The second annual V-Twin Visionary Smoky Mountain Tour brought together bike shows, riding, music and food for four days of fun and friendship
Words by Joy Burgess
Photos courtesy of Rusty Baldwin/Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson
Described by attendees as a family reunion and summer camp crammed into one, the V-twin Visionary Smoky Mountain Tour took place October 8-11, bringing together vendors, industry brands, bike builders and riders from all along the East Coast and beyond for bike shows and rides through the beautiful Smoky Mountains.
Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson and the adjacent The Shed Smokehouse & Juke Joint hosted the tour again this year, and it was a welcome event for the dealership during an events season hard-hit by Covid-19.
“With the pandemic impacting everyone extremely hard during the first part of the year,” Rusty Baldwin, head of marketing at Smoky Mountain H-D, told Thunder Press, “we were expecting to be finished with all of our concerts and events before we even got started. Luckily, business has been booming! And with the rides and everything associated with the V-Twin Visionary Smoky Mountain Tour coming to town, we really got to experience what this year should’ve been like. The tour was filled with amazing rides, epic pro-builders, vendors, and some of the best moto-family hangs you could imagine. It’s really got us looking forward to when this pandemic is officially over and becomes a thing of the past.”
Each day was packed with activities, including rides, mix-and-mingle events, drag races and concerts from bands like Dirty Soul Revival. Both ride-in and invited pro-builder shows were held, with an astounding number of builds showing up from around the country – from Milwaukee-Eights to shovelheads, from choppers to baggers.
The big winner of the weekend was Curtis Hofmann of Hofmann Designs in Minnesota, who took the top honors for his mind-bending cross between a bagger, pro street, and digger. “When the dust settled and judgment was passed,” VTV said, “Hofmann Designs took top honors at the VTV Build-Off and Bike Show. Their entry: a funky cross-breed of digger, bagger, and pro street DNA. All of the entries were great representations of custom motorcycles, though, and we were proud to have each and every one of the invited builders out showing off their terrific work.”
Johnathon Denton of Denton Performance Designs, who brought his concept bike dubbed the ‘FXXT’ to the show, commented: “With everything going on in the world this year, being able to get out and do motorcycles with my motorcycle people was a breath of fresh air at this year’s VTV Smoky Mountain Tour.”
But amid shows and rides and music and, of course, plenty of great food and booze, it’s the friendships created that people remember most. “If you have never been to the VTV Smoky Mountain Tour,” said Natalie Kleiner, co-founder of the DEHAVN, “I highly recommend attending. Not only does it have amazing bikes that people worked tirelessly to create, but you get to ride with people at this event. And as we all know, when we ride motorcycles together we create friendships that often last a lifetime.”
“We have a really great crew that works together on this tour,” Kleiner added. “Brands like RADFLAGZ, Pro One Performance, Motorwitch and Leading Edge – it’s this huge nutty circus of people that all come together and work hard to help each other grow and succeed. It’s a family that we’ve grown into.”
If you missed it this year, the third annual VTV Smoky Mountain Tour will take place October 7-10, 2021, once again hosted by Smoky Mountain H-D and The Shed.
Thunder Press was the official media
partner of the event.
