Posts
9090
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Mesa, AZ, USA
I've seen plenty of this guy's YouTube videos, and they never cease to amaze me. Kaplan America must have some deep pockets cause he sure does have some awesome bikes and showroom.
I guess in his younger years he actually made Pro Level and raced some of the NE tracks back in the day.
If he wasn't so far away, I would love to visit his shop.
Yeah, but the guy is a jerkoff when if comes to the way he presents stuff. Riding all the bikes on the road the way he does.
Looks like a really cool place. The complex has to cost a fortune to maintain.
We stopped at his shop on the way up to Southwick, place is unreal. Definitely a place to visit if you’re in the area. Sr and Jr are solid guys.
He does pretty good for a non-profit. Kind of like the NFL.
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Haha He does not ride all the bikes on the road. He has a very large shop and and the asphalt he's riding on it looks like part of his property.
I've seen him also ride in the forest that is adjacent to his shop. Not sure if he owns the land or not, but he seems like he's very well established in the community, I'm sure they know who is and if was causing problems they would ask him to stop.
All I see him doing is good stuff for the community and the motorcycle people in general.
Win Win
Is he a bit wacky? Yes, but the way I see it, he's a good kind of wacky and a motorcycle nut like me. 🤯
They have put a lot of time,money and effort into being a GasGas dealer . I hope it works out for them. Kap's a bit of a kook,but he's cool.
If you like poorly "restored" and grossly misrepresented vintage bikes, he's your guy.🤡
BTW, shiny does NOT equal restoration. All it takes is the original manufacturers brochure, talent, and time. When it looks exactly like the original brochure down to the last detail...it's restored. Any less and it's simply rebuilt and worth about 25% of a full restoration.
You mean like this one?
https://youtu.be/kI70WkUwNNY?si=hb-rkSvuSWL7FNq8
My God, there's some Negative Nancies on here. No surprise at all though. In reality, he's a motorcycle dealer, what that means is bring in a lot of motorcycles and move them out as fast as possible to make profit.
That's how he stays in business and he seems to be very successful at that. Does he take the time to restore every single bike that comes in down to the frame? Of course not, he would lose his ass and would no longer be in business. What he does as far as I can tell is very successful.
Go ahead and knock him down. But I think he's doing a good job and helps keep our sport alive.
There is a video on his channel that he shows and talks about his past business. He had/has a computer repair shop. In the video I saw he was drastically downsizing. He loves the sport and has put a lot of funds into it. He has a hauler and was helping out a couple local guys doing nationals.
Yah he might be a bit wild, but he lives and breaths motorcycles . I have never been to his place, I want to go check it out sometime. Many of my customers that have vintage bikes or larger collections of bikes, are not fans of his for whatever reasons. And some of my customers love the place.
I would have to say that no matter what You think of his videos or him, its cool that he has a place that people can go and look at so many cool bikes. And he seems to always be adding bikes.
NFL isn't a non profit lol
https://www.publicsource.org/why-is-the-nfl-a-nonprofit/
I first started watching him and his crew doing some amazing vintage rebuilds. Finding vintage parts is an art of its own and he does not skimp.
For some reason he reminds me of Evil Knievel with his unique showmanship .
If he wasn’t who he is we wouldn’t be talking about him.
The teams themselves have always been taxed, it was the league office that wasn't and mostly because profits were distributed to the teams instead of being kept by a separate corporate entity.
I'd guess that the NFL still pays very little in tax, even though they gave up their tax exemption. The league probably keeps enough to cover it's expenses, the vast majority of the money is paid to the teams and thus the NFL itself doesn't show nearly the profit that you'd think. And yes, part of that is the outrageous salary paid to the commissioner.......!
You really should read the article first to avoid posting a self-own
Question. Did Kaplan go around the 2007 MX des Nations and get autographs from the racers, on a white helmet? I think I remember the pork chops for some reason. I cannot verify this but I was wondering if it was him.
I have watched some videos of his, and judging by what I seen there is about zero chance he was ever a pro level rider🤣, unless he is goon riding everytime he rips a bike around.
Well he is OLD (like me) and if you judge his riding by him, clowning around his shop.... 🙄
I by no means am saying he was the king or ultra fast Pro, but in this interview he did say he raced Pro and some expert races at the 13:50 mark in this interview. He also did say he had a lot of injuries.
I guess I don't get the hate that this guy gets. Yeah he likes to put himself out there, which makes him an easy target, but what I think he's doing is pretty damn cool. Bottom line he LUVS MOTORCYCLES and I wouldn't mind being in his position with the awesome museum and cool bikes.
https://youtu.be/4tu2iEjjC5g?si=Va21PFAG87PLB4OL
Oh im not hating really I think the dudes hilarous, just stating lol, people tend to get little carried away about there riding abilities, or there " former " abilities.
Pit Row
That is true. But if he says he raced Pro, even if he might not have qualified for the night program etc and said he also raced expert back in the day not sure why He would lie about that on a YouTube video that many people can see.
I guess he was above average of your typical Racer, but did break a lot of bones! 😵
I think he was a mid pack average Joe type expert class rider in the 80's in the local NESC in New England, probably raced a lot of Southwick events. I remember his name from back then. I checked the Vault and didn't find anything.I just think he's trying to be the next Jerry Bernardo.
The guy definitely knows how to twist it. He has several NESC championships on his wall.
Back then they had more ex/pro races. National or Pro SX, probably not.
He always has super clean 500's. Leave it to Vital to give a guy shit who obviously loves the sport
Plenty of the guys that are in to vintage bikes want to see 100% authentic builds, and most of his builds are way to much bling and american flag inspired graphics to the point that the bike looks like a rolling circus tent.
So i guess that’s why some of the core vintage guys don’t like his builds while others just think ”oh cool bike”.
I used to follow his content before but lost interest and thought he was to much for my taste.
I found his channel when searching around the internet for some 125 elsinore pictures and i remember that he had a clean one on display then.
Some great pictures here https://www.vitalmx.com/forums/moto-related/visited-new-england-mc-muse…
His computer shop is next door to Cycle Gear, I dont think that was by accident....
I can understand that point of view on some of his bikes. I have not seen enough of them , I assumed that he only did that to the modern bikes he resold or his personal bikes.
I need to find time to take a trip down there over the winter .Buying an old mill property like he has , has also been something that I would like to do someday. Seeing the building would be fun for me too. Overall I think its super cool that he has that place. I would have loved to go as a kid. Imagine kids going on a fieldtrip to a place like that! Instead of the average museum.
He is a Stark dealer too, watched a video last night, he is selling them for $10,000.
Fucking A man I'm so proud to have made it on that list my name will always be in the rule book it was a life long dream
Thats cool. Two friends of mine are the first on the list when the senior classes were started back in the 80's. Wow have the age categories grown.
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