Between the Races: Lowell “Junior” Christensen
April 5, 2006
By CJ
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A couple weekends ago, our editor had the pleasure of taking part in one of Danny Walker’s American Supercamps riding schools, which was held at the Colton, California, Honda Rider Education Center. Although he’s a Southern California native, he had never visited the facility, and he was so impressed that he sat down with administrator Lowell Christensen to learn more about it.

Lowell Christensen poses next to a Mick Doohan painting in the Colton Honda Rider Education Center. CJ photo

RRX: How many Red Rider Ranches are there?
Lowell Christensen: There are four—one here in Southern California; one in Alpharetta, Georgia; one in Irving, Texas; and the other one’s in Troy, Ohio.

How long has this one been here?
This is the first one, and it was built in the spring of 1988, I believe.

What’s the general idea behind it?
Well, originally they were built for the ATV classes from when we all signed a consent decree—the agreement that all the major manufacturers signed over the conflict with the CPSC with ATVs. The SVIA created a class that taught safety training for ATVs. Then you had the street bike program, and as California progressed with the CMSP—the California Motorcycle Safety Patrol. We’ve enhanced that as we’ve gone along. The BRC, which is the Beginner Rider’s Course, gives you a little education—a 15-hour course—but it also bypasses the skills course at the DMV. That’s why people take that. The other side is the dirt bike school, which I think is one of our best things, because those are our future customers—the 6-year-old kids on up. We’re full about every weekend, except for the weekends we let Danny Walker come here for his American Supercamps. We do the classes on weekends, we do them during the week, we have evening classes. We get a fair amount of crossover. [Gesturing towards a group of female riders] These ladies, their whole club is going to come back and take a dirt bike class, because the dirt bike class is also an enhancement to their street bike skills. If you put them on a dirt bike, they can see how they can move around differently and they can get on the sidewalls and work that bike. They fell a little freer with more gear on, and they’re on the dirt, so they don’t feel so intimidated.

The Colton center is one of four such facilities run by Honda in the U.S. CJ photo

What do you use for street bikes?
Street bikes are all done with the CB250 because that’s the size you have to use for the street course. We also have a lot of the big street bikes on hand. Those we keep for display bikes, but if people come with bikes that have not-stock exhaust, we’ll let them ride an equivalent bike so they can still go through the course on a big bike. This is an urban area, so we try to adhere to the decibel rating.

How big is this facility?
The facility is roughly five acres. We have three acres for the environmental learning center portion. That’s where we bring (elementary) schools in. We have about six schools scheduled already this spring because there are 4,000 different plants and trees over there. I have an environmental specialist that works with us who’s part of the Children’s Forest, which is a portion of the San Bernardino National Forest. He’s working with the schools, bringing them through.

A few of the bikes used for the street-riding course. CJ photo

How many people use the facility?
The dirt bike school is about 1,500 to 2,000 and street bike is too, so we’re putting about 4,500 people through here on product per year. This is the largest center in the country.

Who funds this?
This is all owned by American Honda. People pay to do the classes. The dirt bike program is $175 per person, and we have family prices, private-lesson prices, and birthday-party prices—although we have to put a limit on that with the all reaction to all the sugar in the birthday cakes, as we found out the hard way one night! In the end, it’s cheaper than going to Disney Land. The street bike program for the state $235 unless you’re under 21; then it’s $150 because in the state of California, you have to take the riding course to get your license. It’s mandated that the price is reduced.

What else do you do here?
We have two classrooms for the classes. We supply the facility for MSF and ASI to do their coach training. That’s the training session where they come to learn to be an instructor. The dirt bike one is just short of a week, and the street bike one is about a week and a half. I pretty well limit the use of the building to motorcycle and recreation industry. We do a lot for the San Bernardino National Forest. They have all their conferences here because Honda works with the volunteer program up there. At all the California supercrosses, we do the Youth Experience in the pits, and we’re doing Houston, Dallas, and Las Vegas.

The American Supercamps school we attended was held in the same area where dirt bike training is done. CJ photo

How many people work here?
Well, I’m full-time Honda staff and the rest are either temps or contractors. We probably have about 20 total. My instructors and coaches are very good, very knowledgeable. Ninety percent of the dirt bike ones are racers; two of them are very good off-road expert-class racers in District 37. [Woman ex-motocross champion] Mercedes Gonzalez works for us, and she loves it. I have four other women who are very active in off-road, and then my street bike guys are just all very good riders who like to teach—none of this old, militaristic attitude.

Who are some of the people who visit?
We get a lot of families who are looking for something they can do together. That’s a good thing. What some of our government officials don’t realize is it’s not a bad element that’s out there riding motorcycles. These new people are very responsible, and they just want to learn and do better.

We also have a lot of celebrities. Cindy Crawford came in here last summer, Matt LeBlanc’s been here—a lot of people. We did Surreal Life 5 with Jose Canseco and those guys. They cut out a bunch of it because there was no controversy! They all had so much fun that it didn’t work for what they wanted! We find that when we train stunt people or people who are professionals in other fields, they train up real easy because they pay attention. Our best students, though, are the 6-to-8-year-old girls in the young classes because they listen. We do an environmental walk first, to teach them about nature and teach them about trail hazards and how to stay on a trail. We were talking about chaparral, and the instructor says, “Can anybody tell me what chaparral is?” All the little boys put up their hands and yelled, “It’s that motorcycle store over there!” [Chaparral Motorsports] Well, at le ast they were paying attention.

The four-acre facility includes a nature area that local school kids attend on field trips. CJ photo