American wins Custom Bike Building World Championship

07/08/2009 by info.

For the first time since the World Championship of Custom Bike Building program made its debut in 2004, an American custom motorcycle engineer has won the market’s top honor of being able to call himself World Champion.

The winner, Dave Cook of Cook Custom Choppers in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was voted World Champion by his fellow competitors at an event that defied motorcycle industry downturn expectations with an increased field of 83 custom bikes in total (compared to 67 in 2008), and one that is widely being hailed as showcasing the most advanced and diverse display of custom motorcycle design and engineering ever seen.

The 51 year old Cook is an internationally recognized engineer and creative genius whose passion for design and engineering excellence had seen him be the winningest American in the past two years, having been fourth and highest placed American competitor behind an international top-three in both 2007 and 2008.

“This is a dream come true”, said Cook, minutes after receiving the acclaim of the large crowd of motorcycle enthusiasts and fellow industry professionals who crowded into the downtown City of Sturgis Champions Park venue.

During the build-up to the contest, Cook’s highly anticipated, exquisite, hand-crafted “Rambler” was among the early favorites to become the first American built World Champion custom bike.

However, as competitors pulled their bikes in for competition run-checks and registration at the weekend, it became apparent that competition for top-honors was going to be wide open and fierce, with up to a dozen stunning machines in contention.

“I have dedicated the best part of three years to trying to win the World Championship, and finally I have achieved the ultimate recognition of my fellow professionals. It is very humbling”, Cook went on to say.

Once described as motorcycling’s “Pulitzers, Nobels and Olympics all rolled into one”, the Official World Championship of Custom Bike Building is staged annually during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, every August in the Black Hills of South Dakota.

It is the culmination of an annual series of worldwide events, including an annual European Championship, that sees hundreds of custom motorcycle design and engineering hopefuls embark on a quest for the opportunity to compete in USA against many of America’s finest motorcycle industry brains.

Dominated by engineers from Canada, Japan and Europe for the first five years since the Championship program’s inception in 2004, American motorcycle customizing has now convincingly broken through on its industry’s biggest stage with seven of the top ten competitors being bike builders based in USA.

Second place was scooped by another American, Kris Krome, of Freeland, Michigan.

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