Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

And mistakes he made few of. "T he tests here were all real basic , Eu ropean-style grass t rac ks ," Case lli said . " It took me a couple of tests to get going, but e ventually I fe ll int o a groove . Actually, the tests w e re a lot like riding sup ereross, where th e trac ks a re just ru tted corner after rutt e d co rn er. To do well yo u have to be smooth and consiste nt lap after lap. Here, th at's so important w he n you ride 30 four- or fiveminute grass tracks and yo ur top ride rs ar e separated by just a few seconds at the end o f the week." As far as the Junior World team, it st rugg led all week. After day one, t he team pulled up the rear in 13th place, but Pau l Neff, Wally Palmer, Cody Mast in an d Fred Hoess has now earned two Go ld medals in Poland. clos ing cere mon ies. He a lso placed an impressive 10th overall. Caselli, this year's "to p American ," played down that unofficial t itle. "Sometimes it gets an noying - all t he ta lk about being to p American ," Caselli said. "T he Six Days is a team event, a nd it co me s down to e ach ind ivid ual's e ffort on that team . I'm not tryi ng to be top Ame rican; I'm tryin g to be consistent and not make mistakes." holding signs saying. :A.manada, we love you.' Then at one of the observation check, where they put an x on your card, this young guy draws a big red heart on my card and says, 'Go Amanda.' Here I was ready to almost give up, and the n this stuffstarts to happen and it just totally changed my day." Jeff Fredette Silver (98th E2) "I had another average Six Days," Fredette said. "It can go from good to bad to worse sometimes. One minute it's the ultimate trail ride , then you notice something is going w rong with your bike, and then your just trying to find a way to finish. O n the morning of day five, I'm looking ove r my bike at the start thinking everything looks good . I'm just getti ng ready to leave and I notice I have a flat rear tire . I ride to the next check and change it. I went to inflate it with some C02 canisters I had and only one of the m wou ld work. So I asked around for some air at the check and nobody had any. So I took off and found a truc k repair shop where hopefully I could get some air. The two guys work ing the re weren't quite sure w hat I was asking for, so I put my hand on the tire 's valve stem and made the noose 'Shhhh-shhhhh' and they both nodded and pointed me to the back of the building. and I filled the tire w ith air. It's stuff like that . People keep asking me how many more of these I'm going to do . I've got 24 of these blue and wh ite helmets at home, and I'd like to add a few more." J.D. Hammock Silver (I 16th E2) "This is my third SixDays, and it was nice to see the who le local community behind it," Hammock said. "It was great to see a lot of people out there watching instead of protesting the event. For me it was nice to make all my checks witho ut any route points. Right now I've got a lot of aches and pains, but they'll all be gone ina couple of days; the memories willbe forever except for the part where my wallet and passport were stolen." Elmer Symons Silver (62nd E2) "I actuallyhad a great week. Once Istarted to relax in the special tests things start ed going better for me," Symons said. "It was funny Inthe beginning of the week. Iwas always searching for the best line. Then I just start ed letting it happen, and that' s whe n things started working bette r. I'm real grateful for being able to ride on the U.S. ISDE team. I'm from South Africa, and I'm currently living and working in California My brother Phillip was able to come up from South Africa, and he helped the U.S. team a lot by preriding the course and being a chase rider." LarsValin Ryan Pow ell im prove d a few positions to finish out the week in 10th . The top finishing U.S. Club te a m was the Skunkwrx.net squad, made up of Kyle Nelson, Dyla n Debel and Jo hn Barber. Debel also received the Valencia Award fo r persevering under e xt reme condi- Silver (90th E2) "Everything went we ll I guess," Valin said. "The trails and the trail pace we re tough, and afte r a while it really started to wear on you. Making some of the checks on time was a rea l ball-buster sometimes." Scott Klamfoth Silver (I I Ith E2) "I had a pretty goo d week actua lly," Klamfoth said. "I'm 44 years old, and this has been like a dream for me . My spec ial test times weren't that good but everything e lse went rock solid. I really wanted to finish on Silver. and I'm glad I did. I didn't want to have to come back and do th is again." Kyle Nelson Silver (I 13th E2) "I made a bad decision on day three when I tried to replace a broken subframe," Nelson said. ':A.l1of my test times were pretty good and Iwas just riding off Gold, but I was convinced that I need ed to replace the subframe instead of tryingto repair it. Bad move. I dropped 18 points, and there went my chances of a good finish and my chance at a Gold medal." Mark Buckholz Bronze (I 50th E2) "Iguess Ifinished but not without having a lot of problemswith my wrists ." 8uckholz said."The trailswere just so beat up that eventually Istarted getting carpel tunneland Icould hardlyhold on. ButI had a blast. Riding the SixDays has alwaysbeen a dream of mine, and I was probablythe slowest American out there ." Brian Storrie Silver (36th El) "I really wanted to race the final rnoto," Stor rie said. "This is my seventh ISDE, and I've never qualified for the fastest moto untilthis year. That was one of my goals all week: to make the fastest moto in my class. Allweek my test times we re good and I even had a cou ple of route points. So you can imagine my disappointment whe n they canceled it." tions. The Gas Gas ride r suffered through many tough b re aks throughout the event , includ ing one in his wrist. Cody Mastin also received an award for stopping and giving aid to a downed rider who, unfortunately, lat e r succumbed to his injuries . (See sidebar.) eN time and a lot of it was the same trai l over and over. And if you wanted to stay on time, you had to ride a good pace. and that made it a challenge." Ray Ge ime Silver (50th El ) "Everything went excellent for me this week - no bike problems and all my tire changes went smooth," Geime said. "I didn't drop a route point all week. My special tests times sucked, but I didn't come here to win; I carne to ride the ISDE." Eric Bailey "Everything went all right for me, " Bailey said. "I had a few crash-related prob lems: By day four my kickstarter wou ldn't always work, so I did a lot of bump-starting that day. I had a rental bike from Gas Gas, and their factory guys were great trying to help me fix the problem . We finally got it worked out to where it wo uld start abo ut SOpercent of the time. This is my third consecutive Six Days and my third co nsecutive Silver; I'm real happy with that." William Hamilton DNF "I started having electrical prob lems on day two," Hamilton said. "The bike just started to lose power. At the end of the day we tried everyt hing: We replaced coils, rectifiers, wiring harness. On day three, we we nt to start the bike and it ran for like 10 seconds, and that was it." Dylan Debel Bronze (63rd El) "This was my seco nd Six Days, but it wasn't as toug h as Czecho in 200 I," Wh ite said. ':A.nybody could have ridde n the tra ils he re and finished. The re it was a str uggle to just get through some sections, but here you had a lot mo re trail "I was the last rider out each day - not last American rider but last act ual rider," Debel said. "That kind of sucked. I really had a pretty good Six Days as far as my tests went. I might've finished on Gold. but I started having trou bles on day three when I started having clutch prob lems. I tried to change the plates, but they were so warped that I couldn't get them ou t of the clutch basket . By the end of the wor k period I still hadn't finished. so I had to push my bike over a half mile to the impou nd area . It took me like seven or eight minutes. Then, ove r the next tw o days, I had to re place a brake hose , a pipe , and I crashed hard enough to crack a bone in my wrist. In all, I had just enough penalty points to finish just off of Silve r." www.cyclenews.com CYCLE NEWS • OOOBER 6,2004 Chilly White Silver (46th El) 3S

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