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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/125752
ISH ;::: - '" eli beaten into submission) and for long stretches I rode all by myself and wondered if I was still on the rigbt trail. There was another 30 mph section along good trail for 10 miles right after lunch. It would have been fun if the schedule had been a bit slower, but 30 mph over any kind of trail is a race, for all but the experts. At the end of the 10 miles, more rock. There were some uphills this time, quite difficult but not impossible, and some very tight sandwashes. There was quite a lot of almost trials-like going through fields of rock. The schedule was only 12 mph and I had figured on making up some time, but I found it hard to hold my own, let alone make up any time. Someplace along in that stretch I came upon one of the strangest things I've ever seen in an enduro. I rode into a small valley, not more than a mile long, and there were bikes and riders all over it. A few guys were ridin(l towards me (backwards on the course), some were trying to scale the hills that made up either side of the valley, a few were sidehilling, and some messing abou t down in a rock-filled gulch along the bottom. I figured there must be some fearsome obstacle along the trail There weren't many places to take a breather and still be moving. ~ w Z W ..J U > U somewhere, but I couldn't see what it was. After a bit of looking and scratching my head, I went down and crossed the gulley, climbed the other side a little ways (having a little altitude never hurts) and sidehilled the length of the valley and went out. Whatever the obstacle, (if there really was one) I never found out. Quite strange. Sort of liking not getting Asian flu when all your friends have got it. Makes you wonder what's wrong with you. Before long we arrived at the Emergency Gas Check. I was plenty tired and one of the hardest things 1 ever did was leave to do the last 34 miles. Fortunately, much of that was dirt road, though with a 30 mph schedule and being late to boot, there wasn't any relaxation. This section was a little irritating because we were criss-crossing a valley back and forth, mostly over uninteresting fireroads, well aware that the club was simply trying to get within the legal limit for their I25-mile National. They got 103 miles finally, but there was 20 miles of "padding". After the run 1 went around and talked to a number of riders and came up against one of those situations that makes life hard for a journalist. Virtually nobody's opinion agreed with my own. I liked the run quite a bit. I've been griping about enduros that were either so easy they weren't a challenge, or that were basically easy but with some impossible obstacle like a bottleneck or an impossible uphill. This one was different. It was plenty tough, (less than 200 finished out of 750 starters) but there wasn't anything a determined HB" rider couldn't get over. And it was interesting_ Within the limits of desert riding, there was a lot of variety. As might be expected, the riders that didn't finish .didn't like the run very much and comments ranged from obscenities to "the worst run I've ever ridden," from some guy with about a hundred finishing pins on his hat. But the surprise was that many experts didn't much like it either. 1 went up to Bob Steffan, who's in contention for a National Enduro ranking this year, and asked him how he liked the run. "I didn't," he said quietly and he didn't 'seem to want to talk about it either. He estimated that he had lost about 40 points. Dave Ekins didn't like it either but he offered his reason. "It's the kind of run that can be won by a Class B rider riding without a watch or speedometer. There should have been a Check before that downhill," Dave said, "to catch the riders who were riding 15 minutes ahead of schedule. The way it was, some Class B rider who's just riding as fast as he can will win and time-keeping won't even enter into it." Ed Wigh t had still another reason. "I don't like riding all those old, worn-out trails that have been used on a dozen different runs." And he proceeded to tell me which parts of the run had been used on what previous runs. He's ridden a lot more runs than I have. Bud Howesman, who's been winning quite a bit lately, left before I could talk to him, but he reportedly said it was "one of the tougbest TUns he had ever ridden." His wife, Ellie, didn't finish which is rather rare. People ride enduros for differen t reasons, so what makes an enduro a bummer for one person makes it a great experience for another. Consider the case of George Verkamp. George finished the first loop with a flat tire, but he determinedly left on the second loop anyway_ He finished, and within his hour, too. His rims were square, he had several spokes missing from the flattened wheel, bis handlebars bad come loose and been secured (sort 0 f) with rope, and his gas cap was missing. But he finished. Probahly the only thing be's going to get for his effort is a little bronze frying-pan finishing pin, but I doubt if many people have got enough money to buy it from him.