Actually, it’s the same face, but Ohioan Larry Pegram wears many different hats, helmets, team shirts, and even business attire. He is a flat tracker, motorcycle road racer, automobile road racer, team owner, promoter, and very successful business owner of an Ohio-based company in a burgeoning industry completely unrelated to motorsports.
On a personal note, Larry Pegram is one of the reasons why my family and I moved from New Hampshire to Ohio in 1997. We had previously lived about 45 minutes from my former home track in Loudon. We made the move to Ohio so I could live near Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, and two of my heroes, Tom Kipp and Larry Pegram, were Ohioans. Those three beacons drew me the Buckeye State like a moth to a flame.
But I digress.
Larry Pegram was born in Baltimore…but not that Baltimore. It’s the one in central Ohio, a small farm town with lots of fields of corn, soybeans, and rolling hills. He rode motorcycles from a very young age, started out on dirt tracks, and began his professional racing career in 1988, finishing as runner-up in the 1991 AMA 600 National Dirt Track Championship.
Adding road racing to his dance card during that same time period, Pegram also quickly made a name for himself on asphalt. He competed in both Supersport and Superbike right from the start, and in 1995, he joined Erion Racing in Supersport on a Honda CBR600F3 while also continuing to also race in flat track.
From there, Pegram’s road racing career included stints with Yoshimura Suzuki, Fast By Ferracci Ducati, Competition Accessories Ducati, Hooters Suzuki, and the list goes on. In 2006, he formed his own Pegram Racing team and campaigned Hondas, Ducatis, BMWs, and Yamahas, with support from Foremost Insurance as one of his title sponsors.
Pegram even had his own reality television show called “Superbike Family,” which chronicles his racing exploits and included his wife Heather, father Jim and mother Mary, and his race crew and team personnel. The show provided a unique look into the life of an AMA Superbike racer and team owner, and it didn’t shy away from showing the difficulties of the sport, as well as the successes and light-hearted moments. Pegram was already popular for always “keeping it real” with the fans, but he continued that theme on TV (Larry is always going to be himself), and it made his popularity grow even more.
Racing for Erik Buell, Pegram campaigned an EBR 1190RX in AMA Pro Superbike, and then, in the FIM Superbike World Championship alongside teammate Niccolò Canepa.
In the past few years, Pegram started a company called Pure Ohio Wellness, and he was selected by the voters in Ohio (I actually voted for him) to be one of the few businesses selected to grow and process cannabis and cannabis by-products for medical use. Pure Ohio was immediately successful, and when Ohio also legalized cannabis for recreational use, Pegram and Pure Ohio was at the forefront. He employs a large workforce, works closely with the Ohio state government, and is a national leader in the industry.
And, he’s still racing. He and his daughter Riley, who is a rising talent in sports car racing, have been competing together as an endurance team in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge’s TCR class. They race a Hyundai Elantra N in the series.
Last year, aboard his Team Hammer/Pegram Racing Suzuki GSX-R750, he finished on the podium in MotoAmerica Supersport at his home track, Mid-Ohio. He’s also road raced in Stock 1000 at Road America, the Mission Super Hooligan National Championship at Laguna Seca and COTA, and he’s continued to race in American Flat Track when he has “spare” time.
He’s back at Mid-Ohio this weekend, racing in Supersport for Team Hammer once again on a Suzuki GSX-R750.
Larry Pegram will turn 52 years old next month, and he is showing no signs at all of slowing down. You can’t stop Larry Pegram, you can only hope to contain him. And, by “contain him,” it would only be in the confines of a race track, his race shop, or his businesses.
