Like so many of his peers, Sean Bice began his lifelong love affair with motorcycling on a minibike. His adventures in small-town, northern New York state eventually led to the purchase at age 16 of a two-stroke Yamaha RD350, which Bice still owns. “My dad was cool enough to go, ‘I’ll pay for half, you pay for half, but you have to take care of this bike,’” he recalls. “It’s where I got started. I have a lot of memories of that motorcycle.”

A writer by trade, Bice kicked off his professional career working for advertising agencies, but he is best known within motorcycling for time spent with first Yamaha and now MotoAmerica. “When I worked for Yamaha as a press officer,” he explains, “there were a fair amount of people who knew me for that, and it was mostly because I not only did road racing, but I also did motocross, supercross, off-road, and ATV.”

Bice has been part of the MotoAmerica team for the past eight years. On this episode, he provides a primer on the eight classes that comprise the 10-round national series. Bice also touches on the forthcoming Talent Cup, which will replace Junior Cup in 2025, as well as the youth-oriented Mini Cup. On free weekends, Bice enjoys throttle therapy. “I like to go out on a perfect Sunday afternoon,” he says, “and just bomb around town.”

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What comes to mind when someone says, “Sturgis”? As in, the annual motorcycle rally set in the South Dakota city of the same name. If you’re Mark Long, host of “Driven to Ride,” you know only what you’ve read or been told. See, before this year, Mark had never been to Sturgis, never mind the rally. So this past August, he packed his bags and pointed the headlight of his Yamaha XSR900 toward Mount Rushmore.

Among the half-a-million rally attendees, some, like Mark, are wide-eyed newbies. Take it from Richard Worsham, co-founder of Janus Motorcycles: “Driving through Sturgis at night, it’s wild—bikes back to back.” Others, like Zach Parham, president and CEO of Comoto Holdings, have been coming to the Black Hills for decades. “I rode my first time on my own bike when I was 16,” he says. “This is my 29th year.”

Long relates his own adventure, with insights from Worsham, Parham, photographer Michael Lichter, YouTube star “Doodle on a Motorcycle,” and others, including Cody Ertman, media and PR manager at the Legendary Sturgis Buffalo Chip, known as “The Best Party Anywhere.” He says, “If I wasn’t working at ‘The Chip,’ I would definitely be one of those people who came every year. It’s such a cool experience.”

The Buffalo Chip

Janus Motorcycles

Official Sturgis Website

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Keith Keller ventured from the U.S. to the Cayman Islands to experience first-hand the spectacular diving and snorkeling for which the British overseas territory located in the western Caribbean Sea is known, and he stayed for the motorcycling. That description may seem odd to dyed-in-the-wool riders, since Grand Cayman, the largest of the three islands, only encompasses 75 square miles—not exactly tailor-made for touring.

On this episode of the “Driven to Ride” podcast, show host Mark Long interviews Keller, a California native whom he met while vacationing on Grand Cayman. A lifelong motorcyclist, Keller owns Cayman Custom Cycles, a “one-stop shop for all things motorcycle in Grand Cayman.” He also operates “Cayman Islands Motorcycle Tours,” which offers a lap of the island from the seat of a late-model Harley-Davidson Big Twin.

Keller is a staunch advocate for the local motorcycling community and the founder of the Cayman Islands Motorcycle Riders Association—don’t call it a “club.” The tours themselves are relaxed affairs, as Long can vouch, with Keller leading from the front, albeit on the left side of the road, which is the rule of law in the Caymans. Figure 90 miles round trip. “But,” Keller says proudly, “you see the whole island.”

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