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                                                            1980 Mugen ME125 W1

   This is the very first Mugen bike sold in the US.  In early 1980 at a CMC Golden State series race at Indian Dunes, Johnny O'Mara was racing a bike just like this.  I was watching practice and around comes Johnny on this white bike that looked like it was from twenty years into the future.  Being water-cooled in the air-cooled era it even sounded different as he motored around the track.  As he left the track I followed him to his van.  There I met Al Baker and Hirotoshi Honda.  After much staring and asking many questions, Hiro told me that they were going to be selling identical bikes like the one Johnny was riding starting the following Monday but the price was going to be $4000.00!  Considering that an average 125 was about $950.00 this was a lot of money.  This was the first and only time that a company would be offering a works bike to the general public. Mugen sold them by special order and to reserve one you had to give them a $1000.00 deposit.  I had about $1025.00 in the bank and did not hesitate to send my $1000.00 deposit that Monday. They were custom made to order and I was supposed to take delivery in about three months.  There were many delays in production and I must have called the Mugen secretary about the status of my bike a thousand times, but after about six months the people at Mugen USA called me and told me it had been shipped and would arrive soon.  A couple of weeks later I got another call and was told that the bike had arrived in the states, but there was one small problem.  The Mugen shipment was lost somewhere in the shipyards in Long Beach!  After about another two weeks I got yet another call.... "it's finally here, I'm staring at it right now!" the secretary said.  I left work immediately, went to my bank, withdrew nearly every penny I had saved and drove straight to Al Bakers shop in Hesperia California.  When I got there, I walked through the front door and there it was, sitting near the reception desk BRAND NEW and mine!

   That same day, I took the Mugen and my 1980 YZ125G to Mockingbird Canyon in Riverside. This was a place in the middle of an orange grove that had a couple of practice tracks and sometimes the factories would go out there to test. One of the tracks was real challenging and very rough. This would be the perfect place to test the Mugen and see how it compared to what I thought was the best production 125 at the time, the Yamaha YZ125G.  First I rode a 30 minute moto on the Yamaha and then I switched to the Mugen.  The difference between the two bikes was absolutely unbelievable!  Much more than I thought it would be.  For six months I wondered just how good the Mugen would be.  I had never ridden a bike that did everything perfect the way the Mugen did, it was overwhelming.  The bike was real fast and the forks were super plush, absorbing any and all bumps like they weren't even there. When landing from jumps, I kept waiting for the impact thud that any other bike would deliver and it never came. By the time you realized there wasn't going to be this huge thud, you were onto the next obstacle. The frame geometry seemed perfect and the bike turned like it was on rails.  If there was any fault it was the rear end (which was better than anything in the day) as it would kick just a little.  Adding Ohlins shocks (recommended by Mugen) cured this very minor problem.  The bike was truly a works bike that anyone could own.  It was designed by Horotoshi Honda himself and years later Hiro told me that the ME125 W1 was one of his greatest achievements.  Johnny O'Mara later told me that his 1980 Mugen was actually a better bike than his 1981 RC125M works Honda.  I raced the bike at Saddleback, DeAnza and a local night race.  I was then involved in a auto accident and would never ride it again.  It is un-restored and has about five hours on it.  

   There were a total of five Mugens sold in the US, at least one of them went to Europe.  Mine was the only one sold in Southern California.  One went to the San Jose area to a kid for his 16th birthday.  Another went to Texas and the others went back east.  Today there are more Mugens than were ever built.  Most are built out of parts, some even having fake frames.

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