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/126013
II 50 miles of ,T uft E' Nilff: 11II i Shooting the rapids t 10 and over the falls f'. O"l By Ron Schneiders " CO RED MOUNTAIN, CAL.• OCT. 18 ~ At first glance , the V .E.A .'s Tuff ..0 E' Nuff Enduro w as not. an o u prospect. The pits o attractive would be located on Trona Road, C\J v' '" +'" fifteen miles north of Red Mountain, some three plus hours of driving from Los Angeles. The run was advertised as 50 miles long, certainly not even three hours of riding. Could a less-than-three-hour ride be worth a greater-than-six-hour drive? There was another thought. Since the ride was so short, would the club overcompensate by putting on some sort of sadistic destruction derby? Finally, the enduro was on Saturday, and the guys I usually ride with were all working. This one, 1 thought, I could pass with no regrets. But then C.N. called and reminded me that it was a District 37 enduro , and would I mind .. . Question number one was, just what, or who, were the U.E.A.? It turned out that they weren't exactly a brand-new organization and in fact if you kind of Help! I'm being attacked by a giant rockl 22 squinted at them in just the right light they looked exactly like the old U.R.A., even down to the red, white and blue jumpers. In fact they were the U. R.A . or at least the better part of the organization. It seems the U.R.A. Corporation (profit-making management) had a dispute with the U.R.A. Club (free labor-pool] so the workers decided to try their hand at management. Shades 0 f Orwell's Animal Farm. The United Enduro Association, fun-loving, nonprofit, District 37 affiliate , is the result of the schism. The Course consisted of two loops nearly identical in length and difficulty, though the latter was not exactly planned. Loop One was designed for the C riders, who were not going to ride the second loop. The club thought it was the easier of the two loops. Noone that I could find agreed with them however, One experienced rider told Good place for a trials bike, wot? me, "I could actually keep time on part of the second loop. but on the first I just rode as fast as I could go." Accor ding to the club members, the terrain on the first loop was easier, but the spe~d averages were kept high to make it challenging for the more experienced riders, but apparently no one noticed that the terrain on the first loop was easier. Loop One had several tough hillclimbs and one descent that started out as just a moderate rocky downhill. but the last 50 yards were very steep! Loop Two had several difficult climbs also . but again the most spectacular section was a trip down the rapids and over the falls. Only there wasn't any water, just about eight nice three-foot high rock ledges to drop off in about half a mile or so. Speed averages on both loops were very high, with three sections at 30, 32. and 34 mph. The lowest speed average worked out to .117 mph; necessary to kill one minute at the Trona Road crossing. The idea was to kill a little time and avoid killing any contestants. It seems pretty good to me. Several other new ideas were tried. One consisted of putting all the A riders on the early minutes. The disadvantage of this method is that friends of different skill levels are sometimes split up. The advantage, however, is that B and C riders do not hamper the more experienced and faster riders, and hence do not get used for traction. Geographically, Loop Two took off in a north-easterly direction and spanned the rocky Spangler Hills. Loop One was laid to the southwest of the pit area. If a new proposal by the BLM is adopted. much of the land used in Loop One will no longer be available to motorcyclists. District 37 has established a legal defense fund, presumably to fight further BL'\1 encroachments on riding land and will assess all District riders S1.00 per event. The assessment is not yet in effect, but the U.E.A. put out a large bottle with a sign asking for voluntary donations and received what appeared to be well over $100 for the defense fund . Tom Purlock won the Sweepstakes Trophy by zeroing the course. He was the only on e who did so. For such a short event. the scores were, on the average, quite high. The best score in the C class was Bob McKiUit with 19, and a score of 7 was good enough for best in the B class . The trophy in that class goes to Craig Wilson, a 250 rider. The 200 Class B trophy went to Dale Boller, one of Cycle magazine 's road testers and half 0 f the layout crew of the C.E.A. (Remember that long, lone, steep, rocky downhill in the Last Chance. . . . Hmmmm?). Now, you might wonder why such a Ito-fast guy is