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Rapp and his companions found significantly less trouble, which meant, of course, that they had to make their own. Tossing M-80 firecrackers at each other's ve- hicles was just one way to break up the long drives between races. More firecrackers would help keep fellow racers awake. "We would pull up alongside each other and roll down the window, like we wanted to say something. So, the other guy would roll down his window too, and then we would start firing Roman candle shots at him. When we were done for the night, and if we were lucky, we had enough money for a hotel. As soon as we got inside, some - body would grab the fire extin- guisher off the wall and start blasting everybody else. The Holiday Inn folks really didn't care much for us! "Most of the time, we had no money, so we slept in our cars. You would race on Sunday, then drive three days straight to get to the next race, just hoping you might have a chance to ride your bike and work on it." "We were all friends, doing this together. We would race like hell on the weekends against each other, but during the week, we were like a traveling carnival. One summer, it was me and Tim Hart, who was riding for Maico, riding with me in my van, with Bultaco paying for our gas!" Rapp's career is poorly rep - resented in the official records of the sport, which catalog only AMA-sanctioned events. But he was a two-time winner at Hangtown, in both 1972 and '73, and he was a three-time win- ner of the Mammoth Mountain Motocross. He underwent knee surgery in 1972, then broke the navicular bone in his hand. Pain- ful injuries by themselves but salted even more by really bad timing. "I had a chance to go to Europe with Jim Pomeroy in '73, which was something I really wanted to do. But I tore up my knee in the Inter-AM series in Rio Bravo in '72, and it took me almost a full year to heal up." "When the Japanese factories came in, it all changed. The Euro - peans used to race a few races against us and then go home, but then Pierre Karsmakers came and stayed and won ev- erything. It was getting serious. It was never about the money for me. I didn't like what it was becoming, so I quit." Rapp embarked on a career in mushroom farming and traveled the world for 40 years, teaching the tricky science involved with the process. You will find him on his Montana ranch, along with his wife and one other resident, a 1974 Bultaco Pursang, who gets to live inside when the temps in Montana's Bitterroot Valley dip below zero. Above it is a framed letter from Senor F.X. Bulto himself, the founder of the company. "I had a chance to ride for the Japanese factories, and I even tested a Suzuki. The Japanese built some great bikes. But I loved my Bultacos, and I loved the company. They were very loyal to me. There are just some things that are more important than money." CN Subscribe to more than 60 years of Cycle News Archives issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives CNII ARCHIVES P120 Tom Rapp was a regular at Indian Dunes.