The History of FWMR

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Dragonfly
Club Staff/Ride Leader
Club Staff/Ride Leader
Posts: 3402
Joined: Thu Aug 24, 2006 9:58 pm
Riding Style: Intermediate Track Rider
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Location: Arlington, TX

The History of FWMR

Post by Dragonfly » Wed Mar 04, 2015 6:09 pm

How FWMR began...

Like many other groups out there we had humble beginnings. We started with a small group of like minded individuals. I first met Terry, our group founder, at Sonic. The same Sonic we start most of our rides from. It was a midday in late October and it was still warm out. The weather was actually perfect for riding, not hot and not cold but just right. As I was riding by I noticed a Suzuki and a rider parked at the Sonic. I was just out and about riding by myself. Basically going low and slow exploring some roads. I decided to pull into the Sonic and talk to this guy. I wanted to ask him if he knew the area and to see if he knew of some good roads to go play on. Everyone I had ridden with up to this point was what you would call a squid/stunter. Their idea of a good road was a straight one that they could either see how long they could ride a wheelie for or to see how fast they could go, or BOTH. Some of the groups we rode with where Throttle Mob, Suicide Lifestyles, Sportbike Hype, TSBA (Texas Sport Bike Association), NTSBA (North Texas Sport Bike Association), DFWSportbike, Texas Sport Rider (Hawks Group) among others as well as individuals with no group affiliations.

Terry had just gotten back from riding with some guys. He said he had actually split off early from the group. He said group was drawing a lot of attention to themselves by doing stupid stuff. I told him that's why I ride alone, I don't want nor need the drama. We got to talking about some of the groups/clubs we had ridden with and the stupid shit they did. While we were talking a guy on a Kawasaki ZX9 pulled up and asked where were we heading to and asked if he could join. Jason was his name, he was a Sargent and aircraft mechanic over at the base. We told him we weren't really riding anywhere, that we were just talking. Talking specifically about some of the dumb people we had ridden with before. He shared some of his experiences as well. He rode on a regular basis with a group calling themselves Throttle Mob. But had also ridden with a few of the groups Terry and I had ridden with. We talked about how great it would be if we could get a group together of responsible riders. It was just some wishful thinking on our part. We ended up going for a short ride around Lake Worth. We shook hands and said goodbye when we got back. Terry said he lived up the street and that he would probably be hanging around the Sonic the following Saturday. Jason and I told him we would meet him there around 8:00am.

The following Saturday we met at the Sonic at 8:00am. Well at least Terry and I were there early, another guy showed up on a Busa. Terry had posted on DFWSportbike, an online community/bulletin board for sportbike riders. Not a club, they were never organized, anyone could join hell you didn't even need to ride or own a motorcycle. Only thing you needed was a computer. It had online games, discussions about everything and anything. Mostly frequented by sportbike riders. You can only imagine it had all kinds of drama on it. Darren the guy on the Busa had seen Terry post about going for a ride. No stunts, no squids just riding. Darren a computer guy was having the same problems we were, trying to find responsible riding buddies. Darren told us he wasn't too sure about riding with anyone from DFWSportbike, but he figured if we were idiots he would just bolt. We ended up going for a ride around Lake Worth and then over to Weatherford. On our way back from Weatherford we found FM5 thru Aledo. It became our favorite road instantly, y'all know why. We used to ride up and down that road until the cops would show up. I'm sure we pissed off a lot of the residents there. That first couple of years our rides consisted of exploring roads roads and we usually ended rides at Sonic or at Cycle Werks West when they were on Camp Bowie.

Anyways, Darren said it would be pretty easy to set up a bulletin board like the one DFWSportbike was using. He said we should set one up and even offered to help set it up. Within a few days we had a bulletin board, pretty basic and simple in its design but ours none the less. We set aside the 2nd and 4th Thursday nights of the month to meet and discuss what we where going to do the following weekends. We chose these nights as it was weeknights Terry could stay out late as he didn't have to work the following Fridays. We called these Thursday nights "Bike Nights" because we discussed bike related stuff and other MC's met on Thurdays as well, so why not? It started off as just us but we started to draw a few people who approached us because we were there on a regular basis. For the first 6 months we met at Sonic on Bike Nights. We talked to the manager and were able to get 1/2 price burgers and drinks if you showed up on a motorcycle. FWMR Bike Nights were born.

Within a few months were starting to outgrow the Sonic for bike nights. So we started looking for a different venue. We had the idea of making bike nights every Thursday instead of the 2nd & 4th Thursdays. We also wanted to alternate locations to see if we could attract some more membership. We found a Chicken Express that was on the east side of Fort Worth. Almost into Arlington but not quite, it was on Eastchase Parkway and Randoll Mill Road just off of I-30. We worked out a similar deal with food there as well. It worked out great for Darren and Myself. Darren lived in Euless and I lived in Arlington. The Chicken Express was much closer to us than the Sonic. This lasted about another six months. But we had one problem, it did cause some confusion. It never failed we would have a small group show up at the opposite location of where Bike Night was being held. And of course you know how people complain. After numerous complaints we ended up holding bike nights at Hooters on 183 & I-20. Terry's boss was a regular there, he was a rider as well and was wanting to be a part of the club. He offered to make a donation to keep us (the club) going in exchange for moving Bike Nights closer to him. He lived between Fort Worth and Burleson.

By this time we had been at it for a year and were needing to get some kind of logo. Plus we also had people asking about T-Shirts/Jackets and such. Darren ended up getting in touch with one of the artist that had done some art work for Big Dog Sportswear. Terry told the artist what we were looking for and the artist did up some quick sketches to show us. Since the majority of the money being paid out for this art work was coming from Terry's Boss we put his bike on the logo. Hence why the Shark is on a ZX-12. Our original idea for starting the club was to have a riding club that a level headed business professional would have no regrets joining. At the time we had a small group of riders that had both Sport and Cruiser style motorcycles. Our original logo had a Cruiser on it as well. That cruiser was a Yamaha Warrior. Please forgive me as his name has slipped my mind. Besides the warrior he also had a TL1000R and his wife rode a Ducati Monster. He also fronted us some money so we paid respect by putting his favorite bike on the logo. We also had a group of friends and family lined up behind the bikes cheering. From the start we thought the sportbike rider should be a shark because that's what the front of the ZX-12 reminded us of, and cruisers have always been "HOGS" so why not a Wart Hog? The artist wanted to draw animals as the background crowd, but we thought it would be to detailed and detract from the Shark and Wart Hog.

Yes at one time we had two sections of the boards, the Sportbike section and the Cruiser section, two separate boards in one. We had separate rides and events for each as well as separate conversation topics. It was a great idea we had to incorporate the two different styles into one club. But the major contributors to the club were the sportbike riders. We had a few cruisers come and go, but our biggest problem was anyone we got to oversee that section of the boards immediately felt like they were entitled. They wanted to make changes and do whatever they wanted without asking for input from Terry. At this time it was only Terry running thing for the club. We as moderators monitored and regulated the boards we had no say in policy making. Not that Terry was a dictator he did bounce ideas and thought off of us but once he made up his mind it was that and only that. We went through a few people that wanted to take over that section of the boards and we even offered to sell off that section and lease out the name, but lack of interest on our part to put up with BS and Drama forced us to close it. FWMR then became a sportbike riding club. We dropped the Wart Hog and Cruiser along with the crowd and replaced them with the Texas Flag. I believe we have Don aka Firewa11 to thank for that art work.

This is a synopsis of our history as a club. I hope you find it interesting as well as entertaining.
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"Not all who wander are lost"