a completely different race with in reality only two-cars in upfront battling it out for the lead and ultimately for the victory. When it comes to the format for this All-Star race, it’s a lot like the NASCAR All-Star race in May at Charlotte Motor Speedway, a big waste and confusing for the fans, I just want to go racing with a halfway break.

Anyway this race was all about two drivers, 19-year old Joey Logano and 16-year old Sergio Pena racing each other tooth and nail for the lead, it was great to watch, neither of them would back down and that’s what it’s all about.

By the end of the night, through all of the caution flags, wrecks, halftime break and more, Joey Logano outraced Sergio Pena to win his second Toyota All-Star Showdown driving Mike Olson’s car. Did anybody notice that his car was a Chevrolet with no Chevy decal, but a Toyota decal on rear bumper, think about that one…

But for me, the story of the race wasn’t Joey Logano, but it was the 16-year old Sergio Pena who made this race worth watching hands down. Lap by laps, this kid learned how to race and showed his talent. I have to imagine that several NASCAR owners took notice and someone will, if he hasn’t already, signed him to a development contract, what a racecar driver, very impressive. Now that’s the way you do it.

Miccosukee Resort & Gaming pulls NASCAR sponsorship from Phoenix racing.

I really had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach last week when I read that the Miccosukee tribe would be holding a vote on February 4th (Yesterday) on whether or not they would continue their NASCAR sponsorship.

I couldn’t believe that a company, no less a business or in this case a tribe like this would hold a vote at the 11th hour to determine if they would continue to sponsor teams that they already had a contract with for the upcoming 2010 NASCAR season, but after they elected a new chairman, they did just that and worse yet, they pulled their sponsorship from Phoenix Racing for the 2010 season, you got to be kidding me.

According to a FOXSports article, James Finch learned that the Miccosukee tribe would be pulling its sponsorship for both the #09 Aric Almirola for all 18 races in the Cup Series that they had under contract as well as the #1 James Buescher for a full Nationwide Series schedule. Now I don’t know if this affects Kyle Busch Motorsports as well, but I suspect it does.

“They’re not going to do anything,” Finch said of the Miccosukee future involvement in NASCAR. “We had a contract, but our only recourse is to go in front of the tribal council and that’s not a case I’m going to win. “If it was back in the old days, I could go in the parking lot and steal some hubcaps to race, but no one uses hubcaps anymore.”

“If I could buy my way into the Daytona 500 I would,” Finch said. “Losing my sponsor isn’t going to keep me from racing next Sunday. I could finish fourth in the 150s and go home. The rules are (messed) up. I’m not going to pay more for the points than I can get for winning.

“I've seen a lot of people come and go from this sport. I stay because I'm a racer. But when you get to where you can’t race because of the rules, that’s B.S.”

Right now I really feel bad for James Finch, he a here because he is a racer and loves it, but to have a contract with in this case a tribe to have both of your cars sponsored by the Miccosukee Resort & Gaming for the upcoming 2010 NASCAR Cup Series and Nationwide Series schedule, be at Daytona for Speedweeks and then be told that you have no primary sponsor, that is ridiculous. I could think of a few different word for it, but kids and teens read this ThinkingBrian too so I will just leave it at unbelievable and ridiculous.

I wonder what he is going to do now after Daytona?

I would say at this point his options are either to go in front of the tribe which he pointed out above which wouldn’t get him anywhere or try federal court. Federal court might be able to deal with it. Miccosukee Resort & Gaming needs to learn that this is a business and you can’t just break your contract and not be liable for what you owe.

I also say that if this is the way they do business and treat people that they shouldn’t be allowed back in to NASCAR nor they shouldn’t come back. They made their choice, but what a poor one, at least they could have honored the contract for 2010 and said no to 2011, but that’s it.

Please understand that while I’m not only a blogger, writer, a member of the Citizen Journalist Media Corp, I’m also a NASCAR fan and a person who treats people fairly and I hate to see companies not take responsibility for their actions and when you sign a contract you should do everything you can and honor it or make it right. I’m sure that they could have worked out a deal with Phoenix Racing and KBM, but from what is said so far they didn’t and it’s wrong.

What do you think?

Sources: Jayski via FOXSports, Image from NASCARMedia

Online Presence: RaceDriven, ThinkingBrian, Facebook, Twitter and more.

I’ve been online for years now, I believe it stretches back to my days in high school, but it really started blogging about five years ago, I have created quite a an online presence and today I’m going to summarize all of the online activities like I did on RaceDriven.com, for example where I blog as well as being on Facebook and other social media sites.

My blogs:

1. ThinkingBrian.com: Since we are here at ThinkingBrian.com, I figured this is where we should start things off. As 2010 is already in full swing, however at the beginning of 2009, I decided to expand and over the last year I’ve been slowly building up a new blog called ThinkingBrian.com. I officially launched this blog ThinkingBrian.com last month on January 12th.

Right now ThinkingBrian is slow going as I’m trying to get the blog listed on search engines and crawled regularly as they do with RaceDriven.com. Articles are regularly getting published and the work continues, but I will be posting more as the site continues to grow.

ThinkingBrian is a brand new blog that I have wanted for a long time now. TB is where I discuss Speed, Entertainment and blogging. There are NASCAR articles, Motorsports, Automobiles, Music, as well as more coming on Television, and of course blogging articles. It’s a site that I’ve always wanted and it’s geared not towards a particular topic, but more towards a particular demographic, namely Men and Women ages 18-49. Just like RaceDriven, the site is clean for kids, but I believe what I talk on the blog would interest people 18-49 more than anybody else. Knowing your demographic is key and because of that and of course good content, TB will over time become very popular.

As for advertising, I will introduce it shortly to the site in the form of affiliate programs so my readers can get us to it, namely what it looks like and layout. I believe that introducing advertising now is better than later that way readers know from the start.

2. RaceDriven.com
Back in March 2005, I started RaceDriven.com as more of personal blog, however now in 2010, RaceDriven has taken on a niche blog identity. RaceDriven.com is now and has been since 2005 known as a NASCAR and Automobile blog where I discuss just that, NASCAR and the Auto Industry. But the big difference is that I wouldn’t be discussing anything but NASCAR and Automobiles. This move has already paid off and it gives my readers what they want, discussions on those topics only and no extras.

Status of RaceDriven.com: As the NASCAR season is getting ready to kicks off this weekend, RD is already in full swing for the new season as well as covering several areas in the auto industry. I’ve seen the traffic steadily grow over the past two weeks, the prediction articles for the 2010 NASCAR season is the hot topic right now and everything is business as usual.

I will be working on updating the RD slowly with a new look, design and layout. I work on this regularly, it should be nothing new. The advertising has seen a good flow of new companies interested in coming aboard as well as a good rate of renewals so far this year. I will be working affiliate programs more into the mix, but in a simple way. I really excited about the future of RaceDriven and 2010 should be another good.

Social Media:

1. Facebook
If you would have asked me this time last year if I was on Facebook, I would have said no and that I wasn’t interested. However after thinking about it, I decided to go ahead and sign up for Facebook back in September (2009), I have found the site to be helpful in both promoting RaceDriven and ThinkingBrian as well as in my personal life. Facebook helps me connect with family, friends, high school friends and meet others who share the same things in life. I even play games online and yes one would be FarmVille.

In signing up for Facebook, I used my real name and not RaceDriven, I felt it was a better move and identity is key online and I don’t want to give people the wrong idea online. My facebook isn’t a fan site, but a standard one where I control who views what including who I’m friends with. In having a Facebook, I also share links to my articles on my wall and are searchable for everyone to read and share. So far it’s a good tool for me, but more personal than anything else.

2. Twitter
Twitter was a given that I would sign up for it, it’s easy to use and you can reach people worldwide. I use twitter more for promoting both blogs, keeping up with news, commenting on topics and sharing links to articles not only by me, but other writers as well. I share links that I like and think people would like too. I log on a few times a week to see what’s going on and it’s not bad, but I find Facebook to be better, but is still different from Facebook and better in some ways. As for advertising on Twitter, I haven’t touched it, but if I did I would tread very lightly.

3. MySpace: MySpace for me is a thing of the past, I use to enjoy, but now I just don’t have the time, I prefer blogging, Twitter and Facebook. As a matter of fact, I haven’t been online MySpace since the beginning of 2010.

Looking Forward:

When it comes to 2010, I believe with my two blogs, two social networks accounts and just being online regularly, I’m pretty much all set with my online presence, however looking into the future, I have created a wish list below that I could see coming true:

- Lifestream: a lifestream is nothing more than a mini-blog, a place to share links, photography and a feed of your social network accounts, basically it’s what you’re doing online all in one place. Right now in February 2010, lifestreams are gaining some steam with people that want something other than a blog.

In a lot of ways, I know exactly how I would build it, where I would build it and what URL address I would use.

- Directory: A NASCAR, Motorsports and Automobile directory of links that I find. A directory that fans would look though to find who has a Facebook or Twitter account as well as a blog or site. Something simple

- An ebook: The best articles on RaceDriven and ThinkingBrian with photography. It’s something that I’ve always wanted to create and sell. I would love to sell something online that I created.

All in all, right now I have exactly what I want for an online presence, a mix of blogging and social media, but the lifestream that could very well become reality either with a full site or something in a compact design to feature on one of my blogs. Life is good.

OCC’s Monster Diesel bike: Now that’s something even I want to own.

OCC’s Monster Diesel bike is a huge success.


'American Chopper' in Baltimore (Handout / January 28, 2010) -- Photo Credit: The Baltimore Sun

Over the years, Orange Country Choppers has built numerous motorcycles or choppers, but the ones that I most enjoy looking at have to be the motorcycles that run on alternative fuels. I’m a huge supporter of using alternative fuels, gasoline isn’t going to be around forever, I don’t even think gasoline will be around in a large capacity in 30 years from now. But nonetheless OCC has built several alternative fuel powered motorcycles including an E85 (Ethanol), Hydrogen, Natural Gas and Electric, but now on the latest episode of American Chopper, they have built Diesel-Powered Bike.

What a motorcycle, a bright orange and black motorcycle for the company Monster Diesel that was equipped with a filter in the tank, a three cylinder engine all the way down to two exhaust pipes sticking up next to the tank. What a sight when you see them start it up for the first time and black smoke raises up from the pipes. You know it was working then.

Now I do have to say that while I’ve been watching American Chopper since its series premiere years ago and even though I’m not a huge fan of the show anymore, its past its prime considering the show was at one point about building motorcycles, I do have to say that this has to be one of the best corporate motorcycles (built for companies) on the show over its history.

Feds order Toyota to stop selling cars with faulty accelerators.

If you can’t fix it, stop selling it.

According to TheBostonChannel.com, “Toyota has been ordered by the Department of Transportation to suspend the U.S. sales of eight models after millions of vehicles that may suddenly accelerate were recalled last week. Several crashes, including some fatalities, have been blamed on the problem.”

The Toyota cars affected are (from the press release):

2009-2010 RAV4,
2009-2010 Corolla,
2009-2010 Matrix,
2005-2010 Avalon,
Certain 2007-2010 Camry,
2010 Highlander,
2007-2010 Tundra,
2008-2010 Sequoia

However this doesn’t affect Lexus or Scion vehicles as well as Toyota Prius, Tacoma, Sienna, Venza, Solara, Yaris, 4Runner, FJ Cruiser, Land Cruiser and select Camry models, including all Camry hybrids, which will remain for sale.

But what this recall and stopping selling affected cars doesn’t say is, what about certain Pontiac Vibes, Toyota made some of the Vibes for Pontiac. The Pontiac Vibe is a Toyota Matrix underneath for the most part.

This problem with Toyota has been going on for months now, first Toyota replaced a floor mat or altered the size of the gas petal, I had a feeling that that wasn’t the big fix. However I do have to say that it’s about time that somebody stepped up to fix this problem, I mean from the way I understand it, Toyota doesn’t even have a fix for the faulty accelerator problem (not a replacement floor mat) and yet they were still selling cars with faulty accelerators.

But there is still more questions to be answered, I mean now that no more consumers can buy any of the effect cars is great, however what happens to the current owners of those cars?

My cousin’s wife drives either a new Camry or Corolla to work every day and that’s not a good thing. But according to the article on The Boston Channel, consumers do have options and according to Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, who said Toyota owners who actually experienced a problem with their accelerator pedal sticking or being slow to return to the idle position should consider their rights and the manufacturer’s obligations under the Lemon Law.

I have to admit that in the past, as a Massachusetts resident, I have used the Massachusetts Lemon Law to get my money back from a dealer because it costs twice the amount of money I paid for the car to get the car to pass emissions, but I’ve never used the Lemon Law to fix a brand new car or a couple year old car. However I heard that it does work.

If you live in another state, visit the state’s website to research if your state has a lemon law or what rights you have in this case if there is a problem. I honestly don’t know what I would do if I owned an effected Toyota car, I would start by calling the dealer I bought it from, research would laws can help me in my state, in this the lemon law and go from there. I don’t believe you can just trade the car in at the dealer for another one that isn’t affected or get your money back, but then I could be wrong, every state has their own laws.

With that said, now I have to wonder once Toyota finally fixes this problem and puts a failsafe in all their cars, what is going to happen in the future with them? It should have been Toyota that made this call, not the Feds saying stop selling cars with faulty accelerators. I mean, most consumers remember the Firestone and Ford Explorer issues right? Well to this day, I still will NOT buy a Firestone Tire, I’m just saying.

What do you think of this?