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MARCH 2017 HOTBIKE.COM
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MR. THREE-PEAT JOHN SHOPE’S THIRD STRIKE WORDS: MARK MASKER PHOTOS: PAUL MORTON
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don’t care who you are—threepeating anything is a bitch. Repeated success is a two-faced giant that loves you with one glance and wants to kill you with the other. John Shope knows a thing or two about that monster, seeing as how his bikes have been the people’s choice for the best on the Hot Bike Tour three years running. The bright side is all the recognition that comes with being a dynasty. Men want to be you and women want to be with you. People love your parts and (hopefully) shell out cash to get them for their own bikes. All that love inspires you to keep going for next year.
So far so good, right? The ugly face is the pressure. Can I do it again? What should I do next time? Do I go with what worked or go the opposite direction for the surprise factor? Every competitor faces these questions, whether it’s in poker tournaments, bike shows, or planning a team strategy for the NFL. For the first two years, John gave us two killer baggers. What was the game plan for the three-peat? This time, John pulled a bootleg turn from bagger building to creating an engraved Softail. A green one at that. “I won twice in a row but wanted to go over to the cool side, and we made a
parts line from that bike,” he tells us. “I got to do something different and show off these new parts. I came from Softails and choppers, and it was refreshing to go back. I got a nasty Fatboy coming out soon too.” The big question we have for John: Why do you suppose you’ve won three years going? “Dude, I’ll say it,” he answers. “It doesn’t mean I’m the best. It’s a people’s choice show. If you can deliver something that everyone likes and capture their votes, that’s how you win a people’s choice show. The looks factors on these three bikes are out of control.”
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CHOPPED
PRISMATIC THE PRISM SHOVELHEAD WORDS: ZACH HINDES PHOTOS: BILLY CHILDRESS
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ICONIC
U N O B TA I N A B L E
PERIOD PIECE RARE 1928 JDH-XR RETRO RACER
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started building this bike from parts for the Born-Free 8 show in Southern California. My goal was to build a dual-carbureted Harley JD at first, but as I discovered more and more rare H-D factory racing parts my vision evolved into building a factory-style 1920s superbike. My friend Stuart from JD Jugs in Australia and I developed the idea to cast a pair of dual-carbureted JD cylinders with intakes similar to the H-D XR750 from the 1970s and were able to use
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our first prototypes on the JDH-XR. Originally, I had planned to build the engine using a stock road model bottom end, but in March 2016 I located a very rare 1928 H-D JDH two-cam bottom end. This model was only produced in 1928 and 1929 and is a street version of The Motor Company’s two-cam factory race engine. Only 1,000 were produced over the two years and are highly sought after by collectors. I was lucky to make a deal for the engine, and I had the makings of what
would be a rare and unique powerplant for my bike. I hopped up the 74ci engine to 92 inches and added reground racing cams, a factory baby Bosch racing magneto, and a pair of (unobtainable) ’36–’39 Knucklehead M5 Linkert Carburetors. The chassis incorporates late 1920s factory-style hill climb/roadrace castings, which Stuart and I began reproducing in December 2015. The neck is a newly cast replica of the factory drop neck, used on top hill-climb machines of the day. The neck lowers the overall center
WORDS: MATT WALKSLER PHOTOS: PETER LINNEY
SAN DIEGO CUSTOMS’ 1991 FXRS
OCTOBER 2014 / 49