The Harley-Davidson Race Team Invited Me To Be On The Pit Crew And I Brought My Bad Luck With Me

Up at first light on an overcast Saturday and ready for a full day of two-wheeled action, I saddled up my own Harley-Davidson and rode a couple hours south for the MotoAmerica races at Mid-Ohio. I’d been promised a place on the Harley-Davidson Factory Racing Team King of the Baggers class squad, shadowing the crew to see what goes into a full factory effort fighting for the win. I knew I would largely be a symbolic addition to the team for the day, but because I’m absolutely smitten with this big-displacement heavy-weight race class, and the audacious maniacs who ride them, I agreed. A day at the races beats just about anything. I saddled up the pony and rode into town. 

Bradley Brownell/Jalopnik

There’s something slightly ironic about riding my electric Harley-Davidson to the race track to watch massive air-cooled baggers do battle on track burning high-test race gas. But with the price of fuel what it is, I’m glad I did. The ride down to the track was uneventful, but just a bit longer than the range the bike allows, so I stopped at a Pilot station and charged up for a few minutes while drinking a coffee and snacking on a pastry. I arrived to the track just before 9AM, ready to get underway. 

The day began for Harley-Davidson team riders Kyle Wyman, Bradley Smith, and customer squad rider James Rispoli with KOTB qualifying. The team informed me that because their bikes are still reliant on air cooling for the cylinders, they are much happier in cooler weather, and the overcast track and threat of rain certainly helped their case. Indian, the team’s biggest competitor, had been largely running the table so far this season, but Wyman won last time out at Laguna Seca, and they were hoping to capitalize on that momentum. 

Wyman qualified within a tenth of Indian’s Hayden Gillim and Troy Herfoss, setting up for a front row start. Rispoli and Smith secured fourth and fifth position respectively. In the two-lap dash-for-cash Challenge race immediately following qualifying, Wyman settled into second place with a good start, while Indian’s Herfoss made nearly a one-second gap. 

A few hours later and the threat of rain had come and gone. As we set up for the grid the sun came out and the heat of the day was upon us. The team wasn’t looking optimistic at the win, but knew they were close enough to capitalize if the Indian team got caught sleeping. As a team member for the day, I helped carry stuff to grid, hauled the tire warmers back to the pit box as the grid cleared, and waited to see what would happen across the nine-lap sprint. 

Because these races are so short, usually well under twenty minutes, there’s rarely a need for tires or fuel unless something catastrophic happens, or it starts raining. So we set to watching the race on a pit side television and hoped we’d done enough. 

As soon as the green flag fell, Wyman got the jump on the field, jumping from third on the grid to the lead before turn one. It was sensational work, and the team hollered with excitement every lap Wyman passed by the main straight still in the lead. For about five minutes the team was over the moon with excitement, then came the bad luck. 

Maintaining the lead but with two Indian Challengers right on his tail, Wyman was pushing with all he had. The 36-year-old New Yorker has been part of the Harley KOTB factory squad since its inception in 2021, winning the 2025 championship aboard his highly modified Road Glide. With it all on the line in Central Ohio, Wyman transitioned up out of the corner and his 620-pound bike ripped sideways on him, high-siding and sliding fast into a section of wall without air barriers. Thankfully he got up and walked away, but Harley’s best chance of a win evaporated in seconds. The good mood of the team soured just as quickly.

During the lengthy red flag to clean up the debris of the fallen Harley, the bike was hauled back to the garage and Kyle back to the pits to meet with his team boss. The first words I heard from Wyman’s mouth as he pulled off his helmet were “I don’t know what the f**k happened!” Post-crash analysis indicates that the bike had so much mid-corner grip and the engine made so much torque that it may have lifted the front tire while still leaned, which made its own overcorrection, bucking the back wheel up in the air and shooting Wyman for a ride. 

When the bikes went back out, Bradley Smith laid his #38 factory Harley down at the self same corner as Wyman’s crash, this time running straight off into the gravel trap and slamming into the air barrier, popping it. The team was immediately skeptical of track condition, demanding an inspection for fluids or other debris. It seems, however, that both riders just made different mistakes at the same corner of the track a lap apart. I couldn’t help but feel I had brought a bunch of bad luck with me to the track that day! 

Smith’s bike wasn’t wrecked nearly as badly as Wyman’s, so the team had the bike called back to the pits and set about rebuilding it to close out the final 5 laps of the race. Most of the damage had been cosmetic, and it was an all-hands-on-deck situation to get it sorted in the time allowed. Because I’m a master with zip ties, I set to the task of getting the carbon fiber bags re-assembled and attached to the bike again. I had to replace one of the aluminum mounting lugs, throw on a couple pieces of duct tape to hold the flapping carbon together, and zip tie the lid back on. We got the five-minute warning for going back to grid, and my heart skipped several dozen beats. It was an all-out team effort to get the bike back legal and running again. 

Unfortunately the #38 had apparently snapped a wiring connection to the main power switch in its slide, and the team ultimately gave up right as the race went green for the remaining laps. 

With just one factory-supported Harley still in the race, the Big Diehl Racing bike of James “Hogspoli” Rispoli, the green flag fell a second time and they were off. Rispoli settled into third behind the two leading Indians and when the checkers finally fell, he was about six seconds off the lead, but had earned his podium finish. It certainly wasn’t the race Harley was looking for, but that’s why they run the races, and salvaging a podium was as good as they could have hoped for. 

On my ride home from the track, once again needing a quick charge to get back, I reflected on what I’d learned across the day. Harley had a great bike, and in the right hands was as quick or quicker than the Vance & Hines-operated Indian squad. Both Wyman and Smith owe a lot to their Alpinestars leathers for keeping them safe in their respective offs. I wish our efforts had gotten Smith back on track to finish the race, but unfortunately that’s how the cookie crumbles sometimes. 

More than anything, though, I once again revived my love of the King of the Baggers series. I’ve seen these bikes race nearly a dozen times since the inaugural exhibition race in 2020, and every time it’s as loud, brash, and exciting as I need it to be. Getting in the mix with the team and sitting even closer to the action made it a pretty good way to waste a Saturday. 

Every season these bikes get even faster, too! To put it in perspective, the front row of the KOTB race would have qualified 17th, 18th, and 19th in the Superbikes race on Sunday, and all three outqualified the Supersport class pole time. These are serious racing machines, and I’ll be a fan forever. 

I decided to stay home for Sunday’s race two, hoping to keep my bad luck about 100 miles away. Indian still took the top two steps of the podium, but Smith recovered from Saturday to take a Sunday podium in third followed by Wyman on the team’s backup chassis built up overnight, and Rispoli down in sixth.