What was is Robbie Knievel's Net Worth?
Robbie Knievel was an American motorcycle stunt performer who had a net worth of $2 million at the time of his death in January 2023. The son of legendary motorcycle stuntman Evel Knievel, Robbie completed numerous daredevil jumps like his father, many of which were televised live. Among his most famous jumps were the Caesars Palace jump in 1989 and the Grand Canyon jump in 1999.
Early Life and Education
Robbie Knievel was born on May 7, 1962 in Butte, Montana as the second of four children of motorcycle stuntman Evel Knievel and his first wife, Linda Bork. He had a brother named Kelly and two sisters named Tracey and Alicia. Due to his father, Knievel began jumping his bicycle when he was only four years old. By the age of seven, he was riding motorcycles. When he was eight, Knievel performed his first show with his father, at Madison Square Garden. He went on to tour with his father doing pre-jump shows. As a teenager, Knievel attended Central Catholic High School, but never graduated.
Motorcycle Jumping Career
As a motorcycle stuntman, Knievel differed from his father in certain ways. Most significantly, he used Honda CR500 motocross bikes, which are 90 pounds lighter than the flat-track Harley-Davidson XR-750 racing motorcycles his father preferred. In other ways, however, Knievel shared many similarities with his father, including his red-white-and-blue V-shaped jumpsuits that resembled his father's iconic white leather jumpsuit. He also made or replicated many of his father's jumps, including the Caesars Palace jump, which he successfully completed in 1989 some 22 years after his father had failed to land it safely. That jump was also Knievel's first to be televised live. His next televised jump was in the summer of 1993, when he challenged British motorcycle stuntman Eddie Kidd to a jump-off contest in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Although Kidd won the contest by scoring the greater cumulative distance over three jumps, Knievel broke the American Motorcycle Association record for a single jump, at 223 feet. He achieved an even longer jump, 230 feet, by clearing ten limousines on the Las Vegas Strip in 1996. In Vegas two years later, Knievel attempted to jump over 30 limousines.
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Knievel attempted two major jumps in 1999, both of which were televised. In February, he jumped the 130-foot gap between the two Jockey Club towers in Las Vegas. He subsequently took on one of his most ambitious jumps in May, attempting to leap over a 220-foot chasm at an Indian reservation near the Grand Canyon. However, he crashed and ended up breaking his leg. Kicking off the new millennium, Knievel jumped over a moving locomotive at the Palestine Park Depot in Texas. In 2003, he jumped 15 trucks at the Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City, Oregon. The following year, Knievel jumped over five military airplanes on the deck of the USS Intrepid in New York City. In 2007, he jumped an array of military vehicles at the North Carolina Auto Expo in Raleigh. Also that year, Knievel was inducted into the Motorcycle Hall of Fame in Sturgis, South Dakota. In 2008, he jumped 24 truck cabs at the Kings Island Amusement Park in Ohio, and cleared 21 Hummers at the Texas Motor Speedway in Forth Worth. Knievel ended the year with a New Year's Eve jump in front of a new volcano attraction at the Mirage Hotel in Vegas; it was his final televised jump. The final jump of his career came in October of 2011 at the Spotlight 29 Casino in Coachella, California.
Other Appearances
Beyond motorcycle jumping, Knievel made guest appearances on the television series "CHiPs" and "Hawaii Five-O." In mid-2005, he starred in his own A&E series, "Knievel's Wild Ride." Later on, he was the subject of the 2017 documentary "Chasing Evel: The Robbie Knievel Story."
Business Ventures
In 2006, Knievel launched a custom cycles business in Lake Hopatcong, New Jersey.
Personal Life and Death
Knievel has three daughters named Krysten, Karmen, and Maria, and two grandchildren named Analise and Kane. On January 13, 2023, he passed away from pancreatic cancer at a hospice in Reno, Nevada.
