Letter: RIP Sybil Young - you were an inspiration to me

  My association with Mrs Young started with motocross, for most of my racing history, I rode Honda motorcycles on my own dime and she would often come down to Coney Island Race Track to support the riders that she sponsored. Rudy Cann, Andy Stoneham, Marlon Tucker and David Lewis are some of the riders that won National Championship for her Honda Motors Race Team. Mrs Young say she liked my attitude and asked me if I would like to ride on the Honda team, I thanked her for the offer and told her that I was more interested in managing the team because I was not that good of a rider. The opportunity to manage and ride for the Honda Team was granted and today I thank her again. We won National Championships in different classes with Ed Jones, Jeffery Stevenson, Mark Lewis, Dwayne Brangman, Duprey Joell, Robbie Smith and Justin Belboda. I would tell her what I wanted and she would get it; new bikes, parts, gas, transportation, storage and technical service from her in-house motor mechanics.

  I find some CEO’s that I have been in meeting with to be very unbending and detached from common people in society, but not Mrs Young, she liked a good joke, she was approachable, always interested in what I had to say and I will always treasure the conversations that I had with her. Mrs Young was by no means a push-over; she was by all accounts a very successful business woman with an exceptional difference, She gave back to society in many ways and I am one of the beneficiaries of her kindness and generosity. Many of the educational skills that I did not learn in school, but I am experienced in today are in many ways due to the opportunities granted to me by Mrs Young through our connection in motocross racing.

Mrs Young, I will be forever grateful to you for your unlimited compassion.

Love Always

Ras Mykkal