I think I’ve said this before but I rode in and wrote an article for a long gone dirt bike magazine for the 3rd annual Fools Gold Enduro.
Well, I rode in and I’m writing an article for the 41st version held May 3rd in the OHV riding area outside of Georgetown. One of the neat things about riding this event is you get to ride some trails you normally don’t ride. With the help and cooperation of the Forest Service they open up what’s called event only trails. There aren’t a whole lot of them but they are a welcome relief from the normal beat up trails you ride on.
The weather was just about perfect from a temperature stand point. Even though it had rained about three inches the week before the event it was dusty to very dusty in some places. But some of the trails were just about perfect something we wouldn’t have had without the rain. The club also helped out by having only two riders per row, at least that’s how it was with the “A” riders.
I enjoyed the course layout, it is what it is, well used beat up trails for the most part. You can ride this event for years and they always put you through some of the same sections, some are very gnarly and for those of us who know the area we know what’s coming.
It’s been a few years since I’ve ridden this event and I don’t remember the last time I rode through what could be called the Manzanita tunnels. Anyone who has ever hit a Manzanita bush knows the last thing you want to do is even touch one of those things, so riding through tunnels of them is a little intimidating.
It seemed to me there was a lot of friendly looking, but official looking people out there at various places on the trail not sure what that was all about. The gas check had water for all of us to enjoy and even had an EMT station that unfortunately looked busy.
For us older slower riders it seemed like we didn’t do a whole lot of time keeping in that you didn’t ride for miles just putting a long time keeping. Most of these events are set up to challenge the top “AA” riders who can zero a lot of the checks that we mere mortals can’t. But that’s the way it is, the club had free time in places that allowed you to get back on time just in time to test you again. Here we go, but in the old days it seemed to me the clubs didn’t do that as much and you just continued to carry and add to being late.
I ping ponged off a couple of trees just before the last gas check that sort of detuned me for the rest of the event and I’m pretty sore as I write this. But I enjoyed it, but also remember why I don’t ride these events much anymore, five and a half hours on a motorcycle is more than my prostrate can handle.
As I was writing this I realized I didn’t have time during the event to talk with my friend Pete whose minute I was on and the reason I rode this event. Usually, not always you’ll have enough time to talk about a particular section you just rode through, sort of a mini bench racing session while still on the trail. In some of the sections where we were late enough the free time barely allowed us enough time to clean goggles, take a leak or have a quick snack let alone talk about the last section and the big rock, log, or branch that almost got you.
The results for the enduro on Sunday were just posted today (Tuesday) which is very fast for an enduro. I was anxious to see how I did for several reasons, one I knew I was the oldest rider out there and even though I wasn’t competing in the same class as my friend Pete and John I wanted to see how well I fared against them and everyone else for that matter. I won my class, but I was the only one in it so all I basically had to do was finish but how did I do against them. Well they both beat me, well actually no I beat myself, I had left them (My time keepers) behind and like a dummy rode into probably the easiest check of the eleven checks to zero three minutes early and promptly lost twelve points for being early. Two points for the first minute and five points for every minute after that. Enduro’s are full of I could have done this if only I had done that stories and my story is the same. I could have won the sixty “A” class and finished 41st overall out of the 122 of us who started, but instead I ended up 54th overall still not bad for an old man. I’m happy with that.
Doug 21J