Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

In Defense of Freedom ===~=============== ~ By J.G. Krol Motorcycling's leading long-run challenge is for industry execu tives, club officials, motorcycle journalists, competition organizers, specialists in government and public relations, concerned motorcyclists, and other leaders and opinion-makers to think through, to work out, and to agree upon a consistent posture towards government. A dozen men can best a thousand at tug-of-war if the latter pull in a thousand different directions. Too often, motorcycle spokesmen offer confused, diffuse, and conflicting recommendations on the proper role of government vis-a-vis the sport. But this is only the symptom of a deeper problem_ ..which is that few cyclists have yet discovered they are willy-Dilly players in a political game that conforms to rigid, though unspoken, rules. The most basic of these is that a group may be well-defined - like all the 28 year-old married males - but without perceived, shared interests it is politically ineffectual, politically nonexistent. Given the essential importance of an agreed, shared in terest we can no longer trust consensus to emerge from mere chance or habit. We must consciously strive towards agreeing a single line of defense, on this side of which government out not to intrude, on that side of which governmen tough t to act with full force and vigor. Thoughtlessly scratching a thousand differen t lines in the dirt is fu tile and self-defeating. An example of this, no doubt advanced with the best of intentions, is Alice Rhea's attack on off-road motorcycle registration, in the Fourth of July issue of Cycle News. Perhaps her conclusions stem logically frOJ:!l her premises, but these she does not state, and without knowing what they are, neither she nor we can assess their validity. But we can state and assess the premises behind the Off-Highway Vehicle Fund (OHVF). and in the interests of limning the shared interests of motorcyclists, we should. The first premise is that each discern able group can protect its freedom and existence only be becoming a sufficien t political force to protect its own interests. uThe rights and interests of every or any'person are only secure from being disregarded when the person interested is himself able, and habitually disposed, to stand up for them", observed J.S. Mill, and the same is obviously true of groups with shared interests. To most people who glean political wisdom from the mass media, a political force automatically suggests a voting bloc, and they correctly doubt that this model is of much use to motorcyclists. Yet this best-known of political devices is actually among the least effective, which is a paradox due to the nature of the mass media themselves. Newspapers, radio, TV, news magazines and, yes, school textbooks are designed for the broadesr possible audience. Since the great majority of potential newspaper bu¥ers contact politics only at the polling place, it is perfectly natural that newspapers should cover this subject from the viewpoin t of voters. This is no more surprising than their coverage of professional sports and entertainment from the viewpoint of spectators_ Millions of people unwittingly, and incorrectly, assume that the main path of accomodation with the government is through the voting booth, for this is what .fllIs the headlines_ In some grand, strategic sense this may be so, but for the particular problems of a particular group, nothing could be further from th e tru th. The second premise behind the OHVF is that the pref.!'rred method for sustaining a group interest is to enter into a fonnal, mutual relationship with a suitable branch of govern men t. Two variants of this have proved themselves in practice_ One is for an agency of the interest group to be vested with governmental powers, or quasi-gove.rnmental powers, in the area of that group's activity, the best examples being bar associations and medical associations. The other, morc common, arrangement is for a governmen t agency to be created to service and to provide liaison wi th a specific c1ien tele, for example farmers and the Department of Agriculture, railroads and the ICC, labor unions and the Department of Labor. [ once compiled a list of over seventy such agencies created by the S tate of California, and the total number is surely several times that amount, Useven times seventy" as the Old Testament would say. Registration of off-road motorcycles and creation of the OHVF are designed to create exactly such mutuality between government and motorcycling. Only through such liaison can any group achieve a stable balance with the interests of all other groups, i.e., with the public. Some, perhaps Alice Rhea, will think to criticize such a corporate organization of society, but it has been the universal social structure eve'T since medieval parliaments assembled the Four Estates: nobles, clergy, burgesses and peasants_ An interest group can survive only by entering into some limited alliance with government, and those which insist on remaining political outsiders inevitably suffer the fate of the coelacanth and the dinosaur. Now that the OHVF has been established, the ou tlook for dirt riding is considerably brigh teT. Taxes paid on dirt bikes will flow into the OHVF, from which they will be expended to benefit off-road' motorcycling. The -fund must be jealously guarded to assure it is used for its intended purposes, of course) but this is a normal situation for all special-purpose funds. Even before the first money was collected, one legislator was trying to raid the fund. To avoid this, close links must be forged between the administrators of the OHVF and the motorcyclists they represent. Alice Rhea's most unfortunate proposal is that we can somehow "get around them" by registering dfrt bikes as highway vehicles. Nothing. could be more self-defeating. 'Motor vehicle taxes flow in to highway trust funds and elsewhere, and provide no direct benefits for the dirt rider who pays them. Taxes paid into the OHVF are earmarked for the dirt rider who pays them. Having moved into the political mainstream with establishment of the OHVF, the dirt rider can look towards other benefits previously inaccessible to him. For example, California Assemblyman Chappie's excellent and equitable AB 151 will transfer a fair share of gasoline taxes into the OHVF, in proportion to the amoun t of fuel bought for use in off-road motorcycles. The dirt rider will then derive more direct benefit from a tax he is already paying, estimated to be as much as four million dollars per year. Motorcyclists should support' AB 151, which is analogous to existing provisions for farm equipment, construction equipment and boats. Motorcyclists should also demand partial transfers to the OHVF as relief from existing tax diversions in such areas as: fees now paid by dual-purpose motorcycles used partly-on, and partly-off, the road; sales taxes now paid on equipment and supplies for off-road motorcycling, the legally mandated spark arrester being an excellent example; taxes now paid on acImissions to private mechanical parks and to off-road competitive even ts; property taxes now paid on land devoted to off-road motorcycling; certain business taxes now paid by the motorcycle industry, as inven tory taxes on dirt bikes in stock. All these represent taxes presently being paid by the dirt rider, but unfairly diverted from directly benefiting him. Furthermore, an ongoing OHVF should receive, in proportion to the popularity of the sport, recreational gran ts from the general revenue of the state. None of these things would be even imaginable without the OHVF. Most importantly, we will finally have a continuing voice within governmeht speaking out for equitable treatmen t of off-road "ycling. Surely this is preferable to occasional cries of outrage or dismay drifting weakly in from the rules. An established agency of government can easily accomplish tasks that would be miraculous for an outside group. It can issue bonds to acquire large tracts of land, repaying them from OHV F revenue. Since the most desirable land for dirt riding is often the least desirable for any other purpose, an established agency could accept jurisdiction over wastelands that other agencies would be happy to unburden but cannot, by law, relinquish to private interests. A government agency could be more readily relieved of certain general legal burdens that are wholly inappropriate to the special case of dirt riding, for instance, the present absurd and unjust liability placed on a landowner for mjuries sustained by a using motorcyclist. A government agency can make beneficial arrangements with other government agencies; for example, the controlled use by well-silenced mo torcycles of suitable portions of the hundreds of miles of dry washes within a few minutes drive of populated areas. The OHVF is an importan t step towards political maturity of off-road motorcycling, and a necessary step towards its survival in a politicalized society. Every significan t group has a with government similar alliance or...like dog groomers ...is working towards one. Modern governmen t considers its duty to be to work with every interest group in measured and responsible pursuit of that group's goals, and dirt riders should consider this a blessing of participatory democracy. By opposing the only agency created for his benefit, a dirt rider in no way harms the mythical "them", but only himself. Let us hope everyone in the sport soon realizes this and works to support and strengthen the OHVF, while closely monitoring its perfonnance to assure adherence to prescribed goals. We can seize this opportunity for constructive, progressive action, or we can passlvely await extinction. There is no practicable third alternative. GAMB" flip one card_ If key time for that check is 11:55, at 1l:59 a "4" will be showing on the rack. At 12: 13, an 18 will be showing. Number 67, our example number, should arrive at that check at one hour and 7 minutes after key time, or 1:02 PM. At 1:02 pm, the number on the flip card rack will be 67! If the rider is on time, and number 67 is therefore showing on the card rack, that number will be recorded opposite the appropriate check number on his score card. If he zeros all the checks, then he will have a whole string of 67's opposite the 67's that he wrote in before he started. Let's suppose though that at some checks he is early, and at others he is late_ Then the number showing will be recorded and he will lose points the same as always. Here is a sample score card. Check 1 2 3 4 5 Finish Rider No. 67 67 67 67 67 67 Time of Arrival 67 72 68 65 62 62 Points Lost o 5 1 4 o o 10 Score 990 Let's see what happened at each check. At check I, he was on time, the 67's match and he loses no points. At check 2 he was 5.p1inutes late and lost 5 points. A t check 3, he made up 4 minutes and lost 1. At check 4 he came in 2 minutes hot, and lost 2 points for each minute, or 4. The fmish is a known check and he can be early withou t penalty up to 15 minutes so he lost no points. See how easy it is to score! You could count on your toes and come up with the correct score in under half a minute. There will also be a tie-breaker score recorded in real time somewhere along the line. This system has been used successfully in the East for 'sOme tirlle now) and it's such a vast improvement over the old system that there's no comparison. Study the system so that you don't have to bother the pioneering Checkpoints unnecessarily on August 19th. The traditional clocks and cards will still be on hand at the checks, if you want to use them to doublecheck_ Although this system represents a tremendous step forward, it doesn't represent the ultimate. One ot the big problems with enduros is that once a rider becomes late, the enduro for him turns into a race and if he loses a lot of time (say at a bottleneck) or the schedules are very tigh t, the even t is a race from that time on_ This not only defeats the whole idea of the enduro, which is after all to keep time, but· eauses acciden ts and problems wi th land managers who don't mind having an eriduro on their land, bu t don't like having races with all the attendant risks and damage_ The solution is called interval scoring_ In interval scoring, once a rider is late, as our example rider was at check 2, his time of arrival, 72, becomes his new key. time and he will have to try for 72's from then on, until he loses more time. Let's see how this would work out. Check 1 2 3 4 5 6 Finish 7 Rider No. 67 67 67 67 67 67 67 Time of Arrival 67 72 72 70 75 77 73 Points Lost 0 5 0 4 3 2 0 14 Score 986 At check 2, the rider both lost 5 points and got a new key time. He successfully maintained the average speed throughout the next section, arrived at "72" and lost no further points. A t the next check though, he went too fast and lost 4 points, even tlwugh he was still behind his mginal schedule! Coming in early doesn't change your key' time so his key time for check 5 was still 72 and he lost 3 points, and gained a second new key time, 75. At check 6, then, his key time was 75 and he arrived at 77, so he lost 2 points. He arrived early at the finish which is allowed, but he would have been late if he had a 78_ His key time for the finish was his largest number, 77. Scoring; you will note is just as simple_ In spite of the improvemen ts that have recently come about in the enduro scene, we still have quite a ways to go, particulary in one area. 1 have recently attended two S RA enduros_ One attracted. 2200 entrants, the other about 850 entrants_ Most of the District runs this year have not even been able to fill a 500 entry limit. When you consider that the S RA charges a higher en try fee, has no insurance, has minimal rescue facilities, and has had rather uninspired courses to date, you can get some appreciation of where the District stands in the eyes of a great many riders. With all our advantages of greater experience gained over 20 years of running enduros, and our vastly greater pool of experienced help, a majority of riders prefer to ride elsewhere. At the risk of drawing yet another outraged arrow from District 37's champion, the indomitable Maureen Lee, I'd say we've dropped the ball somewhere. Certainly, many riders go to the SRA events and others because of their generous trophy policy, which I don't think the District should adopt under ~any circumstances. Trophies have little enough meaning without giving them ou t as finishing pins or Crackerjack prizes. I don't feel that's really the area that's the sore poin t. The truth is that the District' doesn't provide for young riders and inexperienced riders. We have a sink or swim policy that many of the younger and less experienced riders simply fmd unpalatable. Will any new rider who rode the Last Chance Enduro or the Jackass ever come back to a District enduro? Will any rider who has ridden District enduros. all year and never finished come back and do it again? Will any rider who has ridden 30 District enduros and never trophied continue to do so until he retires, or will he start riding SRA enduros? It would seem to me that high on our list of District enduro priorities should come some provision for these riders. Certainly we don't wan t to start giving trophies to everyone who can 'finish the most mediocre ride, but why can't we have a He" class so that beginners can compete? Most beginners have to compete for years before they can successfully tackle the "B" class. What is wrong wi th having graded enduros? Graded enduros are those in which entries from either beginners or experts are not accepted. At the moment, we don't have to worry about not accepting en tires, but we can still grade the enduros as being for novices, intermediates or experts. We could also have different schedules for beginners, or shorten the course for them. There are all sorts of approaches_ All it takes is the will to do something and some imagination. Of course, we can just ignore the situation and let the independent organizations gradually take over. running all the enduros. Then we can gripe about high en try fees and mediocre courses and lie about the good old days. Three clubs have recognized the changing times and started the job of clearing the road. Let's give them a hand to get it on or get off the road. ~ CL ~ Ol III ~ ~

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