We are saddened to learn of the passing of former motorcycle road racer and three-time National Champion Donny Greene, and we offer our most heartfelt condolences to his family, friends, and fans.

Hailing from Novato, California, Greene was one of the very best 250cc two-stroke road racers the U.S. has ever produced. He competed in the AMA 250GP class from 1981 through 1991, and he was fast from the beginning. He won the Novice Road Racing Championship in 1981, and then, he captured three straight National Championships, in 1984, 1985, and 1986. Greene won his first professional road racing champonship on a Yamaha TZ250, and then he followed that up with two straight titles aboard a Honda RS250.

The 1980s through the mid-1990s were a heady time for two-stroke production GP motorcycle road racing in the United States, and Greene competed against the likes of Eddie Lawson, Jimmy Filice, Randy Renfrow, Doug Brauneck, John Kocinski, Rich Oliver, and even MotoAmerica President Wayne Rainey and Chief Operating Officer Chuck Aksland.

A highly versatile racer, Greene also won AMA Endurance races as a member of Dutchman Racing. His international competition credits include the 1985 Grand Prix of Belgium at Spa-Francorchamps and the 1986 Suzuka 8 Hours Endurance Race in Japan, as well as the U.S. Grand Prix at Laguna Seca in 1988. He even competed in the 1984 and 1985 Superbikers events for ABC-TV’s Wide World of Sports.

When he wasn’t racing, he was teaching other riders his craft. Greene was a long-time instructor for Keith Code’s California Superbike School, and I had the pleasure of following Greene around New Hampshire International Speedway (Loudon) when I enrolled in the Superbike School. I use “following” facetiously because he dropped me going into into turn one on the first lap, and he spent the rest of the time looking back to see me and the Kawasaki Ninja 600 I was riding become an increasingly smaller visage in the distance.

Greene also did a lot of testing for Dunlop tires and Fox shocks, who were two of his major sponsors.

Speaking of sponsors, Greene was quite the pioneer in that important area of road racing. In 1988 and 1989, when he was a rider for Mclver Racing located in Henniker, New Hampshire, Greene raced a Yamaha TZ250 that was sponsored by the National Survival Game, which an adult version of “capture the flag” and played in wooded areas of about 10 to 30 acres. The game included airsoft rifles, and was a predecessor of modern paintball gun adventure games.

Greene passed away on February 3 at the age of 64. Godspeed, Donny.