Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/125885
l!"l .... ~ .c E ~ :> o Z Five-yea r-ol d Joh n Jacobson on his first enduro. Hope it wasn't hi s last . He' s pretty young to reti re. By Ron Schneiders j:ALI FO RNIA CITY, CAL., OCT. 27 The Hook ' and Ladder Enduro held this Sunday was like no other enduro that has been held anywhere. And that's a shame because if there were abou t a d ozen o f these even ts spotted across the calen dar and around the co un try, cyclists co uld lose their "bad guy " 6 ima~e almost immediately . The even t this weekend raised somewhere between nine and thirteen thousand dollars for an extremely worthy and ne edy charity . Not only that, but the cycl ists w ho contribut ed th e money had a thoroughly enjoyable time and so m e of th em go t back mu ch m o re th an th ey gave. It was bill ed as the Pasaden a Fire D epartment Ho ok an d Lad de r Enduro , but it was mo re a three-ring c irc us a n d marathon give-a-way th an a simple en d uro and the Pasad ena Fire Dep t. wa s on ly th e organi zing for ce coordi na ti ng th e en ergi es o f half-a-dozen diffe re n t groups. Th e wh ol e id ea o f th e thing was to raise money for th e Burn Ward of th e L.A. County General Hospital. People who ar e criticall y burned in such things as house fires and auto wre ck s need very special Care if they are to have the best chance to re co ver both physically and psy ch ologicall y. ยท1t is easy to reali ze the d iffi culty of treating suc h injuries. If a person is b u rn ed o n both his front and back, how can be re st? An " air fluidized bed" is the an swer , but one costs abo u t $6 ,000. The m oney fo r this item was raised last year. A burned pers on wh o has lost much o f his sk in is extremely susceptibl e to serious infec tion . The solut ion to t h i s probl em is a su per-ste rile room , wh ere th e risk of infection is minim ized. The Women's Au xiliary o f the Pasade na Fir e Department who rai sed th e m o ney for th e be d , found a co n trac to r who would build these rooms at cost if th e money could be raised for the materials. Th e goal is to build ei gh t such units in L.A . County General Hospital this year. Some 50, 0 0 0 people are cr it ica lly b urned ea ch year , abo ut half of th em chil d re n . This Burn Ward is o ne o f o n ly eig h t suc h fac ilities in th e co u ntry . So t ha t was th e problem: raise S 10,000 m o re o r less, for the needed equipment. Ron Vin celette, the moving fo rce behind the Sportsman Racing Association (SRA), heard a bo u t the Only at an SRA event could you be attacked by a Pepsi-wie lding gorilla in the middle of the desert. problem and offered to do the tech nical job of staging a n enduro to ra ise the money , if th e firemen would furnish the labor. It worked beaut ifully . Ron laid out th e co urs e , arran ged fo r the ne cessary chec ks and equipment and held classes for the firemen and their wives and girl friends who were go in g to man the checks and do the clean u p -and so on. Over 75 firemen and th eir families showed up to wo rk. To be effective, th e e nduro had to be of the "fam ily type," one easy loo p tha t almost an yo ne co uld ride and a nother mo re difficult loop to interest th e better riders. The ro u t e pic ke d by Ro n was a masterpiece. T he first loop was very eas y, ' ter ra in -w ise but the schedules were just barely quic k enoug h to prevent the better riders from being too bored. The tiebreaker was in a 24 MPH sec tion and if yo u had been lulled in to a Th is guy's looking back t o see where h is buddies went and m issing that neat mi ne o n t o p of Gov 't. Peak . His buddy m issed the tu rn and was last seen heading for Death Valley.