Vol. 2, Issue 30
Jay Eshbach Biography
By Keith S. Kizer
Born April 29, 1944 in Glendale, California, Jay Eshbach grew up a Southern California kid who hit grade school about the same time as the birth of organized drag racing. In his early teenage years, Jay discovered two things; drag racing and machining metal parts.
Jay discovered drag racing when he was fourteen years old and was hooked for life. Later he crewed on various Top Fuel cars in the So. Calif racing scene. This lasted even after he married his high school sweetheart Dianne. They would spend every Saturday night at the now legendary Lions, Irwindale or Orange County drag strips.
As kids came, Jay was forced to put racing behind him and concentrate on making a living. Jay started a small job machine shop making aircraft and commercial parts.
In the early 70’s, one of Jay’s old high school buddies bought a new 750 Honda, the motorcycle that started the entire sport bike scene. He came to Jay’s shop and said he had heard pistons could be taken from a Honda twin, and remachined to make a big bore kit for a 750. Jay thought, “Sure, I can do that” and he did. His first 836 kit was born. The bike was fast and Jay’s friend’s friends would asked him where he got the kit, and soon Jay had lots of orders. Jay eventually made hundreds of those kits. The trend was moving towards forged pistons, so he was able to convince Bob Anderson and Tom Kipp, the former owners of Wiseco Pistons, to make four stroke big bore pistons. They said yes and Jay became the very first Wiseco big bore kit distributor.
During this time Jay developed heavy-duty cylinder studs for this motor and one of his biggest customers was a guy working out of a garage in Torrance, CA., by the name of Russ Collins. As business grew, Jay and Dianne turned the no name machine shop into American Performance Engineering (APE) in 1974. At that time, aerospace machining was still the bulk of the business. The motorcycle side grew, and by the early 80’s they were 100% motorcycle. Their product line expanded with innovations like the first billet machined adjustable cam sprockets, and the tool steel wrist pins used by nearly all nitro dragbikes.
In only a few short years, all this new business found Jay back at the dragstrip, only now with a two-wheel clientele. Jay was now combining his two loves. The who's-who of racing was using their products and the APE sticker was showing up everywhere. But the one person that stands out the most in Jay’s mind was meeting Elmer Trett at an AMDRA race at OCIR. What started out as a vendor / customer relationship, soon turned personal and Elmer and Jay quickly became best friends. They stayed at each other’s homes when on respective sides of the country. Once Elmer was booked into an event in Australia so Jay and Dianne traveled with the Tretts. In the end, Jay was honored when the family asked him to deliver the eulogy at Elmer's funeral.
During this time of growth in both his business and the sport there was no hard-core publication geared towards motorcycle drag racing. Hot Bike Magazine asked Jay to write a monthly column called "The Quarter Mile File” which became a hit. Jay then started Fast Times magazine to help fill the void. It was very popular, and there are people today on some of the internet forums that say they still have every issue. As an industry guy rather than a journalist, Jay was able to do in depth interviews with people like George Bryce, Dave Schultz, and Elmer and ask the questions he knew the readers would ask if given the chance. Eventually he got too busy with the parts business and discontinued publishing the magazine.
In regards to Jay’s involvement with racing, he was involved in the creation of the IHRA motorcycle division, later to become Prostar, when he met with me, Carl Stieffenhofer, the late Greg Guarinello and several others in a motel room near Atco Raceway in Atco, New Jersey during the U.S. Motorcycle Nationals and hammered out what would become one of the most successful organizations ever. Jay’s words, not mine.
Jay and Dianne’s involvement in Prostar was inspirational. They traveled from California to the East Coast for most of the events being a fixture on the manufacturers midway. They started the APE 200 mph and 6-second clubs, presenting custom awards to the first ten people in each category. These were highly coveted awards, which are proudly displayed by the recipients today.
In the early days of Prostar I would make frequent trips to California to call on West Coast sponsors. That was about fifteen years into APE’s existence. I remember going to their small rented shop in Burbank. You had to park on the street in front of the shop. Inside was a small showroom with an office where Dianne and their daughter Candice were working. The office led to the shop, which was packed in vintage machinery, piled high with metal shavings and inventory. Somewhere in the middle was their son, Ben machining away. I believe it was cam chain tensioners flying off the machines that day.
As the business continued to grow, they struggling for the lack of space, so Dianne and Jay purchased two and a half acres of property at the famed Willow Springs Raceway and constructed a state of the art CNC manufacturing facility, that has allowed them to branch out into other motorcycle racing fields. It’s been a long road from the little shop in Burbank, but a road packed with great memories of drag racing history.
Other Areas of Interest
Residence: Tehachapi, Ca.
Spouse’s Name: Dianne. Married 47 years
Children’s Names (ages): Ben 46 Alicia 45 Candice 42
Occupation: Speed Merchant. CEO of APE
Interest outside of racing: Family
Favorite foods: Barbeque
Favorite movie: Passion Of The Christ
Daily driver: C5 Corvette
First motorcycle: Honda 750 dragbike.
Hero: I would have to say my late best friend Elmer Trett.
If you are interested in being featured as person of the week, contact Dave Schnitz
Previous Features:
Thomas Gates
Tony Williams
Patrick Chabaud
Bradd Gott
Jerry Cooper
Greg Stephens
Lewis Bloom
Dave Page
Cecil Towner
Debbie Knebel
Jay Regan
Les Stimac
Walt Timblin
Mike Lozano
Fred Collis
Boo Brown
Steve Rice
Ronnie Procopio
Peggy Llewellyn
Cliff Jones
Jennifer Robertson
Mark Doucette
Al Omond
Steve McBride
James Rester, Jr.
Don Plesser
Ashon Dickerson
Greg Pollard
Dave Vantine
Brunson Grothus
Tim Hailey
Dan Rudd
Sebatian Domingo
Daniel Burchett
Greg Smith
Dave Conforti
Erica Edwards
Dave Beck
Chris Hand
Rick Moore
Roger Gordon
Masa Yokota
Bob Carlson
Augustine Herrera
Santa Claus
Legends Intro
Legends: Elmer Trett
Monte Campbell
Dwight Leach
Stan Russell
Legends: Vicki Farr
Black History Month
Doug Frierson
Tommy Bolton
Kelly Trett Thomason
Travis Davis
Dean Phelps
Jim Fox
Kevin Fitzgerald
Don Dowling
Jon Cornell
Legends: Bo O'Brochuta
Laurie Dunlap
Mark Dotson
Roy Barrera
Legends: Mo Parsons
You, The Next Generation
Where are They Now? Michael Capozzio
