Anybody else besides my son and I making the trip? We should be on the road by noon Friday. Maiking a stop or 2 on the way (9+ hours for us) take a room Fiday nite and arrive Saturday around noon. Hope the rain gets done down there by Friday nite. Make it easier to park and walk around. Look for a CR 125 #763 in Schoolboy Sunday AM (son) and a Wr 250 #671 in 50+B/C.
Yep, me and a buddy from Hall's will be heading there. Riding the Sportsmans class on Sunday AM so we can still watch the Pros in the PM. I'll be on a blue 08 CR 125 husky #144. See you there!
My pal has to win 200B in order to secure 2nd place by 1 point. So, I'm not going but I'm pulling for him and will be watching the realtime online results. He's had 2 2nd place finishes in 2 races since getting his new bike and less than a second out of first one time. good stuff. Look for my race flyer for the Battle of Atlanta race in January. I'll have 3 people distributing them so I hope you see them.
good luck to all of you. I'm about 30 mins. from there, but can't make the races again this year. Go get 'em BlueHusky! Phyllis
Wow, that was tougher than Unadilla for sure. Many more bottlenecks on the trail and line selection was key in getting good lap times. I got hung up in one bottleneck on the first lap but then put in some OK times to finish 6th in 4 laps 50+B C class. My son rode 3 laps and finished 12th in the Schoolboy. Thats a pretty fast class so he was happy with the result. Pits were a mudfest, always is I guess as they use the farm field to park in and it never really hardens up. Good ride, lots to clean up now!
I saw a few husky there, it was pretty muddy in some spots. The track looked great for traction in most places. Some pretty big hills, Did the AM races go up the ironman hill? The pros were going to the right on ironman, very steep, I don't think I would even try it!
Yep. Morning Classes all ran up the Ironman hill. Not really as bad as it looks. Both my son and I cleared it every lap. Trick was to pick 3rd gear, ignore the people giving you lines at the bottom and pin it straight up the the tree roots about 2/3's the way up, unload the suspension just before the roots, chop the throttle, float over them and then dig back in and finish the climb. Ironman hill was way easier than that slick mud/slop uphill ravine we had to wait in line for your turn to get up. The other tough section was the deep ruts that formed around checkpoint 3. Pick a bad line and your bike was swallowed up to the top of the kickstarter and you'd have to lift it out. Traction was great! Almost too much at times, some of the course was like riding on jello.
First GNCC - Morning race This was my first GNCC so I was not sure what to expect. We started the morning off very early 5am CST, where we stayed in Danville .5 miles from the IN border. We were riding the morning race which starts at 10am so we figured we had plenty of time. We knew we lost an hour crossing the border into IN but had no idea the turnout was going to be so big. We arrived at the track 7:30 EST to a huge traffic jam entering the pits. We seemed to move through the gate line fairly quickly and into our rough entrance to the muddy and very rutted field. Good thing we had a 4X4 lets put it that way! We stood in line at sign up forever. Luckily we were right by the Pro Husky pits so we got to stare at Glenn's TC 250 for a while. Three different lines in all to get signed up and a transponder rented and programed. Absolutly ridiculous! I thought D-17 signups were bad. We got back to the trailer at 9:30 to get dressed, transponder mounted, and go through tech inspection. 3 of us from Hall's ran the 12-35 Sportsman class which just happened to start on the front line. 57 bikes total in the class which made for the biggest starting line in my history for sure. Not no mention the 500 other riders that were there for the morning race. Our goal this weekend was to just ride the morning race and enjoy the afternoon watching the pro race so getting a good start was not important, RIGHT? The flag dropped and I found myself through the 2nd corner in the top 10 on a 125 right behind my other Hall's team mate who is considerably faster than I so I tried to settle into pace. For being a non points paying class these other guys are out for blood! The trails were perfect, a little slick in spots and of course rough, but I was just amazed on how well the course was layed out. UNTIL..... There were several nasty creeks, mudholes, and bottlenecks. I ended up doing the 1st lap almost twice due to some lovely spectators who waved us the wrong way. I also sat around for awhile deciding what line to take through several HUGE bottlenecks but I finally made it to the finish line in 20th for the first lap after being in the top 10 overall for most of the first lap. I went out for the second lap trying to better my position and still again the lappers and bottlenecks took their toll on me after coming through the finish check in 14th I decided to call it a day. The Bluehusky had no color left on it as it was covered in mud and was more than happy to meet my other teammates at the trailer to call it a day. Watching the pro race was what we came for so we all got dressed and loaded the cooler for an exciting afternoon! Strang, Mullins, Kanney, Kearney, Whibs, Jarrett and Caselli were all flying. Some of the lines those guys take are beyond my comprehension. What a great weekend of racing!
Actually, there is a scoring issue with ALL the morning classes at the Ironman. Go to the GNCC web site to confirm, but they (Racer Productions) have issued a release that states they are going to add 15mins of time to those racers on the first lap that bypassed the bottleneck and ended up missing several miles of trail. If the riders lap times showed he/she did it twice (avoided that section of trail) they (Racer Productions) may end up DSQ for that rider. Only fair way IMO. You can honestly miss a section once, but if you miss it twice, you are cheating.
great report,,,thanks. How far off course can you guys go to get around bottle necks? I am not talking under the ribbon cheating,,but just keeping forward motion past those guys.
If memory serves, the offical rule is "within sight of the arrows" or "25ft" I can't remember. Honestly, when I got to the section in question, it was like watching lemmings leap off a cliff (and most of them were in a pile at the bottom) so while I looked for an alternate line, I just bulldogged down the hillside to join the trail just past the tangle of crashed riders. Cost me I figure 3-4 mins to make the commitment to push off over the edge but it was certainly not quicker for me than riding the original trail, it was actually a longer distance but nobody laying down in the way. Some riders were WAY off the main trail looking for a way around, and thats when they happened on some arrows that took about 2 miles off their lap. So while its the riders responsiblity to stay on the track, the layout of that section was too close to the return section from the same ravine, which is the problem with that chunk of property. Been used so many years now, lots of interconection between old trail and new. Don't get me wrong, I think Racer Productions does its best with the trail it has. Its unfortunate but it happens, I hope the situation doesn't cost anybody a championship in their class due to trail loops being too close together.
Without e-scoring and check points it must be impossible to catch ppl that cheat by cutting the course. We had to DSQ a rider from the PS CEC this year because of a major course cut. The lap times don't lie and that made the conversation very simple. I guess to some ppl a victory is a victory even if it is hollow.
PBP, Phyllis Blume Photography is a sponsor of mine who shoots pics around the midwest. These were a surprise to me b/c I didn't even know she was there. I was hoping someone in the world had a picture of my great start. Yes it was very muddy in the morning, these must have been early in the race before the quagmire(s).
Yep, those were the start and first lap I think. Didn't shoot a whole lot. First GNCC I'd been able to get to in awhile; so I enjoyed watching for a change. (my mx race was cancelled that day). The offical photographer is Race Day Pix. www.racedaypix.com My hubby found another who has really nice shots too, but can't remember who it is right now. Will check for you.
