Skunk River Enduro
IERA / District 22 / Moose Enduro Series
Fremont, Iowa - April 27, 2003
Overall Class Winners: A: Craig Holasek 13; B: Jerad Dobbs (200B) 27; C:
Tug DenOtter 35
Top five
winners in each class (excluding overall winners):
AA: Ryan Moss 15, Jamie Driskell 18, Tim Taber 18,
David Campbell 19, Gary Barber 20;
200 A: Brad Dameron 19, Mark Watkins 23, Bryan Dixon 26,
Mike Black 42, Paul Mortiz 61;
250 A: Den Shafer 18, Kevin Dimond 19, Charlie Eller 19,
Eric Burghardt 22, Dave Dupree 22;
OPEN A: Tom Farris 20, Richard Krajicek 25, Jeff Gross 26,
Randy Gregerson 30, Jeff Hood 39;
SENIOR A: Duane Eller 21, Paul Reschke 22, Lonnie Ross 25,
John Dameron 26, Chuck Neavin26;
200 B: Tony Stefanelli 38, Jason Drivenga 42, Dave Coon
43, John Garner 45, Francisco Alareon 46;
250 B: Brian Richlen 29, Chris Mumm 31, David Bergantzel
34, Nathan Thompson 36, Brett Baer 39;
OPEN B: Brad Krauth 32, Terry Venteicher 33, Eric Sieh 36,
Terry Hills 40, Todd Skogland 41;
SENIOR B: James Cunningham 32, William Severance 33, David
Coulter 46, Tim Ellesworth 46, Brent Coulter 48;
SUPER SENIOR: Steve Reschke 27, Robert Brown 33, William DeVore
44, Layton Erickson 57, Dennis Barr 60; C: Bruce Meyer 45, Jason Edwards
47, Josh Luke 60, Edward Stoll 71, Mike Coleman 80;
GOLDEN MASTERS, Ray Poston 7, Dennis Thielke 8, Jim Ross
11, Warren Campbell 15, Steven Porter 22.
I do love the smell of two-strokes in the morning.
There’s something intoxicating about it.
Or at least disorienting. I
don’t even have a two-stroke, but the pungent odor of combusting Bel-Ray
reminds you its time to race. And after
waiting some five months to race again, the riders at Fremont showed up in
force looking for fun.
Recent rains in the area left the course for this
year’s Fremont, Iowa Skunk River Enduro in near perfect condition. Skunk River became the first race of the
season after the Forest City Riders M.C. postponed the April Byron event to
November due to torrential rains in Illinois. This delay disappointed many as
the race includes the added plus that Ryan Moss can’t ride in it and roost all
over the rest of us. The Fremont race greeted its 157 riders with 66.8 miles of
perfect, tractable terrain in and around the South Skunk River basin. The terrain never produced any unconquerable
obstacles, but the pace and tight nature of the trail presented plenty of
challenges. Of the many participants,
106 finished.
The course was actually a 33.4 mile loop ridden
twice. The loop divided again into two
separate sections with each starting back at the pits/race start. The first section looped to the east from
the start and back again. The second
section circled to the west from the pits.
The Turkey Scratch Enduro Riders cleverly started the first loop with a
2.9 mile open field and road section resulting in a loss of any free check area
at the outset. For this reason, the
race really started at the 2.9 mile odometer check where most riders simply
hung around until their minute came up again.
After that, there were no additional road sections
and little, if any, opportunity to catch your breath. The first 21.7 miles of loop one paced at an 18 mile
average. Riders initially followed a
reasonably open path along the Mattix Branch of the South Skunk River. Keeping
pace posed no real problem. This
tightened up and then ultimately opened into a large flat grass track. Although the course was not generally muddy,
I inadvertently got behind a KTM 450 in one of the turns in the track which
slung about 72 pounds of top-soil on me.
At the 21.7 mile marker, or the end of the first
loop of section one, the course granted a reset of nearly 30 minutes back at
the pits. This was one of the first
resets I have ever enjoyed. For that
matter, all three resets allowed some amount of rest as each constituted 30
minutes in length. Of course, that
allowed me to get ahead of the riders who always seemed to pass me within a
mile of recommencing a section. I am certain
that they all got tired of coming back up behind my XR for what seemed like the
twentieth time. But they always yelled “thank you” after I
promptly launched off into the nearest thorn bush or sink-hole to ease their
pass.
After the first reset, the pace increased to a 24
mile average. The race also entered the
west loop. While only 11.7 miles long,
extremely tight woods comprised the loop.
Most of the time, I could have run through the section more quickly than
traversing it by motorcycle. I certainly
would have scored higher on foot in any event.
After completing the loop, the race again deposited the riders into the
pit area for 36 minutes reset/lunch break.
This was actually the first such lunch reset where I have been able to
actually sit around for some period of time and pretend to be unconcerned. I even oiled my chain and peered in my air
box. Didn’t actually change the filter,
but I at least I checked.
|
14th Place 250B Rider - Eric Neu |
Oddly enough, my back screamed like a YZ125 at a
hare scrambles. Turns out I’d endeavored, unsuccessfully, to keep up with some
buddies on a motocross track the week previous and turned my compression
damping way up. That XR was kicking
like a mule on fire. Which brings me to another training
issue. You can jog, lift weights,
wrestle llamas if you’d like, but very little prepares you for that heinous
scourge of the first long distance ride of the year. That’s right; monkey butt.
Guaranteed to remove six square inches of hide no matter what type of
training you invent. And when you got
it, plan on keeping it around for a few weeks.
At first, it just gets gnarlier every day. Its easily bad enough to scare your wife, cause your kids cry and
make local law enforcement consider placing you on a watch list. Try 33 miles on an over-sprung XR and the
results are both foul and spectacular. You get the picture.
After the lunch reset, a reduction in shock damping,
and cordison shot, the second half of the race followed the same two loops
again. The 24 mile average continued
until the commencement of the west loop, when it increased to 30 miles per hour
in an effort to weed out the weak and beleaguered, such as myself, from the
rest of the crowd. This seemed to work
as many of the DNFs came during this latter portion.
At least during this race I was not plagued by my
inability to re-start my XR after a nasty, overheated “get-off.” I recently installed a Terrycable hotstart
switch, based largely on the YZF button of the same name. The system consists of a rubber airline,
which runs from the manifold to a valve located on the handlebars. Just open the valve and it lets fresh cool
air into the engine, which leans the mixture and allows for a quick start. The XR now requires no more than a few kicks
regardless of how overheated, flooded and gimped-up the bike is after it goes
down. I highly recommend the $80
addition to any pre-hotstart 4-stroke.
You can find them at XR’s Only (www.xrsonly.com) of directly from
Terrycable (www.terrycable.com).
During this last section, riders also faced a
two-way traffic area which definitely supplied some confusion. Some of the riders were disoriented enough
to miss the two-way traffic sign. When
they saw bikes coming the other way, they got completely screwed up.
|
2nd Place AA Rider - Ryan Moss |
Not surprisingly, deep ruts and whoops made up the
course during the second time around.
At least one pallet bridge spanning one of the many small washes
collapsed. Given these things are designed to carry around something like
shingles or crates of dog food, its not surprising that they make a mighty poor
conveyance for multiple 250 pound, fast moving motorcycles. Still, they beat
the alternative. I possessed the good fortune of coming up on the dilapidated
structure just in time to see some other poor schmuck stuck in an alternative
route. I’m guessing he didn’t settle on
the course direction until it was too late.
I was able to simply follow him with a bit more momentum and make it
through.
District 23 (Minnesota) AA rider Craig Holasek took
top honors at this race, after picking up only 13 points. Craig has a long history of racing AMA
National Enduro Series and Hare Scramble series. Holasek placed just in front of D22 riders Ryan Moss and Jamie
Driskell who picked up 15 and 18 points respectively.
|
|
1st Place
AA Rider Craig Holasek
Ryan Moss rode his KTM
Moose-Racing/Motion-Pro/Braking-Brakes/Splitfire/Borrelli-Suspension/FunMart-Cycles/One-Industries/FMF/WD-40/EVS/Arai
/Works-Connection/Hinson/Sprocket Specialists/Smith/Pirelli/Pro Grip (Grips)
EXC 200 to second place. Ryan reported that the “terrain is perfect at Fremont,
nice rolling hills, some off-camber, the woods are tight but not so tight that
you can't fall over, and I love the river bottom switchbacks. Traction was good
and the weather was perfect.” The two
way traffic area apparently surprised even our local AA crowd, as Ryan dove off
the side of the trail to avoid hitting the traffic head on at speed. A branch also waylaid Ryan when it grabbed
his throttle cable and pinned it. In
the end, only a few trees lost their young lives.
Ryan told me that he was tying most sections with
Craig and Tim Tabor. Tim is coming off
an injury and Ryan noted that this was the only way they had been able to beat
him in recent years. Craig then aired
the place out during the middle section and got two minutes ahead of Ryan.
Ryan also mentioned that the club threw out a check
due to some confusion over the trail.
Ryan said that several riders, including himself, got lost and missed
some trail. But he thanked the club for
getting out so quickly and fixing the problem.
He agreed that the most fair thing to do involved eliminating the
check. Beyond that, Ryan could not have
been happier with the event or the organizers.
And now that he mentions it, I followed some expert looking KTM riders
off the trail as well.
Unfortunately for purposes of this article and its
limited readership, nothing particularly dangerous or nasty happened to me this
time around. They say in skiing that
you’ll never get better unless you pile it up every now and again. Sort of a “pushing the envelope” sort of
argument. When riding dirt bikes,
however, the same advice produces far more painful, and even more expensive,
results. It seems that practice might be the better way to improve. I’ve heard some riders say that you should
ride at least 100 miles per week to better yourself. Seems like most of us would be bucking for a divorce or at least termination
from employment before anything that outlandish could transpire.
If you, like I, can’t ride that much, at least you
can read what others have said on the point.
I highly recommend Trailrider Magazine as it is the only periodical
about which I’m aware that devotes itself entirely to off-road racing and
riding without any reference whatsoever to motocross. The mag principally covers the enduros and hare scrambles of the
eastern and southern states, but contains a great deal of information about
trail riding generally. For the past
six or seven months, for example, Trail Rider published a regular column
entitled “The Art of Trailriding” which I have found extremely helpful. Many of the tips are old, but still apply
and are worth repeating.
The magazine is owned and edited by Paul Clipper who
wrote a regular column for Dirt Bike magazine back in the 1970s and 1980s
before it became a lame lackey to corporate motocross. Its hardly worth picking up anymore unless
you’re dying to hear how RC is doing or wish to revel at the utter lack of
inspired material in the regular columns.
Trail Rider also includes a regularly column from Ed
Hertfelder called the “Duct Tapes.” Hertfelder has been writing great stuff for
the perennial C rider for years. A
great example of his material is the ten commandments of off-road riding. The first being:
First Commandment: Thou
Shalt Turn Thy Fuel To "On" Before Thy Float Bowl Sucks Wind.
Motorcycles can travel a considerable distance with the fuel "OFF"
only to go quiet four feet from the top of a 65 degree climb, just as you're
going for low gear and your girl friend finally locates the start button on her
video camera. It is wise to double check the fuel tap after the first tenth of
a mile at an enduro. Unscrupulous riders have been known to reach over and turn
off fuel taps right on the start line. Personally, I prefer a slotted curtain
rod for this. If you're riding in the same event as Mel Downs it is wise to
wire the tap open; Mel gets a thrill helping riders out of difficult situations
and shutting off their fuel at the same time.
(Reprinted from Trail Rider Magazine 4/13/00)
You can subscribe at www.trailrider.com. Just $20 per year - cheap. But I digress.
The Turkey Scratch boys assembled a challenging
chunk of trail and ran a professional event that we will not miss next year.
Eric Neu, Carroll, Iowa.