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/1526445
when the U.S. Government made it clear that no one, not even Evel Knievel, was going to jump the Grand Canyon, he switched his focus to the Snake River Canyon, eyeing a parcel that was located on private property. Unless he swapped out the pushrod V-twin for a jet engine, Evel's Harley-David - son XR-750 was certainly not capable of generating enough speed to clear a 4000-foot chasm, so he enlisted the help of Robert Truax, a U.S. Navy engineer, to design his canyon jumper. Dubbed the "Skycycle," it bore no resem - blance to any motorcycle ever produced and was even regis- tered with the State of Idaho as an "airplane." Truax and his team built three Skycycles, the first two used for test flights. Even though the tests revealed that the design was flawed, Knievel was running out of funds and pushed forward with the September 8 launch. Knievel himself had been a motocross racer, so in the days preceding the big event, he sponsored his own race, offer- ing a record purse to the world's top riders. Pierre Karsmakers, Marty Tripes and Marty Smith took the wins in the three class- es, with each rider netting a cool $8000 for their wins. Karsmak- ers and Tripes swept their 500cc and 250cc motos, while Smith went 2-1 for the win in the 125cc class. The first-moto winner of the 125s was Bultaco's Jim Pomeroy, credited with teach - ing a younger Knievel (known at that time as just Robert) how to wheelie a motorcycle! Jump day was a hot one, as temperatures soared into the 90s for the crowd, whose numbers seemed to be in dispute. Cycle News reported a whopping "50,000-70,000," while Sports Illustrated estimated the number to be closer to about 15,000. The event was broad - cast on closed-circuit television, with viewers gathering in places like Madison Square Garden to see Evel do his thing. Via crane, he was hoisted up to the Skycycle at 3:20 p.m., about 15 minutes behind sched - ule. A high school band played, a priest prayed and at 3:36 p.m., the steam splayed as Evel Knievel and the X-2 Skycycle launched, heading up the 108-foot take-off ramp for its trip over the Snake River Canyon. Almost immediately, onlookers noticed that something was wrong. The Skycycle's drogue parachute was out before Knievel was even clear of his own ramp. The premature deployment slowed the contraption dras - tically, eventually causing it to crash into the rim of the canyon. Men in rowboats fe - verishly paddled their way to the crumpled X-2 and pulled Knievel from the wreckage. Bloodied but unbowed, Evel walked away from Snake River, anything but a failure, having pocketed a cool $6 million from the event. There was more big news on that day back in 1974. On the other side of the country, President Gerald Ford had just announced a "full, free and ab - solute pardon" of former presi- dent Richard Nixon, an event which also irked CN's guest writer Schneiders. It was a bad weekend for the journalist, coast to coast. Nixon might have been off the hook, but there would be no pardon for Evel Knievel from Cycle News. Schneiders' dream of the daredevil being tossed into the Snake River by a torch- bearing mob of disappointed fans might not have come true. "But what happened," he added, "was almost as good." CN CNIIARCHIVES P144 Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives Pierre Karsmakers, Marty Smith and Marty Tripes were just some of the stars who competed in Knievel's one-off MX race.