Terry Statum races what looks like a Yamaha XJ550 during an AFM club race at Willow Springs in 1986. The sport touring XJ550 wasn’t a popular road racing machine, but Statum looks like he’s doing just fine on the bike. Besides being a fast local club racer, Statum was also a very good national endurance racer. He raced 24-Hour events with RB Racing and later was a leading rider for Team Sunset, one of the top AMA/CCS GTU teams of the mid-to-late 1980s. Maybe if someone knows Terry they can find out if this is in fact an XJ550 he’s racing in this shot.
Terry Statum races what looks like a Yamaha XJ550 during an AFM club race at Willow Springs in 1986. The sport touring XJ550 wasn’t a popular road racing machine, but Statum looks like he’s doing just fine on the bike. (Larry Lawrence photo)
Rider Files 
I ran with New Haven Kawaski in 86 against Team Sunset in the GTU 600 series, they had 2 fast Ninja 600’s and a host of fast SoCal riders, Terry, Walter Nito, Peter Carol,Todd Brubaker, Don Canet, all good guys on and off the track.
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Larry,
Yup it’s got the stock XJ550 tail section, & everything else is correct, (other than the paint job.) The XJ was a very competent RR bike, that Yamaha only made a few changes to when building the FJ600 that, (with some contingency $$,) became a very popular racebike.
Now the Vision, on the other hand….
Ken
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Hey Larry
I found Terry in his man cave in Lake Mathews CA
He said “That was a 550 Yamaha that Hesh Bohrer built in his Cycle City shop (Santa Ana) and he won a WSMC title on it. He let me ride it at Willow & Riverside a few times. It was really fast, but nobody but me liked riding it. ”
JoeyO
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JoeyO,
Thanks for the back story. It’s cool when people race something a little out of the ordinary and make it work.
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Hi Larry,
Thanks for picture. Just to add to Joey’s reply, Tom Houseworth was the wrench on the Cycle City bike, and that’s how we became friends. It was also great to see Brian O’Shea’s name. Those New Haven guys were wicked fast!
Terry
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Hi Larry,
Please tell Terry I said hello. I was very lucky to have riders like Terry, Pete, Walt, Don and Todd riding my Team Sunset bikes over the years.
Great memories and yes I remember the battles with Team New Haven.
Cheers,
Marcus
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I miss my brother. I remember in Mission Viejo he had a Triumph 650 with straight pipes. He made a blast down Alicante and it was LOUD. He came back and parked it in the garage. Some local Karen came strutting up and complaining about the noise. Anyone familiar with Mr. Wonderful can imagine his reply to her.
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