| Event Review - Snowball Hare Scrambles 2001 |
|---|
Snowball Hare Scrambles
- March 10, 2002
- Maryland Competition Riders
Beautiful crisp weather with none of the forecasted rain gave Jerry
Robinson and his MCR crew a chance to host the first Hare Scramble event
of the ECEA Hare Scramble series, and third of the A.M.A. District 7
Hare Scramble series, at "The Cove" campground in Gore, Virginia, which
is owned and operated by the McDowell family. Visit "The Cove" on the
web at http://www.vvalley.com/cove
Camping was cheap and plentiful for many riders right next to the
signup. "The Cove" has a snowtubing operation in the winter, and the
starting line for the main event was in the snowtubing parking lot, 1/4
mile from the camping area. Pits and the scoring barrels however, were
1/2 mile the opposite direction from the camping area, making for alot
of traffic down a tiny camp road.
Even though it was scheduled on the same day as the Macon Georgia GNCC
event, the Snowball attracted
over 200 riders, which was limited to dirt bikes only but had the whole
array of youth classes, with almost everyone having a good time.
Youth classes had their own loops with a different starting line, and
did not ride the majority of the main course, which was challenging, and
left the line early, 9:30 in the morning with the Mini, 4yrs-8yrs. 50cc
and oil injected, followed by the Mini, 7-9yrs., 65cc and 10-11 yrs.,
65cc at 10 a.m., and ending up with the Youth: 10-11 yrs. 85cc;
12-15yrs. 85cc 2 stroke, 125cc 4stroke: 12-15 yrs. 100cc 2 stroke and
125 4 stroke. The checkered flag dropped at 11:30 with the winners
being unavailable at press time. The electronic scoring worked
flawlessly according to the riders. The scoring guy "couldn't be
bothered" when this reporter tried to confirm unofficial results. I
guess you get a little testy with all the youth parents bugging you for
finishing position before you get a chance to post scores.
The main event began at 12:30, with each line for each class leaving one
minute apart. The trail choked down quickly and traction in the loose
rock made for some interesting starting line action. One poor guy lost
it and ran over the port-O-john. We were laughing too hard to get a
picture, sorry, but we did get a couple of shots of a rocky downhill
section leading to the barrels and the main loop.
The first lap was 12+ miles, with the first 1/3 being rocky, with a
short and challenging boulder garden downhill that created a bottleneck
for some of the C and B riders. This section was only travelled once,
and led to the scoring barrels and into an 8.5 mile challenging loop.
The first half of the loop consisted of 500 yards of tight twisty trail
opening up to a 1/4 mile stretch of old logging road, then into some
nice open woods trails and up some great hills, with a cool double jump
completely over an old logging road. The second half of the loop was a
little more challenging, with some bony ridges to climb, a long off
camber downhill and a series of rocky hillclimbs with a fast downhill
blast to the last 1/4 mile of open woods, over an earthen dam, a baby
rock garden, then blasting for the scoring barrels down a short two
track trail.
Top Riders pulled 8 laps, with the majority of the field getting in 4-6
laps. Marc Grossman, AA rider from Central Jersey Competition Riders,
came out, kicked some major ass, and had this to say about the event on
the ECEA BBS:
"A rock hounds fantasy!!!! Actually, the first lap was flat out scary!
In the middle of the race the trail opened up some, traction was pretty
good and you could see some of what you were hitting. At the end of the
race though traction on the hills was non-existent and you had to search
for it. The club did a great job at getting people to these problem
areas and either helping those that needed it or rerouting around. All
in all a pretty good time."
Overall winners:
1 Aaron Kopp
2 Mark Spence
3 Marc Grossman
4 Mike Bradway
5 Brian Carden
Bill Atkinson, 1999 ECEA Grand Champion, managed to break a femur way in
the back of the course on a particularyl bony section of trail, and was
hauled up the hill by 5 riders from NV Search & Rescue, who along with
10 units from the Fauquier Free Wheelers and three ATV riders from the
Northern Virginia Trail Riders, showed up to provide evacuation and
coordination support for the event. Old and new dirt bike magazines,
pictures of supermodels and pictures of dead presidents are welcomed by
Bill to speed his recovery.
Referee Wayne Rochkind did a tremendous job making sure everything ran
smoothly. Well done MCR!
Photos by Dan Brewer
The double at Camp 8
Bottleneck in the rocks after the starting line
Crashing on the rocks
More information on these, and all the ECEA enduros, Hare Scrambles and more can be found at the
East Coast Enduro Association Web page
More information about A.M.A. District 7 can be found at the
Motorcycling Unlimited
of A.M.A. District 7 home page
GGo back to the Cycling East Archives page