Sunday was Scott’s long anticipated season finale Hare Scrambles, this
one held on a purpose built course on the property of the Bremerton
International Airport. The event is appropriately titled the Hareport
Scrambles. It’s the only time that anyone gets to ride this property
all year, and the Bremerton Cruisers go out after the race and clean
up and rehabilitate the entire course, and then make a new one for
next year.
This year it’s been raining, and the area has had over 10 inches of
rainfall in the last month. On top of that, we’ve had a very wet week
leading up to this race, resulting in the ground being saturated and
very, very soft. The first 2 races of the day were for PeeWees and
kids 8 – 12, and were held on abbreviated portions of the full course
using the grass track section only for the PeeWees, adding a short
woods section for the 8 – 12 Y.O.’s, and adding most of the woods
stuff for the 1 ½ hour long 3rd race for the short race (C class,
Women, really old guys, 15 and Under class, like that), then using the
entire course for the 2 ½ hour race for the A and B classes. Before
the 3rd race was 2 laps old we were hearing stories of the course
falling apart, huge ruts forming, massive bottlenecks, bikes stuck in
seat deep ruts, and the club frantically re-routing the course to
avoid the worst of it. This entire time it was raining, sometimes
hard, sometimes easy, but always raining. As they were clearing the
short course classes off the course, it stopped raining for a few
minutes, giving us time to set up our pit without getting too soaked,
but by the time they flagged off the first wave it was raining again,
and never really stopped for the rest of the day. The start order is
first wave: AA/Pro; second wave: Open A; 3rd Wave: 200A; 4th wave:
Senior A; fifth wave: Open B; sixth wave: 200B. The waves were started
about 30 – 40 seconds apart. The start and first turn were on wet
asphalt. Scott got a good start again, rounding the first turn in
second place, but as he was making the turn Nick the Nemesis passed
him on the outside whooping and hollering, so Scott went into the
woods in 3rd. 2 turns later, out of our sight, Nick crashed and Scott
went back past him, and started working his way forward. The course
was already quite a mess, with deep ruts forming up every where, but
Scott moved his way forward through the Senior A wave and a good chunk
of the 200 A and Open A classes as well. About 4 miles in, he got his
first impression of how bad the race was going to be when he pulled up
to a mud hole to find half of the AA class still pushing their bikes
out of the far side of the hole (remember they had a 2 ½ to 3minute
head start on Scott). Besides the local pro guys still pushing out,
the hole was filled with stuck bikes including one that was standing
with only the handlebars above water. Cleverly deducing that a frontal
assault on the hole wasn’t a good idea, Scott spied a guy cutting
around the left (uphill) side of the mud hole and followed him. The
other guy got hung up on a log, so Scott blew past him and then found
his hot line interrupted by a 3 – 4 foot deep swamp hole. Of course,
since he was pushing through the undergrowth, the first Scott knew of
this hole was when his front wheel fell into it…stuck on the first
lap. Scott pulled back out of the pond and turned back around to try
another approach to the big mud hole. On the way back he warned our
friend Tim Mount, who was starting to follow the same line, not to go
that way. Tim has enough respect for Scott’s ability and judgment that
he didn’t even question it; he just turned around and followed Scott
back to the entrance of the big hole. They worked their way around it
and went back to racing. Scott pitted after the first lap for fresh
goggles, which he needed very badly, and gave us a quick update on his
race so far. Nick had come though 2 – 3 minutes ahead of Scott, so I
knew something had happened, and I figured that Scott still had 2
hours plus to catch back up. Next lap (lap #2) Nick rolled through and
Scott was even farther behind, having lost another couple of minutes.
When he came through at the end of lap 2 he pitted for goggles again,
and told us he’d taken a big stick up between the swingarm and rear
tire, and up past the rear fender, stopping him dead in his tracks in
a 3 foot deep water filled rut. Standing in crotch deep soupy mud, he
tried to lift his bike straight up and pull the stick out while a club
member course worker stood and watched. Scott finally yelled at him to
give some help, which he seemed to grudgingly give, but it got Scott
going again after losing a couple of more minutes. While he as riding,
Scott seemed to be making time on the guys ahead of him, but the lost
time was killing him.
Lap 3 was the worst of the bunch. While negotiating one of the endless
ruts Scott stuck the front wheel, stood the bike up on it’s nose and
keeled over to the side (his only get off of the day). When he tried
to get out of the hole, the bike acted like it was still stuck, though
there was nothing obvious holding him up. When he finally muscled the
bike out of the rut, he found the reason: his front rotor was bent bad
enough to drag on the caliper to the point of locking up the front
tire. A course worker pointed out the way back to the pits, so Scott
left the course to limp in and get it fixed. He had to argue with the
people at the finish check who wanted to check his card for the lap,
but Scott knew he didn’t have the other 2 punches for that lap, so he
wouldn’t let them mark him at the finish and bring up the possibility
of someone accusing him of cutting the course. An entire lost lap.
Anyway, I straightened out the disc fairly well with my trusty
Crescent wrenches, we gassed him, and sent him on his way. Scott rode
the rest of the race without stopping, and without major incidents,
but the damage was already done. He wound up a lap down to the top 2
guys in his class in 8th place for the day. He was kind of pissed off
at the way the race went, but calmed down pretty quickly. It was a
tough, tough race with a very high rate of DNFs, but Scott stuck it
out to the end and scored points anyway.
It definitely wasn’t the end to the season that Scott wanted, but it
was a good effort on his part. Amazingly enough, in 4 seasons of
racing here in Western Washington this was the first real mud race
Scott’s had to deal with. We’ve had wet races, and a little mud here
and there, but nothing like this one. Really, we’ve had an incredible
run of good weather luck for the time he’s been racing. Sunday’s race
wasn’t that unusual in my previous experience off road racing in these
parts.
It doesn’t really change the season results. As far as we can tell,
Scott finished the season in second place after spotting the rest of
the class 3 races at the beginning of the season (we missed the first
3), and we originally only planned on racing 5 or 6 of them to check
them out and get his feet wet. Instead, he loved the racing and we
made all of the rest of them while Scott’s results steadily improved.
At this point, Scott’s plans for next year are to move up to the A
class in the off road series whether they move him up or not, so it
may be a year of somewhat reduced results, but Scott doesn’t want to
stay in a lower class that he pretty much knows he’ll be dominate in,
he wants the competition. Given the pace of his improvement over the
past 3 years since he moved himself out of the 15 and Under class, I
have to say it’s a good decision, and I’m proud of him for taking the
harder way that will give him the most development instead of trophy
collecting in a class he knows he’ll win in.
For those of you that have followed this season with us, thanks for
you interest and support; it really does mean a lot to Scott and all
of us. Next year may not be quite as exciting to report on, but as he
continues to improve, I’m confident the wins will return. It’ll be
nice to take y’all along for the ride.
Tim H
Thanks for the race report, Tim!
It was an excellent read, and I enjoyed it.
I can't wait for next season's reports.
Congratulations, Scott!
Jim
********************************************************
>Sunday was Scott’s long anticipated season finale Hare Scrambles, this
>one held on a purpose built course on the property of the Bremerton
>International Airport. The event is appropriately titled the Hareport
>Scrambles. It’s the only time that anyone gets to ride this property
>all year, and the Bremerton Cruisers go out after the race and clean
>up and rehabilitate the entire course, and then make a new one for
>next year.
>This year it’s been raining, and the area has had over 10 inches of
>rainfall in the last month. On top of that, we’ve had a very wet week
>leading up to this race, resulting in the ground being saturated and
>very, very soft. The first 2 races of the day were for PeeWees and
>kids 8 – 12, and were held on abbreviated portions of the full course
>using the grass track section only for the PeeWees, adding a short
>woods section for the 8 – 12 Y.O.’s, and adding most of the woods
>stuff for the 1 ½ hour long 3rd race for the short race (C class,
>Women, really old guys, 15 and Under class, like that), then using the
>entire course for the 2 ½ hour race for the A and B classes. Before
>the 3rd race was 2 laps old we were hearing stories of the course
>falling apart, huge ruts forming, massive bottlenecks, bikes stuck in
>seat deep ruts, and the club frantically re-routing the course to
>avoid the worst of it. This entire time it was raining, sometimes
>hard, sometimes easy, but always raining. As they were clearing the
>short course classes off the course, it stopped raining for a few
>minutes, giving us time to set up our pit without getting too soaked,
>but by the time they flagged off the first wave it was raining again,
>and never really stopped for the rest of the day. The start order is
>first wave: AA/Pro; second wave: Open A; 3rd Wave: 200A; 4th wave:
>Senior A; fifth wave: Open B; sixth wave: 200B. The waves were started
>about 30 – 40 seconds apart. The start and first turn were on wet
>asphalt. Scott got a good start again, rounding the first turn in
>second place, but as he was making the turn Nick the Nemesis passed
>him on the outside whooping and hollering, so Scott went into the
>woods in 3rd. 2 turns later, out of our sight, Nick crashed and Scott
>went back past him, and started working his way forward. The course
>was already quite a mess, with deep ruts forming up every where, but
>Scott moved his way forward through the Senior A wave and a good chunk
>of the 200 A and Open A classes as well. About 4 miles in, he got his
>first impression of how bad the race was going to be when he pulled up
>to a mud hole to find half of the AA class still pushing their bikes
>out of the far side of the hole (remember they had a 2 ½ to 3minute
>head start on Scott). Besides the local pro guys still pushing out,
>the hole was filled with stuck bikes including one that was standing
>with only the handlebars above water. Cleverly deducing that a frontal
>assault on the hole wasn’t a good idea, Scott spied a guy cutting
>around the left (uphill) side of the mud hole and followed him. The
>other guy got hung up on a log, so Scott blew past him and then found
>his hot line interrupted by a 3 – 4 foot deep swamp hole. Of course,
>since he was pushing through the undergrowth, the first Scott knew of
>this hole was when his front wheel fell into it…stuck on the first
>lap. Scott pulled back out of the pond and turned back around to try
>another approach to the big mud hole. On the way back he warned our
>friend Tim Mount, who was starting to follow the same line, not to go
>that way. Tim has enough respect for Scott’s ability and judgment that
>he didn’t even question it; he just turned around and followed Scott
>back to the entrance of the big hole. They worked their way around it
>and went back to racing. Scott pitted after the first lap for fresh
>goggles, which he needed very badly, and gave us a quick update on his
>race so far. Nick had come though 2 – 3 minutes ahead of Scott, so I
>knew something had happened, and I figured that Scott still had 2
>hours plus to catch back up. Next lap (lap #2) Nick rolled through and
>Scott was even farther behind, having lost another couple of minutes.
>When he came through at the end of lap 2 he pitted for goggles again,
>and told us he’d taken a big stick up between the swingarm and rear
>tire, and up past the rear fender, stopping him dead in his tracks in
>a 3 foot deep water filled rut. Standing in crotch deep soupy mud, he
>tried to lift his bike straight up and pull the stick out while a club
>member course worker stood and watched. Scott finally yelled at him to
>give some help, which he seemed to grudgingly give, but it got Scott
>going again after losing a couple of more minutes. While he as riding,
>Scott seemed to be making time on the guys ahead of him, but the lost
>time was killing him.
>Lap 3 was the worst of the bunch. While negotiating one of the endless
>ruts Scott stuck the front wheel, stood the bike up on it’s nose and
>keeled over to the side (his only get off of the day). When he tried
>to get out of the hole, the bike acted like it was still stuck, though
>there was nothing obvious holding him up. When he finally muscled the
>bike out of the rut, he found the reason: his front rotor was bent bad
>enough to drag on the caliper to the point of locking up the front
>tire. A course worker pointed out the way back to the pits, so Scott
>left the course to limp in and get it fixed. He had to argue with the
>people at the finish check who wanted to check his card for the lap,
>but Scott knew he didn’t have the other 2 punches for that lap, so he
>wouldn’t let them mark him at the finish and bring up the possibility
>of someone accusing him of cutting the course. An entire lost lap.
>Anyway, I straightened out the disc fairly well with my trusty
>Crescent wrenches, we gassed him, and sent him on his way. Scott rode
>the rest of the race without stopping, and without major incidents,
>but the damage was already done. He wound up a lap down to the top 2
>guys in his class in 8th place for the day. He was kind of pissed off
>at the way the race went, but calmed down pretty quickly. It was a
>tough, tough race with a very high rate of DNFs, but Scott stuck it
>out to the end and scored points anyway.
>It definitely wasn’t the end to the season that Scott wanted, but it
>was a good effort on his part. Amazingly enough, in 4 seasons of
>racing here in Western Washington this was the first real mud race
>Scott’s had to deal with. We’ve had wet races, and a little mud here
>and there, but nothing like this one. Really, we’ve had an incredible
>run of good weather luck for the time he’s been racing. Sunday’s race
>wasn’t that unusual in my previous experience off road racing in these
>parts.
>It doesn’t really change the season results. As far as we can tell,
>Scott finished the season in second place after spotting the rest of
>the class 3 races at the beginning of the season (we missed the first
>3), and we originally only planned on racing 5 or 6 of them to check
>them out and get his feet wet. Instead, he loved the racing and we
>made all of the rest of them while Scott’s results steadily improved.
>At this point, Scott’s plans for next year are to move up to the A
>class in the off road series whether they move him up or not, so it
>may be a year of somewhat reduced results, but Scott doesn’t want to
>stay in a lower class that he pretty much knows he’ll be dominate in,
>he wants the competition. Given the pace of his improvement over the
>past 3 years since he moved himself out of the 15 and Under class, I
>have to say it’s a good decision, and I’m proud of him for taking the
>harder way that will give him the most development instead of trophy
>collecting in a class he knows he’ll win in.
>For those of you that have followed this season with us, thanks for
>you interest and support; it really does mean a lot to Scott and all
>of us. Next year may not be quite as exciting to report on, but as he
>continues to improve, I’m confident the wins will return. It’ll be
>nice to take y’all along for the ride.
>Tim H
****************************************
Toodleloooo
Wudsracer/Jim Cook
Smackover Racing
'06 Gas Gas DE300
'82 Husqvarna XC250
Team LAGNAF
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> them together.