Prairie City Hare Scrambles

The District 36 Hare Scramble started at the Prairie City OHV Park.  The track was rolling grass hills over land that has been dredged so the are lots of drop offs and rocks around.  We had some good rain this week and it left the course a little on the muddy side is which is better at this race.  For the start of the race we had to run twenty feet to our bikes and start them.  Brian had some problems starting his bike and suffered a bad start.  I did better on the start and was in about fifth place behind Rob Zimmerman who took the holeshot, Stevie Bonita, and Craig Wesner.  About a mile into the race I was trying to get past Stevie and he went through a big puddle of water and it soaked every inch of me as well as ruined my Smith Goggles.  I was happy to follow the other riders at this point because the first lap of a race at Prairie City is dangerous with all of the drop-offs and rocks ridden in the grass and it is smart to take a lap to look around at the conditions.  Brian was back in the pack but it was hard to move up quickly partly because he wanted to scout out the course and be safe and partly because it was the first race of the season and everyone was riding at the extent of their limits, battling for every position early in the race.  On the second lap I moved by Criag Wesner and was putting some pressure on Rob Zimmerman when he fell down in front of me handing me the lead.  Craig stayed with me for a little while until we got into traffic and I moved passed the other riders a little easier and opened up a gap.  Brian was steadily moving through the field having a few interesting moments including one incident where he was moving past Brian Butler but Butler was having trouble with vision and was trying to clear it and accidentally moved over on Brian and they both almost went down on a fast fourth gear fire road.  I pulled into the pits on the end of the third lap and Troy Camerer did a good job of getting me gassed up and a fresh pair of goggles.   By this time the course had dried up a bit and was in perfect condition.  I put in some hard laps and was having fun on my new KTM 250 MXC.  Brian had worked passed everyone else and was just ahead of Wesner going into the last lap.  Near the end of the lap Brian's bike came to a stop and he realized that he was out of gas.  Wesner came along and Brian tried to wave Craig down joking that Craig should stop and give him gas.  Brian tipped his bike on the side to get some gas in the carb.  He got the bike running again and made it to the top of the next hill and saw Craing on the side of course out of gas.  We were the only ones to make the seventh lap so no one else was going to pass them but Brian and Craig were in a battle for second.  Brian managed to cross the line first but not without a little bit of pushing. I held on to take the win with Brian coming in second, and Craig Wesner in third.  Rod Kreis was fourth and fellow Boulder Creeken Cole Marshall rounded out the top five.  

Back