Former Grand National Racer Paul Bostrom Passes
Larry Lawrence | March 12, 2014
Paul Bostrom, a well-known West Coast AMA Grand National racer of the 1960s and ‘70s, passed away Monday, March 10. He was 70. A family friend said Bostrom had long battled progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP).
Paul Bostrom was the younger brother of Dave Bostrom and both were successful on the AMA Grand National Championship. Dave’s son’s (Paul’s nephews) Ben and Eric Bostrom went on to become two of the most successful and most popular Superbike racers of the 2000s.
Paul Bostrom followed his brother Dave into motorcycle racing merging from the racetracks of Northern California. Paul was perhaps best known as a TT rider. Of his 16 top-10 AMA Grand National finishes, 10 of those came in TT Nationals.
The Bostrom name is firmly rooted in Northern California racing. Dave and Paul Bostrom built their legend kicking up dirt on local flat tracks, including the half-mile Calistoga Speedway at the Napa County Fairgrounds.
“Paul and I went to pretty much every tack in Northern California back in the day,” Dave Bostrom told the Vallejo Times-Herald in 2010.
Bostrom’s best career National finish came at the Houston TT in 1970 where he raced a Triumph to a runner-up finish behind winner Jim Rice.
Bostrom, who ran national number 46 for years, raced a variety of machinery during his pro career in including Triumph, Harley-Davidson and Honda.
Bostrom was known as “one of the nice guys” on the circuit, and always calm and cool, according to his friend Steve Gregory. He rode for many top teams on the West Coast such as Les Edwards, Cycle Imports, Louie Aruta and John Tavis Sr, Phil Cancilla Racing, Custom Engineering, JK Cycle Inn and Circle Bell Industries to name a few. He was a civil engineer by trade and a father of two children Jeff and the late Dawnyce.
Larry Lawrence | Archives Editor
In addition to writing our Archives section on a weekly basis, Lawrence is another who is capable of covering any event we throw his way.
