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/125888
; Guest editorial DGI 2: s Kill "killer enduros" ~ g What if they gave an enduro and nobody came? That's the fate ... District 37 enduros are facing ..0 E again. Back in 19 71 our club, the -er-C'l Q.) Q.) :> o Z 16 CEA, got sucked into the tail-end of a wh o-could-throw-thetoughest-enduro contest. That year the San Bernard ino MC's end ur o was tough, th e following Foothill Haw ks' J ac kass was tougher an d o ur Last Ch an ce (an AMA Natio nal) was th e to ughest - 4 11 entries, 39 fini shers. After those thre e survivor ty pe end ur es the d istrict ru ns nearl y d ied for lack of entr ies. Now the Shamrocks, Hawks (disbanded) , San Foo thill Bern ardino and Rams en d uros are gone. District 3 7 cl ubs are doing it again ano ther who-can-p ut-o n-the- toughest enduro co ntes t. Pro gressively , up to the ' Checkpo in ts" AMA National J ubi lee en d uro, the severity of the courses has increased. Simultaneously the number of entries h as decreased. The Checkpoin ts had o nly 206 mail en tries and a small number of post en tries. The club will lose money and its mem b er sh ip is so discouraged that some say they probab ly won't p u t on an enduro next year. Exactly the same thing happened to our club three years ago. Ad ded to the to ughening district endures have b een the URA's Little Tuffy bottleneck, the Tecate 500 en d uro killer rocks, and the Shamrock's ISDT q ual ifi er body 'n bike d estr oy er. Th e CE A 's Last Chan ce relies on the ou tcome of previ ous en dure s (District 37 and non-district) plus the rep uta tio n of our prior ru n. High finis her enduros mean h igh entries; killer end ures kill entries. Ou r 1973 Last Chan ce enduro was a whoppi ng success b ut possibly will be oversh ad o wed by th is ye ar's Checkpoint, Double Cro ssers, URA , Pasadena Shamrock an d Los An cianos surviv or events. None were fun for the majori ty of en trants. Their resu lt s may be disas trous for us . . In So u th ern California , off-road events promo tion, espe cially endures, is a competitive proposit ion any how. There are lots o f even ts to ride every Sunday. Rid ers are not restrict ed to Dist rict 37 en dures. If th ey don 't like a event's reputation (from co mi ng previo us record or prio r events results) they don't ride, it's that simple. And the district dubs can't survive on the hu ndred or so enduro-point-hungry rid ers alo ne. Iro nically, if you check past resu lt s you wi11 find that the same riders that win or finish high in less impossible en duros do equally as well in the killer events. So what's the point? And what will be the point of being number one District 37 rider when no one shows up fo r district endures? And what will happen to the rid ers getting support to .co mpete in District 3 7 endures if no on e en ters? The gobs of club riders that supported District 37 endures Shamro ck, Dese r t MC, San Bernardino, Dirt Diggers , CE A, Foothill Hawks and others - h ave virtually disappear ed . They stopped having fun . But th ey can be brought back. Most importantly, new rid ers can be enticed to spend their money on and rid e District 37 enduros, Just stop th e to ugh es t-en d uro co n test. The CE A d oesn 't care wh at any of the supposed lov ers of survivor end ures say . We are lay ing o ut t he Last Chance en duro for ride rs t o finish on ti me and enj oy . We want to encourage new H e" rid ers to co mpe te, m ak e "B riders want to become " A " class an d make U UA riders use their watches and speed os again. We are stic king our nee k out all the way on our two-day enduro. If we get too few entries we'll lose money (again) and probably get forced out of the District 37 enduro racket by financial necessity. We hope not. Mostly we hop e the other District 37 clubs get th e message and end th e co ntest or we 'll all lose o ut. Dave Ho leman Californ ia Enduro Associat ion tr~ " TtO n,' 'rGO i ' " n" 'rGO rvo on" '\f; o r vo Lt;,C)'f, f, !~~TH,~:'MAHA ~~ ~b ~ or YAMAHA SWEATER SALE £., ,, Show yo ur co lors . A great Christmas gift . Colors : Yello w, Blue, Wine . In Crew Neck or Turtle Neck st yles . All Machine Washab le. REGUL AR PR ICE $2 2.95 SA LE PRI CE $ 17 .95 A small deposit w ill ho ld these un til Chri stmas. r I: ~ r .. 0 "" • 2, 24020 Narbonne Ave ., Lom ita,CA .90717 . Phone (2 131 53 4 ·23 11 ( 0 T"c ('1-(.'-' T ~ C.) r eo l"l.O "re;(.) 1"<;" "rEO "re;(J 1"<;" "rEO T'r.(,) ' ( , SCUDERIA HUSQVARNA PENTON LA VERDA SALES, SERVICE-, AND M AIL SPECIALISTS TESTS Yamaha YZ 80 Wankel Hercules PREVIEW Sadd leback Trans-A MA Book review The Motorcycle Wor ld By Phil Schilling, Random House, 1974, 252 pages, illustrated $17.95 The photographs are strikingly reproduced in exacting color, the text is complete with serifs for easy reading. And it is a very good read. Author Sch illing relates the story of motorcycling 'up to the mid-seventies with encompassing hindsight, which is the most you can ask of a historian, and pegs the present period almost as accurately, granted his constricted view as an editor of a mote-monthly. But this is an independ en t effort, and you never saw such views as these in any magazine. I can recommend this book as a talisman of great taste should you give it or display it. Schilling's narrative actually captures the magic appeal of motorcycling and pins it to the page for us to wo nder at, even those of us who are ca ught up in it. He treats the machines an d the riders developments equally , with deep u nderstanding that even explains the basic conservatism in "character bi kes" and the unleas hed aggression of J ap an ese designs. The mode m ph o tograph s of pivotal motorcycle models are alone wo rth th e boo k 's p rice. Lik e the T riumph Th underb ird , the Parilla Grand Sp ort, th e 193 6 Harley -David so n knucklehead - b eau t ifu l, connoisseurs' li th ograp h s th at make yo u realize again h o w rubber and alloy and iron can make a man dream. The Mo torcyc/e IVarid is an en thusiast's co llector's ite m. Get your bookstore to order one for you. 9t Charles Clayton RACES ORA Desert double South Bay half -mile Bill Robertson Honda 5626 T ujunga North Holl ywood. CA 9160 I 213-766-4356 So. 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