Our original membership was dwindling in recent years with members retiring and moving elsewhere. In 2021 we started moving in a new direction – actively seeking out new members that want to engage in riding locally and on adventure trips, social activities, club picnics, technical activities, and rides to regional and national BMW Rallies. We are 62 members strong at the end of 2022, and we continue to grow! The club is a low-key organization, committed to the enjoyment of motorcycling and developing camaraderie and last friendships among its members. We’re an informal group and we encourage family participation in all our activities.
The Lehigh Valley Beemers started in the early 1990’s by a number of BMW Riders at the time. Floyd Keim was ‘voice voted in’ as the initial Club President at that time. Floyd continues to be a member in 2023 and we salute him for starting the club and leading it for so many years. We are a Northeast PA Club of BMW motorcycle riders, owners, and enthusiasts, located in and around Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton and surrounding towns.
We are chartered with both BMW Motorcycle Owners of America (#277) and BMW Riders Association (#369). Membership in the club is open to riders of any brand with an interest in riding in a ‘spirited fashion’ safely. Yearly dues are $25 for a single rider.
We plan and schedule club rides from April through October, have (at least) monthly breakfasts, hold an annual picnic, and are getting back to a yearly Christmas/New Year Celebration. An informative, brilliantly written monthly newsletter. We schedule our rides and other events in a private MEETUP group. Going forward, we want to participate in charitable fundraisers and support local charities, especially related to children in need. Please consider joining the club to enjoy club-based motorcycle riding, and to meet new friends and make lasting memories! We have a 2024 Ride Plan that will knock your socks off! Weekend Day Rides, Weekday Rides, Multi-Day USA Trips, and an International Trip.
The club plans international riding events, such as the 15 Day Ireland and Isle of Man (IOM) ride some of us did August/September 2022. What a blast riding the 37 Mile IOM Mountain Course – the same roads as the TT Races! We have an upcoming 12-day Pyrenees Tour in Spain September 2024 (1 slot left). We have planned and executed multiple multi-state trips also, such as group trips to BMWMOA Rallies in Great Falls Montana (2021), Springfield Missouri (2022), and Richmond VA (2023), a 6000 Mile Ride (AR, TX, OK, NM) in April 2023, and a 10-day Colorado 60 Passes Ride in July of 2023 (3000 miles IN COLORADO). Looking ahead, we are planning an “ALPS Trip” in Europe in 2025.
Please join us!
Meet Our Officers
VINCE KELLY, PRESIDENT
Originally from the Philly Area, I’ve been a resident of the Lehigh Valley since 1984. I’ve recently retired from full-time employment and now consult on a part-time basis. This has given me more time to devote to my love of motorcycling.
My wife MaryAnn and I have three grown sons and four grandchildren. #5 on the way in 2024 🙏.
I rode dirt bikes some as a kid, but life took over after high school and I didn’t ride for 35 years. Not proud of that sabbatical. I mountain biked starting in the early 1990’s, but work life and family life kept me very busy. I didn’t get back into motorcycling until 2010. Since then, I’ve ridden over 125,000 miles and owned 7 bikes (3 Beemers). I bought my first BMW in 2012 – a ’12 K1600GTL, and have since owned two GSA’s – a ’13 R1200GSA, and my current bike – a ’15 R1200GSA (Bimski 3). I’ve got 76,000 miles on her now as of this writing. Looking at an R1300GS for 2024. I have been a BMWMOA member since 2012, and a BMWRA member since 2018. I took on the role of BMWMOA Regional Coordinator in 2021 for NE PA and NJ.
I’ve ridden the Mid-Atlantic BDR, BDR-X PA Wildlands and Cross PA Adventure Trail (CPAAT), and want to ride more BDR’s. Bought a KTM 690 Enduro-R in 2023 to focus on dirt riding. Planning on going after the NEBDR in 2024, and other BDR’s thereafter.
Since my first long distance trip in 2012 to Sturgis SD (NOT during bike week!) on my K1600GTL, I am hooked on planning and riding long distance trips. I’ve taken thirty-four (34) Multi-Day Road Trips to date to-date. See my history here. BMW Motorcycle Owners of America Community (bmwmoa.org)
Have a bucket list of rides and trips and am working through them methodically but with a sense of urgency.
I was ‘elected’ President of the Lehigh Valley Beemers in May 2021 by a voice vote at the May Club Breakfast at Superior Restaurant, at which I was not present! No Problemo. I like meeting new people and making friends, and planning and riding. My goal as president is to increase club membership and maximize camaraderie amongst club members by providing members with many riding opportunities in our MEETUP group.
Contact me with any ideas you may have about rides or other club activities you’d like to see. I’d also like to add some charitable activities to our calendar as we move into 2024. Please reach out to me if you have any questions about the Club.
VICE-PRESIDENT, POSITION VACANT
Seeking a Volunteer for this position currently.
SECRETARY and Newsletter Editor, POSITION VACANT
Seeking a Volunteer for this position currently.
DAVID DUNN, TREASURER
After working as an investment banker, owning several businesses and doing small business development, I’m ready to retire and focus more on riding and club motorcycle activities. This is happening in 2021. I have a focus on motorcycle training for the club since I am currently a board member of the BMWMOA Foundation, which has a goal of training every rider. While I currently work in Economic Development and co-run a manufacturing incubator in Allentown, Pennsylvania, going forward I am eager to be in saddle and on the road as much as possible!
My wife Vikki and I have three grown children and one granddaughter. I started riding motorcycles in college, but took a 15-year break while raising his kids. I came back to riding in 2004, while living in Vermont, when I purchased a 2002 R 1150 RT and joined the MOA.
I’ve served on many non-profit Boards and have been elected multiple times to run/chair a large school board. I have donated my time towards helping many charities from United Way to Habitat. I am also an experienced Paramedic (13 years) and now teach EMTs in the Lehigh Valley.
I recently sold my ’16 K1600 GT and moved into riding a 2020 R1200 GS in late 2021. I enjoy the open road. I love long distance touring, motorcycle camping and splitting my time between riding and working EMS at rallies. As treasurer, I meticulously manage club funds and continue to find ways to grow the funds through collections, raffles and the like so that we can increase our social activities and also contribute some of it to club member training.
ROGER SPOSILI, RIDE MASTER
My wife of 36 years and I share a home in the Nazareth area, we’re grandparents these days with all the joys the role presents. Our son Josh works for Piaggo North America corporate as the Northeast regional manger, (after an earlier career with years of touring as guitarist and singer for the group BigWig) -yes we are relieved!
Bought my first motorcycle in 1972 with the cash saved up from washing dishes at the young republican club after school. Walked off the stage in my cap and gown right out to my Dad’s car for the ride to the dealership, his graduation present to me being a new helmet of course. I had learned to ride over the year before and had my motorcycle license for several months before being licensed to drive a car. Fair to say I was committed.
I only recently retired from a career as a systems design engineer in automated indoor environmental controls; for the last decade my work focused primarily on automated environment operations for vaccine labs and similar critical environments related to health care and sensitive production facilities.
Nothing I found unpacked the accumulated stresses my engineering commitments imposed like riding my motorcycles, so it developed that I rode increasingly throughout these years and over greater distances than ever I had in the periods before.
These trips were the highlights of the year and took me across the country from coast to coast several times, a majority of these adventures in company with riders I’d met and befriended through a non-affiliated NEPA motorcycle club called the ‘PCTD’s’. When I joined in with this crowd over 20 years ago I was the youngest member; many, if not most, were 8-12 years my senior with MC experiences stretching back to the 1960’s. Their shared values and experience as well as talents as riders had a great influence on my approach to the ride. To be sure I know that these days my riding philosophies and practices are patterned on the example set for me by riding with this group of riders and the hundreds of thousands of miles they’ve ridden as individuals and way beyond a million in aggregate.
I was introduced to the BMW marque through my association with these gents, the majority of whom, though having multiple motorcycles, seemed unerringly to chose to ride their BMW machines when doing any “big” riding as a group. I bought in with a 2002 BMW R1150RS, and really haven’t looked back. 5 other BMW machines have followed with my current mount being a 2016 R1200RS. At this point I’m well beyond my second hundred thousand mile mark on BMW machines, and with retirement’s “every day’s a Saturday” stretching out ahead I’m determined to add to the totals on rides near and distant. I hope we can count on a fair number of folks to join in as their time allows.
I savor the mind clearing and immersive effect that develops when the presence of my “future” contracts itself to the corner approaching ahead and my awareness of the “past” diminishing to the corner just exited. That and the stress clearing arrived at when on the second and subsequent days of a long distance tour the realization at day’s end that all one is committed to do the next day is ride; no honey-do, no schedules and no one to disappoint. Gotta love motorcycles! I have such a catalog of friends and experiences I’d not have had without them, I’m grateful to have found the ride.
VINCE KELLY, NEWSLETTER EDITOR
Vince is the acting the newsletter editor. He is actively seeking a volunteer to head this up with Club Officer input! He promises to work together on the newsletter. If you want to see a shorter newsletter – PLEASE CONSIDER VOLUNTEERING!
JOHNNY WANG, WEBMASTER (www.lehighvalleybeemers.com)
Johnny is the Lehigh Valley Beemers web page webmaster.
More inputs shortly…..