PRESIDENT’S AWARD

Pick up a September 1963 issue of Cycle World magazine, flip to Page 18 and you’ll read these words by contributor Boyd Reynolds: “The 1963 Laconia Silver Anniversary Road Race will be recorded in history as one for the high-tension events of the calendar year.

“It was a race started with a shock, spiced with surprise and topped off with a climactic punch bettering even an Alfred Hitchcock (cinema) creation.” Similar hyperbole about that race is found in Cycle and Motorcyclist magazines of that same year.

The Laconia National’s two primary players were veteran racer George Roeder and second-year AMA Expert, 19-year-old Jody Nicholas. Roeder rode a Harley-Davidson KRTT, among the top road race bikes within the AMA ranks at the time; young Jody masterfully maneuvered a BSA Gold Star only yards, some-times feet, ahead of the veteran racer throughout their cat-and-mouse duel. But as the pair completed the penultimate lap, Nicholas made a mistake that led to a low-side crash as they headed towards the flagman near start/finish, allowing Roeder to gingerly motor around the fallen bike to begin the race’s final lap. Undeterred, Nicholas, who managed to keep his single-cylinder engine running during the crash, promptly remounted to give chase during that closing lap.

“All (spectator) eyes were strained watching the downhill section,” continued Reynolds. “Then down the hill they came, Jody Nicholas had passed Roeder and was in the lead, the crowd cheered and screamed so loud that motorcycle exhausts were drowned out, girls were jumping up and down, (and) BSA pit men were hugging each