…an old friend known as the “Blue Goose” (one million internet points if you know who that is) contacted me and suggested posting the top 10 all-time winningest riders in the history of the AMA national championships.

So I bumbled some spreadsheets together and came up with the following list – while I was doing it though, it dawned on me that Logan Cipala has won the AMA Amateur Hillclimber of the Year award for 3 years in a row now. To the best of my knowledge, that’s the only time that’s ever happened…

Without further ado, here’s the top ten all-time champions:
Todd Cipala – 14 championships
Logan Cipala – 10 championships (including the 4 he just won this year)
Mike Bronk – 9 championships
Jacob Prebe – 8 championships
Mike Wood – 8 championships
George Loring – 7 championships
Jeff Piontek – 7 championships
Luke Cipala – 7 championships
Jeff Campbell – 5 championships
Brian Childs – 5 championships
Frank Wilson, Jr. – 5 championships
Jay Sallstrom – 5 championships

(Yes, that’s 12 riders…but there’s 3 ties in there)

…and then there’s lots of riders with 4 championships each.

Now, just for fun, here’s a list of championships by last name (note that not all the riders are necessarily related…they just all have the same last name):

Cipala:  33
Prebe: 17
Bronk: 12
Wilson: 12
Piontek: 11
Wood: 10
Mueller: 9
Gerdes: 8
Loring: 7
Parmeter: 7
Campbell: 6
Coon: 6
Haas: 6
Peterson: 6
Waddell: 6
Watson: 6

…and then bunches at 5 and 4 etc. Note that the Cipala family has nearly twice as many championships as the Prebes in the #2 spot. The force is strong in that family…or maybe there’s something in the water there. Someone should go test it…