Article By: Chris Callen Photos By: Milwaukee Mike & Debi Holmes
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ebi Holmes, owner of this long ass chopper, is the type of person that is not only an inspiration for women riders but rides hard enough that most everyone could set their pace by her. She rides so much and has ridden through all kinds of weather and lives life through the bars. Her Instagram page alone is a constant reminder to me that whatever I’m doing when her daily posts come up, I should be riding like Debi. I figured at this point, so many people have been following her dream bike build that I would concentrate more on the story of the woman behind the bike. Debi came up around bikes her whole life. She had her first ride at the age of 8 and promptly crashed it into the root system of one of those big ass trees that grow in Arkansas. Shortly after that, and still a little scabbed up, she got back on and kept the wheels turning. Growing up in a single parent household, Debi and her mom moved around a lot. Early on, she found herself in Northern California where she was exposed to the Sand Hill Ranch. Tom Anderson, who owned the place, was a friend of Debi’s mother and spent tons of time there. The guys that rode the motocross track would let her take practice laps on their bikes when they came in for breaks. She was a self-admitted tomboy and was almost destined for a life of, gas, and oil. In grade School, she lived in a pretty rough neighborhood, kind of a ghetto. They didn’t have much money, but there were always bikes around. Her mom’s boyfriend knew some of the guys in the club, and she remembers getting rides around the block from a few of them. Eventually, she got married, at a young age and to a man who didn’t believe in women, especially the mother of his children riding their own bikes. He did, however, give her a volume of hands-on information on combustion engines over their
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February ‘18 - CYCLE SOURCE MAGAZINE
