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Elsinore 2000 After hearing about Elsinore for years I was finally able to go this year. Brain wasn't able to go becausehe hurt his shoulder a bit the in the final moto in Six Days. I drove down late Friday night and my first race of the weekend was the Unclassified Race at 7 in the morning. The race track is a five miles loop in and around the town of Lake Elsinore. It starts on Main Street and chicanes a couple times then is flat out across a dirt straight, then drops down onto another road. The course hits a fireroad for a mile, hits a jump, back onto pavement then another fireroads for two miles back into town. The Main Street of down was barricaded off and had a bunch of exhibition tents. It was more like a fair than the average motorcycle race. KTM showed up in grand fashion, sporting the Semi for the first time at an off-road event. Shane Watts was sticking around for one more race before heading back to Australia for the season break. Scott Myers and Brent harden were also there for KTM. The Suzuki team was there as well as Destry Abott and all of the Kawi riders. A bunch of the BC Boyz also made the trek for the races. It was misting a bit for the first race and it was slippery and foggy. I had to pull my roll-offs a bunch, but scouted out the course for the other races, and ended up top five in the process. The next race for me was the 125's. I had been riding a big four stroke lately and when I started the 125 race it was weird at first. I got a bad start and took a while to get going but it was super fun riding a 125 again. For the 250 race I was on my 200. Even though I was lacking some cc I still wasn't getting outpulled even pulling 15/46 gearing. I was running in sixth when the thing lost power on the road section going over the freeway. I had a good push back to the truck and was done for the day. On Sunday KTM was letting me ride the 520 four stroke in the Hamel 100. After a bit of confusion the pros were allowed to line up first and everyone else drew numbers for the rest of the spots. There were 112 entries for the Hamel 100. My start got me into about tenth place and we set out for 22 laps around the course. When we hit the pavement for the first time I let the big motor do its thing and had it buried. I was catching up to the rider in front of me and I upshifted to make sure I was in top gear and I was almost surprised when it shifted up to sixth. I was going way faster than I wanted to be going. I don't really like riding my dirt bike on pavement. The race was pretty fun but it was a little fast and scary at times. Mike Kiedrowski. won for the first time since switching to off-road racing. His teammate Steve Hatch was second and KTM's Scott Myers rounded out the podium in third place. I took the last money spot finishing in tenth place. |