Mert Lawwill




Mert Lawwill (Born September 25, 1940) is an American professional motorcycle racer, race team owner and mountain bike designer.[1] He won the 1969 AMA Grand National Championship and, was one of the top competitors on the AMA national racing circuit during 1960s and 1970s.[1] After his motorcycle racing career, Lawwill became one of the top motorcycle racing frame designers and builders.[1] Lawwill then used his experience as a motorcycle frame builder to become an innovative mountain bike designer, developing one of the first bicycle suspensions.[2] He also developed prosthetic limbs for amputees.[2] Lawwill was inducted in the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame in 1997 and the Motorcycle Hall of Fame in 1998.[1][3]




Contents






  • 1 Motorcycle racing career


  • 2 Design career


  • 3 References


  • 4 External links





Motorcycle racing career


Lawwill was born in Boise, Idaho.[1] He started his racing career as an amateur racer on the local TT track in Boise and, later, scramble races (later known as motocross) across the United States Northwest.[1] In 1961, he moved to Los Angeles, California so that he could race at the Ascot Park race track which, at the time was the epicenter of dirt track racing.[2] He gained sponsorship from Dudley Perkins, a Harley-Davidson dealer in San Francisco.[1] It was during this time that Lawwill began to learn about modifying motorcycle frames for racing competitions.[2] By 1963, he had become a professional rider and in 1964 he signed a contract to compete for the Harley-Davidson factory racing team with whom he would remain for the rest of his racing career.[1]


Lawwill won his first AMA national race at the Sacramento Mile on September 19, 1965.[1] In 1969, Lawwill won the AMA Grand National Championship and, was voted AMA's Most Popular Rider of the Year.[1][4] His defense of his Grand National Championship during the 1970 season became the subject of Bruce Brown's 1971 motorcycle documentary film, On Any Sunday co-starring actor Steve McQueen and off-road racer Malcolm Smith.[5] He continued to compete for the AMA Grand National Championship until 1977 when, he retired at the age of 37 due to an inner-ear disorder that affected his balance.[1][6] He accumulated 161 career AMA Grand National finishes and won 15 Grand National races during his 15-year racing career.[1]



Design career


In the late 1970s, Lawwill became involved in designing bicycle frames for the burgeoning sport of mountain biking.[2] He was one of the early pioneers in the off-road bicycling world, having introduced the first production mountain bike.[3] He also developed the first commercially produced four-bar linkage suspension for mountain bikes and patented the design.[7] During this period, he continued his involvement in motorcycle racing as a race team owner in the AMA Grand National Championship until 1990 when, he grew frustrated with the way the AMA ran the championship.[2] He then ran the Yeti Cycles racing team competing in downhill mountain bike racing and, developed the successful Lawwill DH-9 full-suspension downhill bike.[2][8] Lawwill's custom racing bicycles became highly prized by top racers around the world and his designs won numerous national and world titles.[1][3][8]


Lawwill is currently involved in constructing and marketing street-legal versions of the Harley-Davidson XR-750 bike that he raced in the Grand National Championship.[2][9] He also runs a non-profit company supplying prosthetic hands so that amputees can ride bicycles or motorcycles.[2] Approximately a third of all the prosthetic hands that he manufactures go to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, for use by military veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.[2]



References





  1. ^ abcdefghijklm "Mert Lawwill at the AMA Hall of Fame". motorcyclemuseum.org. Retrieved 2 January 2016..mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"""""""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration{color:#555}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration span{border-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/12px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center}.mw-parser-output code.cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{font-size:100%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#33aa33;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-right{padding-right:0.2em}


  2. ^ abcdefghij "Backmarker: Mert Lawwill". motorcycle-usa.com. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  3. ^ abc "Mert Lawwill". mmbhof.org. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  4. ^ "AMA Grand National Champions Past And Present". Google Books. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  5. ^ "On Any Sunday: A Picture surreal, Larger And More Detailed Than Life". Google Books. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  6. ^ "Mert Lawwill. Old? Maybe. Fast? Definitely". Google Books. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  7. ^ Hadland, Tony (2014). Bicycle Design: An Illustrated History. Books.Google.com. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  8. ^ ab Heller, Peter (2002). Outside Magazine's Urban Adventure, Denver/Boulder. Books.Google.com. Retrieved 2 January 2016.


  9. ^ Girdler, Allan (2005). Sunday Rider. Cycle World. Books.Google.com. Retrieved 2 January 2016.




External links



  • Mert Lawwill's official Web site

  • Mert Lawwill at the AMA Hall of Fame

  • Mert Lawwill at the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame

  • Mert Lawwill's prosthetic system









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