| 2001 Race Reports |
 |  |  |
Knob Noster, Missouri
3rd of 19 in Open B
Knob Noster...the name alone made me want to see what this place was all about.
The bottom half of the MHSC schedule adds some mileage to my rapidly aging
Sonoma, with several races held on the left side of the state during this hot, sticky
stretch of the series. Earlier in the week I had put the original torpedo-sized silencer
back on, noticing that the sub-frame mounting holes didn't line up very well. A few
healthy blows to the sub-frame with a sledgehammer helped line up the holes, but
one of the frame welds cracked a bit. Oops. KaTooMer maintenance at its best.
The staging area was an open field with fresh hay windrowed into straight lines
across a quarter-mile square. Knob Noster had received some rain over the
weekend, causing a quagmire near the field entrance. As with Lebanon in February,
a John Deere tractor was on hand to pull out the less fortunate racers with no
four-wheel-drive. At the end of the day, the hay looked about as fresh as a rendering
plant in August (a little agribusiness humor for the 3 people in the world who will
actually understand that). With one push of the 4WD button, the truck squished
through a rutted waterway and I found a prime spot in front of the Pizza Man
entourage. The Pizza Mini-Thumper, an XR250 from the mid-1990's, was resurrected
for Knob Noster as a replacement for a Shake's Team racer with a broken bike (okay,
it's not really a team, just a bunch of guys who always pit together, but it sounds cool).
The usual 150% humidity, typical for Missouri in July, kept the sweat flowing like
melted butter as I took a quick look at the course around the staging area. I came
back to the truck with two important questions: a) Where's the rocks, and b) Will the
water level in the creek suck down my bike like <insert crude Monica Lewinsky
metaphor here>. At least I had the new Michelin S-12 rear tire...still hanging on the
wall in my garage. Doh!! Guess the half-used Bridgestone would have to work.
I took a practice lap and found the first potential bottleneck about a mile into the
course. Fast-girl (and MHSC hottie) Amanda Lappe had already discovered a tough
way up the steep bank of a small stream. I parked the KTM and went back to help
clear out some alternate routes, and Pizza Man came up from behind and pointed to
the best line. That guy is just so darned helpful. If I asked him nicely to let me pass
during a race, he'd probably think about it for a couple seconds before roosting me
with the Pizza Thumper. Anyway, the first big creek crossing was deep but passable,
and when the course took us back across the same creek a few miles down the trail, I
followed a group of riders who did not notice the arrows directly across the creek on
the opposite bank. The lead rider on a Kawasaki charged upstream into flowing
water that was nearly as high as his seat. He bobbled in the rocky creek bottom and
dumped his bike, completely submerging it. Like a fool I followed the group into the
deep, black rush of water, except I successfully walked the bike through and stopped
on a sand bar, looked around, and saw not a single arrow or evidence of other bikes
that had taken the same path. Gee, Einstein, think you're still on the course? After a
quick scan downstream, I saw some colored ribbon on the opposite bank where we
should have crossed. So I walked the bike back through the deep stuff, gave my
condolences to the Kawasaki rider, and finished the practice lap.
Back at the truck, I dumped a quart of water from each boot, put them back on with a
duct tape seal around the tops, and headed for the starting line. When the 15-second
board dropped, I took two kicks to start the bike and found myself at the back of a
19-rider pack. Some aggressive passing got me to mid-pack within half a lap, and
soon I found myself in a familiar spot behind Pizza Man. When he went down in some
ruts, I got around and continued my charge. Since no ATV's were racing this course,
some of the trails were very narrow and passing was a challenge. But after one lap I
had moved up to 4th place and held that spot throughout most of the race. Another
guy in my class, Marty Smith, kept trading places with me, and at each pass through
the main check he was ahead of me but still within striking distance.
The course reminded me of Illinois, with tight trails sometimes carved out with a
farm-type mower or cut with a machete. The club did a great job of re-routing the
bottlenecks, and it was only on the third lap that I ever had a problem getting through
any of the tough sections. One time I tried to aggressively cut around a rider hung up
on a small, slippery hill. I didn't make it either, but got up easily on the second try. On
a similar hill a bit further down the trail, I got hung up with a downed rider who decided
to pick up his bike at the same instant I was attempting to pass.
On the 4th and final lap, I passed Marty again and rode strong until he got around me
at the final stretch. During these passes and re-passes, I wasn't completely sure he
was in my class, but when he got around me in that last mile of the course, I didn't
care. I was going to beat him to the scoring trailer. Most of the final mile was riding
through the center of a small creek that offered few opportunities for passing. We
would ride in the creek for a short stretch, come out, then go back in again, over and
over. I tailed Marty to a spot where we dropped back down into the creek, and he rode
past the first entrance to another drop-down that had developed as an alternate route.
I decided that the only chance I had at passing him was to take the first drop-down
and charge through the water, hopefully carrying enough momentum to beat him to
where he was dropping into the creek. I put the bike in second gear and went
wide-open into water about 2 feet deep. Water splashed into my face as if I was
standing under a waterfall, but I just barely edged out Marty and held my position to
the finish.
The two regular fast guys in our class took first and second place, but I held on to 3rd
place by 4 seconds over Marty (the 5th place guy was less than a minute behind) and
solidified my 3rd place spot in series points. Again, I dumped a quart of water from
each boot. I felt an intense sadness upon realizing that duct tape had failed me. But
then I admired my hard-fought trophy and the pain was slightly less intense. But I will
never look at duct tape the same, ever.
August 12, 2001
Polo, Missouri
12th of 15 in Open B
Pain is my friend.
Or so I tell myself each time I make an annual visit to my friendly physician, usually on
a Monday following a bad race. The good doctor is always kind enough to skip the
I-told-you-so posture and focus on curing my ailments. This time it was the right
shoulder in pain and I was certain my collarbone was broken or my shoulder
separated (or both). But Dr. Joe produced two X-rays showing no breakage, just a
healthy bruise. KaTooMer dodges another one -- here's how it all started....
Matt and I made the long drive to one of the few MHSC races north of I-70, which
usually means less rocks and tighter trails. We parked by Lars Valin and his gang,
right next to twin porta-pee-holes and under a nice shade tree. Shade good, smell of
hot feces bad. We wasted no time getting setup for the practice lap and quickly
discovered very tight trails (for Missouri), a moderate amount of rocks, plenty of logs
across the trail, some dust, and a few interesting rock ledge drop-offs. One section
had optional routes of "Easy" and "Hard." Feeling up to a challenge, I chose the
deceivingly "Hard" trail and soon found out why: a two-foot rock ledge as the trail
curved its way downhill. I bravely launched myself off the ledge, and just as I had
nearly recovered from the landing, a foot-high log appeared out of nowhere. A panic
wheelie got me over the log and ahead of Matt, who took the "Easy" route. So I gained
about half a second in exchange for risking life and limb and personal encounters
with trees. The rest of the course was a series of woods sections linked by open
pasture areas. Pretty good course, but the start would be critical because passing
appeared nearly impossible in the woods.
I lined up next to PizzaMan and explained to him the many benefits of applying duct
tape to 53% (and rising) of the surface area of my motorcycle. I could sense his
incomprehension, but one day he will understand, probably late one night at Shake's,
after one of his sorority-girl employees forgets to put the lid on the tomato sauce, and
in the dark, as he is leaving for home after a long day of cheese application and
pepperoni layout design theory (elaborate concentric circles or simplistic intersecting
lines? Oh, the possibilities...), while reaching past the olives, onions, and camshaft
bearings to the broken muffler from his XR250 where he hides the car keys from the
Mizzou frat boys who initiate pledges by tying them the his tomato-shaped delivery
truck and joyriding through campus, he knocks the open jar of sauce to the floor, slips
on the sweet, red pizza-nectar, slams his head against a leftover cylinder from the
1955 Cushman scooter he took apart "just for kicks" back in the days when engine
tear-downs and pizza preparation often occurred side-by-side in pizza joints across
America, and as he sees his world spinning wildly, appearing above will be the
image of a three-headed John Stichnoth offering duct tape of all shapes, sizes, and
colors, proclaiming "It's all about the duct tape, man." Yes, then it will become crystal
clear.
But I digress.
On the start, I lofted the front end high in the air, slipped into the woods about
mid-pack, and proceeded to ride as horribly as I am capable. Every third tree on that
course has an imprint of the KaTooMer barkbusters. Each time I tried a creative line
to pass in the woods, a couple of guys would get around me. I managed to drop the
bike in a section of willow trees that had been cleared approximately handlebar-wide,
holding up another rider while I dragged my bike out of his way. By this time Matt and
PizzaMan were long gone and I tried to regroup. About two-thirds into the lap, I came
upon a guy on a Yamaha with a severely flat rear tire that was halfway off the rim. In
an open section of pasture I began to pass him on the left, but then he moved to the
left, thinking I was passing on the right. Charging ahead in third gear, I moved farther
to the left and off the beaten path. I immediately found myself in the shallow part of a
gully that became deeper and nastier by the inch. At the exact instant I thought, "Doh!!
This not good!!" the bike went into a series of contortions and promptly sent me flying
forward through the air. As they say, it's not the fall, but the landing that hurts. And the
landing was about 20 feet ahead of the bike on rough turf. I whacked my head very
hard and saw the world spinning around me while trying my best to remain
conscious. After regaining my senses, I felt sharp pains in my left shoulder and knee
and was convinced I had broken my collarbone or done some other damage to my
shoulder. Somehow I got the bike upright, painfully restarted the engine and decided
to complete the lap and at least get scored for the race.
One ice pack and a quart of Gatorade later, Matt finished his race and we headed for
home. Matt had a decent race, finishing 5th in Open B. The shoulder will be sore for
awhile, and the next MHSC round at Sedalia will have to wait until next year.
3rd of 19 in Open B
Knob Noster...the name alone made me want to see what this place was all about.
The bottom half of the MHSC schedule adds some mileage to my rapidly aging
Sonoma, with several races held on the left side of the state during this hot, sticky
stretch of the series. Earlier in the week I had put the original torpedo-sized silencer
back on, noticing that the sub-frame mounting holes didn't line up very well. A few
healthy blows to the sub-frame with a sledgehammer helped line up the holes, but
one of the frame welds cracked a bit. Oops. KaTooMer maintenance at its best.
The staging area was an open field with fresh hay windrowed into straight lines
across a quarter-mile square. Knob Noster had received some rain over the
weekend, causing a quagmire near the field entrance. As with Lebanon in February,
a John Deere tractor was on hand to pull out the less fortunate racers with no
four-wheel-drive. At the end of the day, the hay looked about as fresh as a rendering
plant in August (a little agribusiness humor for the 3 people in the world who will
actually understand that). With one push of the 4WD button, the truck squished
through a rutted waterway and I found a prime spot in front of the Pizza Man
entourage. The Pizza Mini-Thumper, an XR250 from the mid-1990's, was resurrected
for Knob Noster as a replacement for a Shake's Team racer with a broken bike (okay,
it's not really a team, just a bunch of guys who always pit together, but it sounds cool).
The usual 150% humidity, typical for Missouri in July, kept the sweat flowing like
melted butter as I took a quick look at the course around the staging area. I came
back to the truck with two important questions: a) Where's the rocks, and b) Will the
water level in the creek suck down my bike like <insert crude Monica Lewinsky
metaphor here>. At least I had the new Michelin S-12 rear tire...still hanging on the
wall in my garage. Doh!! Guess the half-used Bridgestone would have to work.
I took a practice lap and found the first potential bottleneck about a mile into the
course. Fast-girl (and MHSC hottie) Amanda Lappe had already discovered a tough
way up the steep bank of a small stream. I parked the KTM and went back to help
clear out some alternate routes, and Pizza Man came up from behind and pointed to
the best line. That guy is just so darned helpful. If I asked him nicely to let me pass
during a race, he'd probably think about it for a couple seconds before roosting me
with the Pizza Thumper. Anyway, the first big creek crossing was deep but passable,
and when the course took us back across the same creek a few miles down the trail, I
followed a group of riders who did not notice the arrows directly across the creek on
the opposite bank. The lead rider on a Kawasaki charged upstream into flowing
water that was nearly as high as his seat. He bobbled in the rocky creek bottom and
dumped his bike, completely submerging it. Like a fool I followed the group into the
deep, black rush of water, except I successfully walked the bike through and stopped
on a sand bar, looked around, and saw not a single arrow or evidence of other bikes
that had taken the same path. Gee, Einstein, think you're still on the course? After a
quick scan downstream, I saw some colored ribbon on the opposite bank where we
should have crossed. So I walked the bike back through the deep stuff, gave my
condolences to the Kawasaki rider, and finished the practice lap.
Back at the truck, I dumped a quart of water from each boot, put them back on with a
duct tape seal around the tops, and headed for the starting line. When the 15-second
board dropped, I took two kicks to start the bike and found myself at the back of a
19-rider pack. Some aggressive passing got me to mid-pack within half a lap, and
soon I found myself in a familiar spot behind Pizza Man. When he went down in some
ruts, I got around and continued my charge. Since no ATV's were racing this course,
some of the trails were very narrow and passing was a challenge. But after one lap I
had moved up to 4th place and held that spot throughout most of the race. Another
guy in my class, Marty Smith, kept trading places with me, and at each pass through
the main check he was ahead of me but still within striking distance.
The course reminded me of Illinois, with tight trails sometimes carved out with a
farm-type mower or cut with a machete. The club did a great job of re-routing the
bottlenecks, and it was only on the third lap that I ever had a problem getting through
any of the tough sections. One time I tried to aggressively cut around a rider hung up
on a small, slippery hill. I didn't make it either, but got up easily on the second try. On
a similar hill a bit further down the trail, I got hung up with a downed rider who decided
to pick up his bike at the same instant I was attempting to pass.
On the 4th and final lap, I passed Marty again and rode strong until he got around me
at the final stretch. During these passes and re-passes, I wasn't completely sure he
was in my class, but when he got around me in that last mile of the course, I didn't
care. I was going to beat him to the scoring trailer. Most of the final mile was riding
through the center of a small creek that offered few opportunities for passing. We
would ride in the creek for a short stretch, come out, then go back in again, over and
over. I tailed Marty to a spot where we dropped back down into the creek, and he rode
past the first entrance to another drop-down that had developed as an alternate route.
I decided that the only chance I had at passing him was to take the first drop-down
and charge through the water, hopefully carrying enough momentum to beat him to
where he was dropping into the creek. I put the bike in second gear and went
wide-open into water about 2 feet deep. Water splashed into my face as if I was
standing under a waterfall, but I just barely edged out Marty and held my position to
the finish.
The two regular fast guys in our class took first and second place, but I held on to 3rd
place by 4 seconds over Marty (the 5th place guy was less than a minute behind) and
solidified my 3rd place spot in series points. Again, I dumped a quart of water from
each boot. I felt an intense sadness upon realizing that duct tape had failed me. But
then I admired my hard-fought trophy and the pain was slightly less intense. But I will
never look at duct tape the same, ever.
August 12, 2001
Polo, Missouri
12th of 15 in Open B
Pain is my friend.
Or so I tell myself each time I make an annual visit to my friendly physician, usually on
a Monday following a bad race. The good doctor is always kind enough to skip the
I-told-you-so posture and focus on curing my ailments. This time it was the right
shoulder in pain and I was certain my collarbone was broken or my shoulder
separated (or both). But Dr. Joe produced two X-rays showing no breakage, just a
healthy bruise. KaTooMer dodges another one -- here's how it all started....
Matt and I made the long drive to one of the few MHSC races north of I-70, which
usually means less rocks and tighter trails. We parked by Lars Valin and his gang,
right next to twin porta-pee-holes and under a nice shade tree. Shade good, smell of
hot feces bad. We wasted no time getting setup for the practice lap and quickly
discovered very tight trails (for Missouri), a moderate amount of rocks, plenty of logs
across the trail, some dust, and a few interesting rock ledge drop-offs. One section
had optional routes of "Easy" and "Hard." Feeling up to a challenge, I chose the
deceivingly "Hard" trail and soon found out why: a two-foot rock ledge as the trail
curved its way downhill. I bravely launched myself off the ledge, and just as I had
nearly recovered from the landing, a foot-high log appeared out of nowhere. A panic
wheelie got me over the log and ahead of Matt, who took the "Easy" route. So I gained
about half a second in exchange for risking life and limb and personal encounters
with trees. The rest of the course was a series of woods sections linked by open
pasture areas. Pretty good course, but the start would be critical because passing
appeared nearly impossible in the woods.
I lined up next to PizzaMan and explained to him the many benefits of applying duct
tape to 53% (and rising) of the surface area of my motorcycle. I could sense his
incomprehension, but one day he will understand, probably late one night at Shake's,
after one of his sorority-girl employees forgets to put the lid on the tomato sauce, and
in the dark, as he is leaving for home after a long day of cheese application and
pepperoni layout design theory (elaborate concentric circles or simplistic intersecting
lines? Oh, the possibilities...), while reaching past the olives, onions, and camshaft
bearings to the broken muffler from his XR250 where he hides the car keys from the
Mizzou frat boys who initiate pledges by tying them the his tomato-shaped delivery
truck and joyriding through campus, he knocks the open jar of sauce to the floor, slips
on the sweet, red pizza-nectar, slams his head against a leftover cylinder from the
1955 Cushman scooter he took apart "just for kicks" back in the days when engine
tear-downs and pizza preparation often occurred side-by-side in pizza joints across
America, and as he sees his world spinning wildly, appearing above will be the
image of a three-headed John Stichnoth offering duct tape of all shapes, sizes, and
colors, proclaiming "It's all about the duct tape, man." Yes, then it will become crystal
clear.
But I digress.
On the start, I lofted the front end high in the air, slipped into the woods about
mid-pack, and proceeded to ride as horribly as I am capable. Every third tree on that
course has an imprint of the KaTooMer barkbusters. Each time I tried a creative line
to pass in the woods, a couple of guys would get around me. I managed to drop the
bike in a section of willow trees that had been cleared approximately handlebar-wide,
holding up another rider while I dragged my bike out of his way. By this time Matt and
PizzaMan were long gone and I tried to regroup. About two-thirds into the lap, I came
upon a guy on a Yamaha with a severely flat rear tire that was halfway off the rim. In
an open section of pasture I began to pass him on the left, but then he moved to the
left, thinking I was passing on the right. Charging ahead in third gear, I moved farther
to the left and off the beaten path. I immediately found myself in the shallow part of a
gully that became deeper and nastier by the inch. At the exact instant I thought, "Doh!!
This not good!!" the bike went into a series of contortions and promptly sent me flying
forward through the air. As they say, it's not the fall, but the landing that hurts. And the
landing was about 20 feet ahead of the bike on rough turf. I whacked my head very
hard and saw the world spinning around me while trying my best to remain
conscious. After regaining my senses, I felt sharp pains in my left shoulder and knee
and was convinced I had broken my collarbone or done some other damage to my
shoulder. Somehow I got the bike upright, painfully restarted the engine and decided
to complete the lap and at least get scored for the race.
One ice pack and a quart of Gatorade later, Matt finished his race and we headed for
home. Matt had a decent race, finishing 5th in Open B. The shoulder will be sore for
awhile, and the next MHSC round at Sedalia will have to wait until next year.
Knob Noster, Missouri
Polo, Missouri
Polo, Missouri