Cycle News

MOTOCROSSER JIM WEST P100 Feature She needed to have a plan for a future that didn't include tightening spokes, cleaning goggles and driving a Ford van across the country. "The night before Saddleback," Susan recalls, "Jim looked at me and he said, 'we have to start thinking about life after motocross.' He told me, 'you will have to find another passion in your life.' I remember that so well, because we never talked about life after racing." "That morning before the race, he took my hand and he held it. He was squeezing it…so tightly. I will never forget that." On January 4, 1976, a Jim West Memorial Race was held at Valley Cycle Park. "I'm going to win the 500 Pro class for Jim West!" said friend and fellow Maico rider Gaylon Mosier. And he did, with another Maico rider, Rich Thorwaldson, finishing second. Warren Reid won the 125 class, and in the 250 class, Danny LaPorte battled Kenny Zahrt, on an Ossa, before taking the win over Bob Elliot, another Saddleback regular. Most all of the riders donated their winnings back into a Memorial fund. The track promoter gave the gate fees to Susan. She was at the track, but simply wasn't ready to watch another motocross race and had spent the day sitting by herself in a friend's van. Mosier, Zahrt, Thorwaldson and Elliot are all gone now too, as are Ossas and Maicos. Idle for the past 25 years, Saddleback Park is an old adobe ghost, coughing up nuts, bolts and an empty, plastic bottle of pre-mix every now and then. Motocross' old-timers sneak on to the weedy property to shoot photos and then post them on the web, defiantly stating they can still make out the uphill start, Suicide Mountain and Banzai Hill. "I had a box of photographs and magazine articles," Susan says, "but I just could never bring myself to open it. It even hurt to just look at his face. As I relocated over the years, it just moved from one storage unit to another. Then, about 30 years ago, one of the units caught fire and I lost everything forever. Now, with the internet, I am seeing so many great old photos of Jim. It's won- derful that so many people remember him." The internet was also helpful in reuniting Susan with another important part of her past. Through a random eBay search, she discovered her old pit bike, the same little Honda that he had redone to look like his Husqvarna. After hearing the story, the seller was thrilled to be able to get the little bike to Susan. "I hadn't sat on it in 45 years!" she says. "It has needed a lot of work, but we even managed to find the old shocks that Jim had put on it! I'm going to a legends motocross race in Boise, which will be the first race I've attended since Jim's Memorial race. We're going to take the little Honda with us! "It's all I have from those years," she says. "After Jim died, it took me many years to start living again. I tried to block it all out. Now, I guess I was just supposed to find it…it's like it came back to me at a time when I could have it." CN Everyone knew who wore the number-28 plate.

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