Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

~ NOSTALGIA Elsinore Grand Prix ~ ve one wa ere u arne s Riders b last d own the streets of Elsinore on one of the pa vement se ctions. Spectator turn-ou t was h uge for the Grand Prix, and became a maj or con tributor to its de m ise. By Maureen Lee hey were racing weekends to end all weekends, beginning at the end of an era of flower power, hippies, lo ve beads, a nd to-hell-with-the-government g a th e r in gs, and ta iling o ff with a groan in the '70s due to spectator beh av ior resembling that of internationa l so cce r fans. But if you were a racer - oh my , was the Elsinore Grand Prix fun . At Elsinore, competitors got to ride on more kin d s of surfaces and through more kinds of settings than it's p oss ible to find a t co n te m po r a ry events. Now, the Grand Prix races of its type are gone; th e people, gone, but th is piece will attempt to document what those weekends were like and h ow irres ponsib le humans (some of th em racers, unfortunat ely) kiIled the events - dead. . Driving to the smaIl town of Elsinore, California, nowadays brings back memories, esp eciall y if you take the back streets which were used before the freeway was finished . You'I1 pick up the old feelings in Corona, a town w he re car races ran on the wide, curved main street during the "Roaring '20s ." Lined with ancient pepper trees and pretty, old house s, the road s till hasn't changed. Proceed up the hiIl to a left turn, the spot where a large-frame mansion that was then a commune stood. The road continues through an a re a wh ere acres of oranges once grew and where bracero shacks used to line the road; one or two are still there if you know where to look . Take the road on out past Ken Maeley's T 24 pla ce and be sure to schedule a stop at Tom's Farms. If you rode Elsinore, you 'll remember Tom's Farms, a fruit stand wher e mo st riders would stop for bags of frui t and . other goodies (no booze was sold), an d maybe eat some of the best ham burgers in the world. Believe it or no t, the stand stiIl looks like it did on those weekends, and even back then it looked like it hadn't changed since the '305. The only clues are the sligh tly fancier cash registers, and the fact that they've added a proper restaurant and a man-made duck pond . The approach to Elsinore show s that lik e everywhere el se in sou th e rn California - the wide open spaces are quickly being covered by what the cu rrent tacky s ty le is : e ither Cape Cod bu ildings in blue and whi te, surrounded by skinny eucalyp tus trees, or something caIled Mediterranean, which is us uaIly in sha des of flam in go a nd green with red-tiled roofs ...Yuck! The town itself? Am azin g. It ha sn't changed much at all. Just try to look at it without the housing tracts in the background; instea d keep your eyes focused on the main street, the old hotel and little town park in th e downtown section, which are all just the same as before. Many of the grand old (and smaIl old ) hot spring ba th houses are no lo nger there, and neither is the hotel tha t was built in the '205 as a health spa. The huge lot and stone waIl are stiII there, and you may purchase it if you wish, hot spring and all. So in spite of it all, Elsinore can still give y~u an attack of the wistful s. It all started in 1968, on the weekend of February 10 and 11. AMA' s Dis tric t 37, the national organization's southern California chapter, had done wonderful w ork in setting everything up. District' Pres ident Ron Sloan and Bill Adams, a true desert hound and a marvelous old timer who rode in the desert d espite the fact th at he was m issin g o n e hand , worked with the Gripsters M.e. and convinced the Chamber of Commerce that a motorcycle gra nd prix was jus t the ticket to bring in some much-needed cash an d excitemen t to the town. The Catalina Grand Prix was already go ne, ma ny things having killed it. The hardest job with that event had been the transport of bikes, riders and spectators to and from the isla nd . Elsinore posed no such problem, a nd exciteme nt ran h igh. Even Corona restaurants ad ve rtised race-day speci als, and the local citizenry was behind it. Francis Petty was the president of the Gripsters, and the amount of work that he and his club members assumed was , en ormous; though it was all done gladly. Dirt b ikers w ere more like family in tho se days. Belonging to and supporting yo ur club was important, but everyone pitch ed in at Elsinore, regardless of their club affiliation. Leafing through that firs t program, you' ll fi n d ad s from Herb Litchs Ma ch in e Shop in Long Bea ch , Ken Ma el ey th e steel shoe man ($25 plus p osta ge , back then), Long Beach Triu m ph, Irv Seaver BSA (featuring a sketch of DaIlas Baker), Malcolm Smith (h is Riv ers ide Husqvarna dealership was much newer, and he had not yet started his successful distributing company or product li ne), and Milne Brothers (offeri ng BSA, Yamaha and MotoBeta, along with an all-lea th er motocross boot from England that was caIled "B ig John" - nothing like them around today). Other ad s were fr om Norm Reev es BSA and from BSA Western itself, reading, "Ha ul yo ur old sled in, rid e ou t on a brand-new BSA 'beauty, power, reliab ility." Also inclu ded was a double-truck centerfold of all the current Greeves, which we re available at Nick Nicholson Motors in North HoIlywood. The race course started south of Highway 71, out in the boonies by the lake. There actuaIly is a Lake Elsinore, and d epend ing on w ha t the weather is like at the time, it ranges from a nearly dried-up puddle, to a nicely filled bod y of water that is perfect for water skiing. to a monster that has fl ood ed and destroyed part of the town. In 1968 it was growing nicely a nd looked quite pretty. The pits "fere out in a vast grassy area, quite a trot from town. The start blasted away in almost hare and hound fashion, with long rows of riders leaving all abreast in one-mi n ute intervals. The marked area then tigh tened up to eventuaIly drop down into a bear of sandwash which ca used either terror or delight, depending on your view of rough dirt riding. Some of the TT rid ers nearly had heart attacks in the secti on, 'bu t desert racers hopped up and down over the rollers with great aplomb, shooting rooster tails as they ripped

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