José Peón Pérez

He is a motorcycle commissioner in Ciudad de la Habana, head of the technical commission of the Cuban Motorcycle Federation and President of the Speed Commission of the Latin American Motorcycle Union (ULM).

Education Level: Higher Education
1. Bachelor's Degree in Physical Culture with a Specialty in Physical Education 1981.
2. Technician in Automotive, Industrial and Diesel Mechanics.

Professional Data:

Professional Experience:
Due to the affinity of my studies with the sport of Motorcycle racing, I began practicing it in 1960. Modifying my own racing motorcycles. Years passed without ceasing to compete. In 1968, I completed the Competition Motorcycle course, taught in Cuba by German professor Mr. HOST FUGNER.

I worked as Administrator in the racing motorcycle workshop (National Institute of Sports). In 1968, the first special competition motorcycle arrived in Cuba, brought by the famous German engineer, inventor of the rotary valve in two-stroke engines, Mr. WALTER KAADEN. This special competition motorcycle was assigned to me. Beginning his life in international competitions outside of Cuba.

Results as an athlete in Motorcycle Competitions:
• On July 13, 1969, he competed for the first time outside of Cuba in the sport of Motorcycle racing, being the first Cuban motorcycle athlete to compete outside of Cuba and one of the first Latin American athletes to participate in the World Motorcycle Championship.
• 5-time national champion and participating in more than 70 national and international events.
• Participates as an athlete in more than 20 international events, representing Cuba, in Belgium, Chile, Germany, Czechoslovakia and Cuba.
• 7th place in the World Championship held in Germany, (MZ-RE 125 CC Motorcycle) -SACHSENRING circuit.- on July 12, 1970.
• 1st place in (MZ-RE 125 CC Motorcycle) the Sub-American Championship held in Chile -PEÑUELAS circuit.- on September 10, 1972.
On August 23, 1973, he retired from active sports after 13 years as an athlete in Cuban motorcycle racing. And he went on to hold the position of National Commissioner and President of the Cuban Motorcycle Federation, for 10 years.

Relevant Results as a Motorcycle Executive:
• World Championship, held in Belgium, in 1974, he worked for the first time as an international referee and in 1975 was appointed by the International Motorcycle Federation FIM as director of international races, with ID # 0698.
• In 1976 he was appointed referee by the Latin American Motorcycle Union with ID # 0013, participating as a referee in Mexico, on May 9, 1976 in the first Latin American Championship of Motorcycle Speed Racing.
• Founder of the Latin American Motorcycle Union.
• 1991 worked as head coach of the national motorcycle speed racing team, for 10 years.
• At the Annual Congress of the Latin American Motorcycle Union in 2002 held in Caracas, I was elected Member of the Speed Commission of the ULM.
• At a meeting held by the CV/ULM held in September 2003 in Bogota, I was appointed Secretary of the CV/ULM.
• At the Annual ULM Congress, held in Guatemala, on November 20, 2005, the general assembly, by proposal of the executive committee and the board of directors of the ULM, elected him President of the Speed Commission of the LATIN AMERICAN MOTORCYCLE UNION.
• International Road Racing Steward with ID # 3253 from the International Motorcycle Federation -FIM-
• International Steward -FIM- at the Latin American Motorcycle Championships, National Championships and other international competitions of the Motorcycle sport.

He participated in the world championship -MotoGP- held in Indianapolis on September 14, 2008. He participated in the 2008 FIM annual congress in South Africa held from October 16 to 26, 2008 and in the ULM congress held in Cancún Mexico from November 25 to 30, 2008, ratified as President of the Speed Commission of the ULM.

For several years he worked in other areas of sports, within the Institute of Sports of Cuba, until taking Cuban motorcycle athletes to Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Argentina, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Colombia, standing out among the multiple good results, the Latin American Championship with athlete Nirio Rivero in 125 cc in 1993. In addition to many important results with different Cuban athletes in Latin American championships, international Copa Cuba competitions and in Caribbean area championships, held in Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.

Honors:
• Distinction, Martyrs of Barbados.
• Order of Sports Merit.

When speaking of the first participations of Latin American motorcyclists in world speed championships, it is mandatory to mention Cuban José Peón, who in the 1969 season made his debut in the Grand Prix of the German Democratic Republic, also known then as East Germany.

Peón Pérez, then 24 years old, is the prospect entrusted with the task of qualifying in the large and competitive 125cc class. He has an MZ model RE with a two-stroke engine and is assisted by the same German factory. It is a circuit he does not know, in fact, it is the first time he races outside the island. But to the satisfaction of those who believed in him, he achieves the objective of posting a minimum time to be part of the group of 40 drivers, 23 of whom would reach the finish line.

The Grand Prix of East Germany, the seventh of the twelve rounds of the calendar, was disputed on the original Sachsenring layout, inaugurated in the thirties, of 8614 meters, a route that ran through the streets of the local town and the surrounding roads, so the motorcycles traveled at more than 200 kms/h between houses, sidewalks, trees, lamp posts, telegraph poles and surrounded by thousands, hundreds of thousands of fans. The program, in addition to 125cc, featured the 50cc, 250cc, 350cc and the star 500cc categories.

"I arrived at the World Championship with very little training, but I managed to qualify on my first opportunity in Sachsenring, a really tough track - José Peón specifies - It was the first time a Cuban motorcyclist participated in an international competition. I had barely been driving the MZ-RE that the people from the German factory had left in Cuba for a year. Apart from being a driver, I was in charge of managing the racing motorcycle workshop of the National Institute of Sports, and together with the MZ factory, they gave me the opportunity to debut in the 125cc German GP of 1969".

The participation of Caribbean José Peón not only made him the first Cuban to take part in a motorcycle Grand Prix, but also one of the first Latin Americans to do so. Peón obtains his best world performance in the 1970 season by arriving seventh in the same semi-permanent Sachsenring layout.

For almost three decades, Peón has accompanied and directed the new generation of Cuban drivers, a group in which José Lazo, Benigno Jull and particularly the small and extremely fast Nirio Rivero stood out, who achieved the Latin American title in 125cc in the 1993 season, in addition to the runner-up in 600cc Supersport in 1995.

Currently, accountant and physical education teacher José Peón holds the position of president of the Speed Commission of the Latin American Motorcycle Union (ULM), an organization of which he was a founding member in 1974, while at the end of July he will be present in Guatemala, venue of the only date of the continental speed calendar, a test that will be disputed in the Superbike division.