Whitaker On The Move

by Andrea Barrack on May 20, 2009 at 08:10AM

On Tuesday afternoon, with seven hours of open road and his Sirius XM Radio set to “Classic Vinyl”, Bailey Whitaker began the 450-mile trek from Philadelphia to North Carolina in the Rum Bum Tour Bus. No, he didn’t race over the weekend in the City of Brotherly Love; rather, he traveled there to attend an uncle’s funeral. Our thoughts and condolences are with his family.

Eyes ahead, Whitaker pushes onward to his next race. With a heightened sense of self-confidence after achieving his personal best time of 7.10 seconds at the last race in St. Louis, Whitaker heads to the Gann’s garage where he’ll prep his bike for the next race in Chicago at the beginning of June. He’ll start by replacing the motor, which locked up at the end of his last race while Whitaker was approaching 200mph. But for what sounds like a near death experience, the racer says he wasn’t scared at all (it’s not like he went down, the impervious rider reminded) and should have the motor fixed in a few days with the help of crew chief, Blake Gann. He’ll also tune up his skills on his bike over the next couple of weeks. “It’s not like anyone just gets on the bike and goes,” he said – then added, “These bikes are very fast, have you noticed?” Thus, he heads south to meet up with the Gann clan.

If the RumBum Tour Bus is Whitaker’s second home, then the Gann’s place (aka. The Rum Bum Race Team garage headquarters) in Stoneville, NC is his third. Whitaker, Shawn and Blake Gann, and their crew typically start working on the bikes around 9:00AM, take a lunch break, and head back into the shop – often staying there to the wee hours of the morning – when Whitaker will retire to his bed on the bus. And just as he loves working with the bike, he has a special place in his heart for the Gann family. Not only does he work with them in the shop during these weeks (somewhat resembling a summer camp for drag racers), he also accompanies them to church and says grace with them before Mrs. Gann serves meals. Of the Gann family, Whitaker expressed, “I love them… They’re beautiful. Very kind and very honest.”