This little antidote comes via my sister and her ex- husband who was a racer. I knew of Skip because of the TT expert he was in his racing days, but I never got to know him personally until he was a distributor of Marushin helmets (back in the mid 80’s).
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| Skip Van Leeuwen |
While I was visiting my sister, who lives near Solvang, California, I knew that Skip and a friend would be in the area, so we all arranged to have dinner together.
During dinner my sister related an event that happened to Skip during Daytona ‘back in the day’.
The story goes that they were all at a night club which was full of racers and college kids on spring break. My sister mentions there was a ‘veteran’ racer who was an excellent ballroom dancer; it turns out to be Everett Brashear (AMA hall of famer). Then she starts telling how Skip was flirting with a college girl and the girls’ boyfriend was not too happy about it. It turned physical and a brawl ensued of bikers versus college kids.
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| Everett Brashear |
Up until now Skip did not remember the incident; but he then chimed in with many colorful details. It sounded like one of the brawls you saw in a cartoon because Skip crawled out the bottom of the pile to hide under my sister’s cloth covered table. While he was under the table, they gave him Everett’s coat and tie (yes, people used to wear sport coats and ties to clubs) and he sat down at the table. By then bouncers were throwing people out and they came up to Skip and start accusing him of starting the whole thing. Of course he insisted it wasn't him as he had been sitting at the table the entire time. He never did get thrown out.
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| Skip Van Leeuwen |
Daytona hasn’t changed much over the years. If you have gone, or know of someone that has been during Bike Week (or during the old days before it was known as Bike Week), there’s stories aplenty!
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