Renegade Issue 30

36-37 / 100

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Ohio Bike week was my first big show out of my home area
and first stop on the Zombie Apocalypse Tour. As it always
seems to go I had a very short time to pull it all together, I got
the final confirmation on the show only four weeks prior to
the event leaving me very little time to pull it all together. Not
only did I need to put together all the ads posters and flyers,
make tons of phone calls, email and social media blasts, I
also had to buy a new van!
My old van was having many issues and I just did not trust it
to be road worthy, so I had to buy a another one, and I want-
ed to use as many of the parts as I could from the old van
on the new van, so I had to find another Dodge van around
the same year and model. I found one two weeks before the
event and within one week I cleaned out the new one I just
bought, stripped the doors off my old one and replaced them
on the new van along with the entire interior set up that I had
built in the original van and had it painted by the following
weekend! I also slapped together my 77 Ironhead project
bike so I could take it with me, all making me a week late in
getting to Ohio! Leaving me mvery little time to go out and
drum up word about the show.
Fortunately for me I ran into the awesome and lovely Kimmy
Kruz, who has been a bartender at bike rallies across the US
for many years and in doing so has built up a lot of friends
across the land in in Ohio! She hooked me up with a couple
of awesome area car guys Gene Reiter (Geno) and Tom Ritz
from the Rolling 88’s CC. They hooked me up with many cool
cars and cool people like Beaver who had a ton of cool old
cars stashed away all over his property who also helped to
help fill up the show. I have to admit, if it was not for all the
cool people I met in Ohio I would have fallen flat on my face!
When it was all said and done, it was a great time! I admit
not the biggest turn out I’ve had for shows I’ve promoted, we
had about 20-25 cars show up and they were all unique and
interesting rides. Not to bad for a first time show, plus we
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were going up against 3 other well-established car shows in
the area on the same day.
In the end I was satisfied with the event, but appar-
ently the promoter was not and did not want to pay
me the agreed balance, leaving me in a precarious posi-
tion, since I was counting on that payment to continue on the
road for the Zombie Apocalypse tour. The promoter made me
wait around for a few days but in the end I did get paid. In the
promoters defense, I did not exactly do everything I had prom-
ised to do, I was a week late and I did not make the promised
updates to their website. Honestly I admit I was a little over my
head, but I did bust my ass to get all my shit together to pull
off the show and do all the other bull shit I needed to do to get
ready for the road. Not an excuse just the simple reality. Hope-
fully I can make the promoter happy so we can do it again next
year!
Thanks Ohio!