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Deep Wisp Hare
Scramble/ GNCC The Maryland GNCC is located at the deep Wisp Ski resort
and is an amazing setting for an off road motorcycle race.
The area is about the nicest I have seen back east and looks a bit like
Tahoe. There is a big lake nearby
and the hole area is a big resort area. We
started the race at the base of a ski slope.
There were more spectators at this race than I have ever seen at a off
road race with well over a thousand people checking out the race.
Unfortunately at the start on of them a little kid ran out in front of
the pack. Brian was headed right for
him and just saw him at the last minute and managed to just nick him on the way
behind. Randy Hawkins or the kid
wasn't so lucky and ran straight into him and hit the kid hard enough for Randy
to crash. Brian still had a top ten
start but got ran into by the pack in the second corner causing him and Mike
Kiedrowski to crash. I was on the
inside of them in the corner and managed to squeeze by.
We continued up the half pipe and then were wide open up the ski
run. We tucked into the woods
and then onto more ski runs for the first two miles.
There was some dust on the ski runs and a few guys got past me in it.
Brian caught and passed me at the top of the ski run going really fast.
We went back into the woods where it was pretty rocky.
There were rocks over the whole course, sometimes full on rock fields but
mostly just a bunch of rocks buried in the ground.
I got some serious arm pump and had a hard time getting comfortable at
the fast pace in this terrain. Brian
made pretty good progress on the first lap and came around in ninth place.
I started to feel better on the second lap and had some good races going
with another D-36 rider Rod Kreis, along with a few other guys.
On the start of the third lap Brian heard a terrible noise from the bike
and noticed that he didn't have any more teeth on his sprocket.
He came back into the pits and did a quick change but reentered the race
at the back of the pack. I started
to feel better and picked up the pace and picked off a few more rider.
About the fifth lap I went into a rocky fire road section and it threw me
to the left right for a tree. I
wasn't going really fast and slowed down just enough to jump off the back of the
bike falling even though my bike ran into the tree.
Right then Brian pulled up and asked if I was alright.
I was and was surprised he was so far back and told him to get going.
On the second to last lap I began to hear funny noises from my bike and
realized it was the teeth on my front sprocket coming off.
I went through the check and tried to go out on the last lap but didn't
make it far before it was skipping really bad and I knew I wouldn't make it
around again. I never like to DNF
but it was the last lap and I was way back in the pack and didn't have an extra
sprocket so I was done. Barry Hawk
won the race and extended his GNCC points lead in a close race with Jason Raines
who broke his leg at the race last year and was really looking to win it this
year. The two raced down to the wire
and finished just a couple of seconds apart from each other.
Rodney Smith had the lead for much of the race until he tangled with a
lapper and dropped back to third place. This
race hurt Brian in the Hare Scramble Championship hunt since Brian didn't score
any points and Fred Andrews who has the points lead finished in fifth behind
Steve Hatch. |