Dyracuse photos – August practice day

click on the photo to see many more photos from this practice day!

Dyracuse World Championships

The Dyracuse World Championship of Wisconsin offroad racing!  That is what Scott and I have been billing it as.

Dyracuse is where both the WIXC series and the D16 AMA series was going to come together and race the last race of the season together.  It was held at Dyracuse riding area, on trails that Scott and I knew pretty well.  And, it was not without it’s share of Drama – mostly in the AA class, so I will let you read about that on Scott’s blog.

Dry, Dry, Dry! That was the order of the day.  We knew it was going to be dusty and we knew it was going to be dry and hard to see.  Sure enough, it was.  Huge clouds of dust.  During the week before, it rained cats and dogs in Madison.  Madison is just an hour and a half drive south of Dyracuse.  We were pretty excited during the week, that there could be perfect dirt at Dyracuse.  But, a check of the actual weather in the days before showed less than .5inch of rain during the week before.  Ugh.

The course is long at Dyracuse, so Scott and I decided to leave at 5am so that we would have time to ride the whole course on our mountain bikes before the race.  Scott had brought with him a Gary Fisher 29’er, but all I had at home was a Trek Jack dirt jumping bike.  Scotts bike worked perfectly in the sand, but mine with indoor tires set up left a lot to be desired.  So, Scott made it all the way around and I made it just a little bit.  Oh well.

turned out there was quite a bit of unused trail that they found for the race.

Ahhhhh!

There was also quite a bit of virgin trail, and that will play in Scott's story!

Yep! We are dorks.

Turned out to be a huge crowd on the line.  I think for sure the biggest crowd of the year here in Wisconsin.  I guess that is what it is like when we bring both race series together and kind of proves my point that we have enough racers here in the state for 1 series, but not for 2.

There were 18 guys on the line for the +40 race.  Wow.  This was going to be fun.  The gun went off and I did not get a good start.  I knew that I needed to be near the front at the beginning of the race or the dust was going to be impossible.  I pushed really hard to get by people on the track before we headed into the woods.  On the 4th turn, I chose to go under a rider and when I did I must have been too close as he fell over on top of me.  Literally on top of me.  His bike was on mine, and he was on me.  But, my bike was laying there under his – still running.  Damn that Rekluse clutch is amazing.  I got my bike untangled and got going, and when I came off the track, Brian told me that I was 2nd to last.  So, I had my work cut out for me.

I caught up to Rob really quickly, who was on a new 450.  Yow.  That is too much bike for me, but he claims to love it.  But, I knifed through him pretty fast and kept going.  In the woods, just because you are on a 450, that doesn’t mean that a 250F cannot leave you behind.  When we came through after the first lap, I was in 3rd.  I assumed that Jim and John were ahead of me.  I was right on Jim, but it turned out I was wrong on John.  I caught Jim and another guy and worked my way through them on the 2nd lap.

At the end of the 2nd lap, I was in 1st.  Not bad for the start that I had and getting off the Motocross track.  I do really well in the opening laps, especially when I have a deficit to make up.  I rode the next 4 laps in 1st place, and probably got a little bit complacent.  I think I settled into a mellow trail pace, thinking that I had it in the bag.

Unfortunately, Jim and John had a different idea.  They caught me on lap 6 and had a good freight train going.  They went right through me.  Ugh.  How could I let my early part of the race pace, fall off.  I got mad again, and that is when I ride much better.  I decided this wasn’t going to happen and put my head down again.  On the MX track, I came over a rise only to discover Jim on the ground.  I could not see him until to late, and unfortunately I ran right into his back wheel when he was picking his bike up – knocking his bike back down.  I felt really bad for that and apologized like crazy.  But, I did not want to wait for him as I really wanted to see if I could catch John.

On the 7th lap, I completely fell apart – again!  I have problems.  I threw away another race.  Another time that I should have won, but did not.

So, the District 16 series is over.  John won the overall.  He deserved it  He was the most consistent of us all.  I took a credible 2nd overall, but I have some consistency issues that I need to work on for next year.  Fitness and being able to hold that pace for the 2nd hour as well.

That is it for today.  More observations to come.

out!

Joe

Definitely Soiled

Could not resist. This is a good photo

That's where they go!

Dyracuse riding and Dresser racing!

I have a lot to talk about.  You could say that I probably always do.  In fact, most people would really like me to shut up.  But I always have a lot to say.  Even on average weeks I have a lot to say.  But, I really have a lot to say today.

Haven’t written much lately, so here goes.

Last weekend I rode for 2.5 hours at Black River Falls with John B.  This week on Wed, I rode with Scott, his brother Pat, Tom Baker and Roger Bird.  We had a whole posse at Dyracuse.

loading a bunch of bikes in the back of the van and going to Dyracuse is always a good thing.

We rode for hours and hours and burned up a bunch of gas.  We traded bikes back and forth and everyone had the opportunity to ride others bikes.  Of course I like mine the best, but Scott’s primary race bike is pretty interesting.  He is faster than I, so he is looking for more power where I am looking for manageable power.  His bike was almost violent feeling.  Mine is friendly.  We both used those terms when we were done riding each others bikes.

I LOVE my bike.  The RMZ250 and I are perfectly suited.  I can ride it agressive all the time.  Last year when the XC2 guys would pass me, I always marveled at how they were always on the gas.  When I was on the 250 2stroke, I was always trying to stay away from the hit.  If there was a small clearing in the trail, you were afraid to give it a bunch of gas, because it was going to go all death-murder-kill on you.  I mean the power was violent on that thing.  So, to avoid that hit of power, I would try to carry lots of momentum all the time.  Good strategy, but not really fast.  Now, I am on the gas also.  And it shows.  I have gone from struggling with my riding to always riding at the pointy end of the group.

Damn, it feels good.

Today was the Dresser D16 race.  It was interesting.

Started out the drive at 5am, it was dark and foggy.  Ugh.  Tough driving.  Candi pulled me through though.

She has me going, but look closely and you can see that I have quite a ways to go.

I had the radio going and was putting down the miles, and the sun eventually came up and gave up a killer sunrise.

On the road again!

I made it to the race, and it was getting hot and there was no moisture anywhere in sight.  I mean I am talking dust like you have never seen before.  There was 100+ riders on the line and 8 rows.  An 11 mile course, with an Enduro cross section.  Telephone poles at angles, piled up rock section, and a second piled up Telephone pole section on a big downhill.  It was super fun.

The gun went off and I was 5th going into the woods.  20 people on the line, and it was a dust cave.  The woods had this really powdery grey dirt that just made huge clouds.  The whole 11 miles ended up just one big dry rut of powdery dirt.  When the guy in front of you got on the gas on an uphill, you would get a solid face full of dirt.  Blasted.  I am scared to look at my airfilter.

I ran a filter skin, and pulled it at an hour.  The bike did run better for 15 minutes or so – but eventually must have choked and it ran really rich.  bogging.

I worked my way to the front a little bit into the first lap.  I was riding really really really well.  That RMZ just kicks ass.  Suits me like… I don’t know what.

In the end, I had a really great 2’05” race.  I rode nearly perfect for that time.  Unfortunately, the race was 2’20” long.  Dammit.  I was so close.  With about 15 minutes to go, I fell over.  Nothing bad, just a tip over.  Unfortunately when you do something like that, it just creates a cloud of dust that is choking.  Took me too long to get going, and John along with a lapper went by me.  I rode like mad, trying to get around the lapper to get up to John – but in the end I just put myself over the edge and then crashed again.  Got going after that, and then a guy that I had just passed screamed at me.  I let him go by, and he proceeded to get stuck on the next hill, forcing me to go back down to the bottom and find another way up.  It took me forever to get over that hill.

Funny how you can go from on top of your form to so retarded in so little time.  I still was 2nd, but I should have won.

After the race, I had a text exchange with my daughter Hanna.

Me – Dammit.  I led for most of the race, but with 15 minutes to go i fell and mangled my radiator – breaking my shroud (again).

Hanna – I’m sorry

Me.  Don’t be I still had fun and was 2nd.

Hanna. What time will you be home.

Me.  Candi says 9, but she lies.  I usually can beat her time.  Stupid stripper voice GPS unit.

Hanna. Ha sounds good.

Me.  Eating Quiznos, listening to foghat.

Hanna.  Chillin, listening to Celion Dion.

Me. Yuck

Hanna. I’ve lost my tea

Me.  Odd that Penguin being there.

Me.  No point in steering now.

Hanna.  Your brothers drunk?

Hanna.  My super powers are supercharged.

Me.  I totally have a space pen.

Hanna.  Well that is bizarre.

Me.  Left handed driving is he.

Hanna.  Well it’s the wrong side of the body.

Me.  Are there any animals that breathe mud?

Hanna. Frogs should

Me.  Radioactive mud.

Hanna.  Anything’ll do

Me.  What is better, Maroon 5, dehydrated breakfast cereal hour or Cleveland?

Hanna.  Cleveland, Rays.

Me.  Only 1 dog pooping today.

Hanna.  me too.

Me.  Hard to see when you are racing.

Hanna. Strange same here.

Hanna.  Mall too

Me.  I have never raced at the mall.

Hanna.  Weird.

Me.  She is your friend.

Me.  The weather, construction and traffic conspired to slow me down.  Home at 9:25.  I already apologized to Candi.

Hanna.  Haha.  I say you ower her an apology for sure.

There you have it.  Not sure what we meant by all of that.  I do know that I cannot wait to race again next weekend.  Pretty roached right now.

I am getting up early to work on the motorcycle.  Clean it and take the broken shrouds off to look at the radiators.  I need to try to get AJ at Victory Circle Graphix to send some shroud graphics to get me going before next weekend.

Scott texted me on the way home to say that he smelled a podium for me at Crawfordsville.  Not sure about that.  I am faster, but that is a long way faster.  If I was to do that, I would probably want to go back and do them all again next year.

yow.

Oh, even though the heat and dust were bad.  Moose Sahara gear is incredible.

That is is for me.

Joe

New Moose Gear!

Oh ya!

Visiting Offenbach

Liz and I are in Europe now.  We are visiting our former foreign exchange students and going to the big bike show in Germany.  We spent last weekend in Offenbach Germany.  Lisa lives there.  While we were there, we met her family and friends.  We saw her village.  And spent time looking around the area.

While we were there, the village was celebrating it’s 1225 year birthday.  Holy crap!  There is nothing that old in the USA.  We went to a big music festiaval for the first night, we drank too much beer, we saw a parade the 2nd day.  The parade was different from a parade in small town in the USA, and the same at the same time.  There were a few interesting things that you would not see there.

We toured the wine making area south of there and we hiked around a few castles etc…  all in all, good fun.  Heading over to the bike show in Friedrichshafen now.  Here are a few photos for you to enjoy.  Chcck back later.

Joe