LONG rides will never get old and over as the riders' passion for motorcycles is as strong and concrete like the road.
This, as lived by the Davao City's pioneering riders club, the On Any Sunday Riders.
Established since 1987, the club was pioneered with only eight members.
"Now we already reached to 200 members, half of it is active," Ken Angeles, one of the pioneer members shared in an interview with SunStar Davao at the Griddle Burgers and Sandwiches, Tionko Ave., Davao City.
The eight founding members of the club are Angeles, Peter Carido, Pepito Mac, Jaime Ong, Pete Bato, Bobby Go, Caloy Acusta and Wency David.
"We are actually already riding from places to places some 10 years before we formally formed the club. We just decided to create the club to organize things," he said.
Currently, the club is divided into 10 teams named after colors.
The pioneers belong to the yellow team.
"We are 15 in the team, seven of which are past presidents of the club," Pepito Mac, pioneer member, for his part, said.
The riders also shared to this writer that the country's President Rodrigo Duterte belongs to their team.
Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Ronal "Bato" dela Rosa is also a member of the club. This year's club president is lawyer Abo Gempesaw and chairman is retired Colonel Sam G. Afdal.
Pastor Apollo C. Quiboloy, a close friend of President Duterte, also joined them before in their long rides.
The club is also one of the pioneer riders' groups that formed the National Federation of Motorcycle Club Inc.
"The federation started with three rider clubs, us (On Any Sunday Riders), Cebu and Bacolod, but now we have 40 different club members and yearly we are staging a national convention," Angeles said.
When asked about why they named the club as "On Any Sunday Riders," Angeles was quick to add that it is inspired with a 1971 movie directed by Bruce Brown, the "On Any Sunday" which focused on the lives of real-life riders.
"But definitely, aside from that movie, before we are riding mostly on Sundays since we had busy lives on weekdays when we were younger," Angeles said.
Boy Umali, one of the decade-long members of the club and Boy Pineda, the current team leader of the yellow team, also shared that they treasure most the strong brotherhood established throughout the years of riding together.
"When we gather now, together we reminisce both the good and bad times in riding," Pineda said.
Riding Haven
The riders shared that in their rides all over the country they consider Davao Region as the riding haven in the country.
"This is because we have less traffic here, just a minutes and kilometers away you are already in a wide and smooth highway. Last week, we went to Davao Oriental, maybe of the 800-kilometer road, only seven kilometers of which are rough because of ongoing constructions, but the rest are perfect roads," Angeles said.
He added that safety is also one of the factors contributed why Davao is considered as one of the driving havens in the country for the riders.
Memorable rides
The riders shared that one of their memorable rides was the one with Duterte when they started as a club.
"Our ride to Calinan in Davao City, Digos City and Cagayan de Oro City with the humble and tough President Duterte," Pineda said, adding that their food trips along the rides showed Duterte's simplicity as he ate even dried fish or bulad.
He, however, added that all riders had their own shares of misfortunes on the road.
"But, thank God nobody died because of our rides," Angeles poked a joke while sharing their club's good memories.