To Finish First You Must First Finish

by Tony Murphy

Now in my eighties, I met scores of famous people within the motorcycle and car racing world and became lifelong friends with many of them. I'd work and professionally road race for the Honda, Yamaha, and Bridgestone factory teams, win national championships for two of them, and be associated with Bombardier, maker of Ski-Doo snowmobiles and Sea-Doo watercraft when they undertook the development and manufacture of the Can-Am, a North American off-road motorcycle to challenge the Japanese. I'd also spend forty-years importing Bombardier-Rotax racing engines from Austria. I'd do motorcycle development projects for several other manufacturers and even a motorcycle project for General Motors, then the largest corporation the world had ever known. I'd win the Baja 500 off-road car race for another automobile manufacturer, American Motors, on a team sponsored by film star James Garner, with teammate Bob Bondurant, a former Formula 1 race car driver. But all that was yet to come and in no way could I have portended what excitement, success, and personal notoriety lay ahead in my then-young life.
I'd become living proof that the United States was truly the land of opportunity. If one was prepared to be dedicated and work hard, almost any dream could come true.