Sturgis At 85: Does The Legendary Motorcycle Rally Still Have Its Edge?

STURGIS, S.D. — Choppers, rockets, baggers, sportsters and trikes. 

It’s a melee of gleaming metal and angry loud pipes, growling animalistically through Boulder Canyon like a pack of wolves.

The alpha is easy to spot. 

He wears a black bandana, leather vest and stout black boots kicked up on the highway pegs as though he were in a reclining chair. A slender woman in a paisley bandana clings tight around his chest, her long Indian braids whipping around in the wind like rattlesnakes in a combat dance.

But it's not what he rides, it’s how he rides, rounding corners as smoothly as a shine cloth over the curve of a boot toe.

This is the coolest guy alive, you think to yourself.  

Then the two of you come to a dead stop side by side at a streetlight in Sturgis, and you start to second guess things.

You turn your head to find a man whose face looks older and more haggard than a game-used Babe Ruth baseball glove. Though, the glove may find that comparison offensive.

On the one hand, being old has never looked so cool. On the other, you wonder if one of the great icons of American badassery — the biker — is past its prime. 

'It's All Old People'

It’s a question on the minds of many Sturgis Motorcycle Rallygoers, including a 50-something biker you find standing still as a rock amid the river of foot traffic coursing through downtown Sturgis.

He wears a cowhide leather top hat and stares wistfully down Main Street, where thousands of motorcycles glimmer in the high noon sun.

“The younger generation can’t afford bikes, or they don’t want to buy them. If you look around, you don’t see as many people or couples or groups in their 30s. It's all old people,” said the man, declining to give his name. 

He says he’s nostalgic for the days when ad-hoc burnouts sent smoke billowing down this road, and when there weren't enough cops to do anything about it.

He laments the presence of khaki shorts and tennis shoes. He bemoans the rally’s turn toward family friendliness, evidenced by the declining numbers of topless women. 

“Oh my god, no one used to wear pasties at all, and we could do burnouts up and down the street and never get ticketed,” he said about past Sturgis rallies, which has been happening for 85 years. “Now there’s more yuppies, there’s more inexperienced riders.

“The rally itself is dying because of it, I think.”

Of course, with rally attendance this year already surpassing 300,000 at its midpoint, he’s not talking about the death of an event, but rather the end of a culture.

But Sturgis is not a place to be summed up, and on every corner, you’ll find examples to both support and counter his Midwesterner's perspective.

What Does FTP Stand For?

A few blocks down on Lazelle Street, a group of decidedly not-old women covered in tattoos — and barely covered by bikinis and pasties — are waving “BIKE WASH” signs and suntanning in the grass with a quality of absentmindedness that summons the bygone era of Golden Gate Park’s Hippie Hill.

As far as they understand it, the classic attributes of biker culture are still alive and well at Sturgis. 

“I've seen bikers getting into fights right here. I’ve had people try to pay me with drugs, which is illegal, but … you know,” said Shanea Dayley, a russet-haired woman with a “seen-it-all-before” tone that belies the fact she’s 23 years old.

“It can get sketchy here, especially at night, but as long as I leave before dark, I’m not worried.”

In a pink bikini and fishnets beside her, 24-year-old Rami Tucker also takes the coarse biker culture in stride.

“Today this guy rode past and put his fingers to his lips and stuck out his tongue and gave me the [oral sex] sign,” Tucker said, giggling, as though flattered. “I love it. It’s just funny and random.”

Tucker doesn’t yet have a motorcycle, but she knows what she’s getting once she can afford it.

 “It’s got to be pink, and it’s got to go fast,” she says. 

She’s all-in on the culture’s edgy aesthetics. She wears so many studs and facial piercings her head looks like the business end of a medieval mace. She pulls down her bottom lip to reveal a hidden tattoo with the initials FTP.

F*** the police, you ask?

She knits her brow into a quizzical look, as though this were a test. Finally, she answers, “No. F*** the population.”

Best Sex Ever On Shrooms

Around the corner there's a booth of women promoting something that is simultaneously brand new and age-old among the biker set: psychedelic experience.

"BEST SEX EVER ON SHROOMS,” reads their streetside sign.

While rallygoers are not new to induced experiences, this is among the first years that a magic mushroom adventure is perfectly legal due to technical “species blending workarounds,” said vendor Jenny Horton.

“These old bikers don’t believe it’s actually going to do anything. But they take a pack anyway, and they always come back the next day and say, ‘I want more. That was awesome!’” Horton explained, saying that their incredulity catches them unawares. 

“One guy said he had to pull over on the highway and sit there for like an hour before he could get back on his bike,” she said. 

That biker might have benefited from a taxi driver, although that guy was tripping too. 

“This taxi driver bought some yesterday, and later on he had the munchies and ate the whole bag. Came back today and said he hasn't been able to drive since,” said Horton, who is at least partially responsible for the fact that Sturgis is now one driver short. 

“That guy bought more too.” 

The Body Keeps Score

Old timers recall rolling in on heavy bikes with drum brakes and coil spring suspension forks, which on a long haul makes for a long recovery. 

“I’ve been trailering in, and some people will still give you shit for trailering your bike. To them I say, you ride to Sturgis on a ’67 sportster from the East Coast, then you can talk to me about trailering,” said a limping and elderly rider who, like apparently everyone here, doesn’t want his name in the press.

The man has a stringy white beard that looks like it's seen more wind than the Great Plains. He’s wearing a pair of size 15 Air Jordans, along with a back brace that says “Sturgis” on it, which in this context is kind of like a purple heart.

“These new bikes are a whole different game. Things might have been different. I’m still recovering from that sportster,” he said, before hobbling away down Main Street.

Hells Angels

One thing that may be different or not, depending on who you ask, are the Hells Angels. 

This formerly-but-maybe-also-currently outlaw group has represented the culture’s wild side for more than a half century, in no small part from the image cultivated by its longtime de facto leader Sonny Barger, who passed in 2022.

Whatever the reality, their bad boy reputation holds among some bikers at Sturgis, including a 63-year-old Montana man who, go figure, declined to give his name, but did offer advice for all curious journalists out there. 

“Don’t take any pictures of those guys. You’ll lose your phone, your ability to use your phone. You may end up missing. Those guys are dangerous dudes,” the man said, nodding toward the Hells Angels storefront across the street. “They’re the 1 percenters. They’re ‘Sons of Anarchy,’ but for real.”

Naturally, being a curious journalist, you head straight across the street and ask to speak with the guy in charge. It’s instantly clear these guys have a different vibe. 

The men at the merch booths stand with their arms crossed over their chests as though anticipating trouble, not commerce. A friendly Angel may nod. One even offered a weak smile. They’ll say “Hi,” but that’s about the extent of their chumminess. 

Surveilling from the front window is a man with a shaved head, thick eyebrows and a beady stare. You tell him you're with the biggest news organization in Wyoming and ask if he’ll entertain a few friendly questions about the Hells Angels.

Thanks for asking, he says, but NO.

“We have a policy of not talking to the press. They push ideas about us being a criminal organization, and it's not true,” he said. “We’re a group of guys who have things in common. We have a similar idea about what freedom means. We love our country, and we want to ride around it.”

Freedom of the roads and freedom of the press: Hells Angels and journalists are not all that different when it comes right down to it, you think about saying but don’t.

Some Things Change, Some Things Stay The Same

Though classic biker culture is alive and well in Sturgis today, the consensus is that it’s not what it was,and never will be again. 

“It’s changed and it’s changing. There’s less and less hardcore bikers every year,” said the rider who surprisingly offered his name: Ray Sumrall.

Sumrall made his first ride in 1967 as a 17-year-old. He recalls a time when the people who came were bikers first, and everything else second.  

“Nowadays it’s not like that. You’ve (got) doctors and lawyers and all walks of life who are doing it for fun, but it’s not their lifestyle. Didn’t used to be that way,” he said. 

At least one thing feels the same at Sturgis: the sense of community. 

“My battery died on the way here and I had three different bikers stop to help,” Sumrall said. “Cars drive right past you. But bikers will always stop to help. Bikers help bikers.”

Zakary Sonntag can be reached at zakary@cowboystatedaily.com.