Interview with Slade LaBadie AKA “Slade the Blade”
“First, why do people call you Slade the Blade?”
It all started back in high school, when one friend just started calling me that and it caught on.
“Why did you choose to go to motorcycle tech school?”
I went to MMI because I had and have a passion for motorcycles and I wanted to make a career out of
it. I loved to work on my own bike and my friends’ bikes. So, when I saw the TV ad in high school, I knew that is what I wanted to do in life and to make a living out of it.
“Do you have a background with motorcycles?”
Yes I have been working on bikes since I got my first dirt bike at the age of 10. Since then, I have been working on my own bikes, I have owned a handful of different kind of bikes from mini bikes to a Japanese cruiser bike.
“When did you start to tinker on vehicles?”
I started at the age of 10. I got my first bike when I was 9 and it was broken. My dad had me work all summer to pay for the parts. I bought them all and finished the bike on my 10th birthday. From there, my bike passion took off.
“Is working on bikes in the real world different than what you imagined when you were in school?”
In school I chose the Harley Davidson program so I only worked on H-D but now in real life I am working on BMW and Japanese. Also customer bikes are not as clean as the school bikes! (hint, hint)
“What do you like most about your job?”
I love that I can put a smile on customers’ faces. When I work on their bikes, it is a satisfying feeling to know I can fix a customer’s bike, put it into spec, and get the customer back on the road. I also like that I can repair some part of the bike that I thought would never work again.
“What do you like least about your job?”
Pushing customers’ bikes in and out of the shop, most BMW bikes weigh 3 times me “haha”.
“Give us a story about a satisfying repair?”
I did a full service on a bike and the customer gave us good feedback. He said his bike “ran better than when it left the dealership’’ that right there made me feel like all the extra work I do pays off. Some customers don’t notice the extra work I do, but when they notice, it feels good.
“Give us a story about a real challenge and what you learned.”
We were working on a Swiss Army vehicle called the Pinzgauer 712 for a commercial client. I had to rebuild the carburetors on it. I had never worked on carbs like that. There were a ton of pieces to the two carbs. This taught me to not overlook the process, and, at the end of the day, it’s just a carb like on other bikes, just a different size, but it works the same. Knowing how a carb works is what got me though the rebuild.