Born Free 2026, Silverado, CA
The Legend of 2009
Legend has it, that a few California dudes had the idea to round up their choppers on a meadow in Orange County and call it a "show", which apparently wasn’t a thing back then in the year 2009. An idea so fresh and off the wall that they repeated it the next year. And the next. And the next again. And before they knew it, they had invented a kind of World Fair of Chopper Building: Born Free was here.
And, sure enough, the 17th edition, as all others before, made good on the Born Free promise of "come over on a summer weekend and be amazed that there are mods and builds, goofy tanks and sky high upsweeps, technicolor paint jobs and yet-another-barnfind-to-end-all-barnfinds that you have never seen before"
Which may partly be due to the Invited Builders
taking up the challenge and creating builds like no one has ever even thought of. Building during short days and long nights, with a little help from their friends, suffering setbacks, having a beer or two, dreaming of rubber, oil and gasoline, always panicking they won’t make the deadline. The ultimate incitement being "Best of Show" earns the ticket to the Hot Rod Custom Show in Yokohama, Japan next December.
It’s not only those select few builders that make Born Free what it is, it’s also the many, many bikes parked (because their owners had secured a Grass Pass) between the sponsor flags, the vendors’s stall and the throngs of spectators.
You walk in awe and ask yourself: can a legend ever end? Or will it just keep on getting stronger every year?