Rest In Peace, Bill West (1936 – 2024)

Remembering the Pioneer Promoter of Supercross and Motocross

August 10, 2024 – (Motor Sports NewsWire) – William (Bill) Carroll West, 88, a pioneer in the promotion of Supercross and Motocross events, passed away on July 28, 2024, after a lengthy illness.

Born in Clarksville, Tennessee, in 1936, West was a member of the U.S. Army in the 1950s, stationed in Germany. After his service, West was working for Florida Power when he bought his first motorcycle, a Honda 100 Scrambler. With a growing passion for both cars and motorcycles, he opened his own shop in St. Petersburg called Cycle Village. He also began competing in flat track, enduro, and motocross events, despite the fact that he was well into his thirties. He soon ventured into motorsports promotion, which is where he found his true calling, and began creating and producing events that helped shape the entire motorsports world as we know it today.

West’s first venture was the Florida Winter-Am Series, which he co-created with a fellow enthusiast named Russ Coe. Within a few years it became one of the most competitive and prestigious series in the entire sport.

In 1971, West helped convince Daytona International Speedway into adding a motocross event on their infield to run in conjunction with the Daytona 200 and serve as the final round of his Winter-Am tour. That event morphed into the Daytona Supercross, what is now the centerpiece of the Monster Energy AMA Supercross Championship. In that same year he began organizing a youth event called the Winter Olympiad, a multi-discipline event run over the Thanksgiving holiday that is now simply referred to as the Mini O’s and remains one of the single-largest amateur competitions in the sport, with more than 6,000 entries just last year.

Next for Bill West was Pro Motocross, as he began hosting southeastern rounds of that AMA-sanctioned series at tracks like Sunshine Speedway, in St. Petersburg, Road Atlanta, and Gatorback Cycle Park, in Gainesville. The success of those events and many other ventures led West to create SuperSports, one of the most highly respected motorsports promotional businesses in the world.

When Supercross began its expansion, West hosted rounds of the series inside stadiums in cities like Atlanta, Orlando, Tampa, Miami, and more. When the various promoters of the Supercross tour decided to consolidate in the mid-90s under one roof, West’s World Sports company became a part of PACE Motorsports, and eventually became…