Merry-land and the 12 Hour

Wow... not even two weeks and I already have so much to catch up on! It’s definitely been a busy month. The day after my last blog I was on a plane to Washington D.C. where I’d be staying for a week (Waldorf, Maryland actually). There was an AMA Pro Motocross National at Budds Creek that I was covering on Saturday, and the following Tuesday/Wednesday there was going to be a new bike intro at the same track. So rather than fly home Sunday and come right back on Tuesday, I just stayed for the week.

(left) Self portrait at Chesapeake Beach, Maryland.

After the two weeks before that I thought it would be nice to have some down time and be able to sit in my hotel room and relax a bit – which I did for about two hours on Sunday morning before I was itching to go do something. No bikes, no friends in Maryland and I was climbing the walls with boredom. By Monday afternoon I was going stir crazy because I had to stay in the room and get my story done, and then be at the computer all day because that’s the day we go to print.
Finally on Monday afternoon I got to get out for a bit. I headed over to Chesapeake Bay to check out some of the beaches. Here’s a tip – what they call a “beach” is basically a dumpster full of sand emptied out onto some boulders. And get this – they charge you to step off of the boardwalk and onto the sand. There are people standing there like at a subway ticket booth making sure you paid your $8 to be on the “beach.” Pfft!

(right) The boardwalk is free, but you gotta pay to walk on the sand here!

The bay was beautiful, though. It was blazing hot and the humidity was off the charts, but other than that, it was nice. There are crabs everywhere and lots of geese on the beach. Quite a change of pace! I sat down at one of the boardwalk restaurants for a bowl of crab chowder and a glass of wine. That was also nice... but it would have been a LOT nicer with some company!

(right) Canadian geese kickin' it on the Chesapeake Bay shore.

That’s the weird thing about all this travel. Yeah, it’s cool and all, but it feels kinda empty when there’s no one there to share it with. It’s like someone says, “Here you go. You can have the coolest house you ever dreamed of, but you can’t ever have people over.” So is your house still as cool?
Anyhoo, my solitary confinement ended on Tuesday afternoon when the editors and Kawasaki peeps showed up for the KX250F intro. At last! Social stimulation! Tuesday night we all hopped on a shuttle bus and went across town to dinner at a Persian... Mediterranean type place. Steak and shrimp, tandoori and baklava! Mmmm...
Wednesday was our intro at Budds Creek and wow was it a brutal day. Record heat in the area, high humidity and NO BREEZE whatsoever. It felt like you had to cut the air with a knife to even walk through it, and we were going to be riding motocross in this!
I usually don’t have a problem with heat at all. Triple digits – no problem. But I’ve never been in humidity like that. Just a few laps in and I was feeling light headed and nauseous. After I pulled in for a break it got worse. I was dumping ice water on my head and even on my feet, but I couldn’t cool off! My heart was still racing and my vision was starting to tunnel... not good. After a few hours of rest, and letting the temperatures drop a bit, I tried riding again. (I know that might sound crazy, but that’s the thing with this job. You can’t exactly just sit back and say, “It’s too hot to ride,” after Kawasaki has put on this big event and flown you across the country for the North American launch of their new flagship motocross bike. You gotta tough it out. Even after 30 hours of traveling and no sleep, you gotta freshen up, clip on a smile and go to the welcome dinner. Or if you’re sick, hung over, sleep deprived and it’s snowing outside, you have to finish your motos for the shootout. A thousand people would kill for my job, so there’s no complaining and no cop-outs! This job is a privilege and a responsibility and I never forget that.)
I got in a few more laps before I started feeling sick again. I tried my best – we all did – but the weather just wasn’t cooperating. At least we got some good photos done that morning so it wasn’t a total wash.
We had another great dinner that night. This time it was barbecue. It’s weird but Maryland feels more like a Southern state than some actual Southern states do. The barbecue dinner was great, but at that point I think I would have settled for an IV and a salt lick.
Thursday we headed home. I spent most of the day Thursday and Friday still feeling sick and dehydrated. I was starting to worry because Saturday night we had the Glen Helen 12 Hour endurance race which, as you can imagine, is a really demanding race. You can’t go into that feeling under the weather. That’s what happened last year when I had the flu, but still tried to tough it out because I didn’t want to let the rest of the team down. I ended up in the hospital the next day with bronchitis.

(left) Saturday night - time for some night racin'!

Fortunately I woke up Saturday feeling like a million bucks, and we were off to the races! My friend Brandon, our photographer Mark Kariya (I always call him Kato) and one of his friends who I just met (Adam) were the four riders on our team. We were riding the Beta 400 RR (the same bike we rode and shot up in Arroyo Grande a few weeks ago). The 12 Hour race was at night this year – 5 P.M. to 5 A.M. – so we had the bike and our helmets rigged up with HID lights.
The course was brutal – really rough and pretty technical with some treacherous downhill sections. It was pretty punishing... just how I like it! At the end of an endurance race, or a Baja ride or an enduro, you should feel like you were just dragged behind a truck. That’s my philosophy! So for sure, I left this event happy.
Things got interesting at about 2 A.M. when a water main broke and sent a big fast-moving river down the middle of the track. That was rather surprising to come up on in the middle of the night. Each lap the river was getting longer and stretching further down the course so it certainly kept us on our toes – and struggling to dry off by the fire between rides.
I felt I rode well. I had quite a few close calls where I thought for sure I was going down – one of which was a nose-wheelie after an awkward landing from a step-down. I hit some big rocks and square edged bumps that kicked me totally sideways but I always managed to keep moving forward with the rubber side down. We had no busted grips or bent levers in the end. But in typical “Jean” style, I did actually hit the ground once – I tripped and fell walking to the bathroom.

(left) Here I am at 4:30 A.M. heading out on my last ride.

We finished the race 12 hours and 250 miles later. It was my rotation by the end of the night so I got to be on the bike as twilight broke, and I got to take the checkered flag. It’s always a sweet feeling to come through the scoring chute with the flag waving and your teammates high-fiving you. And I love LOVE riding the ridges of Glen Helen as the sun comes up. It’s such an incredible feeling when the light finally breaks, and you have that feeling of relief and accomplishment that you made it through the night. The rest is always downhill after that. Surviving the night without crashes or breakdowns... or emotional meltdowns... is always the toughest part of the endurance races.

(right) This pedestrian bridge was part of the course. Here I am coming down the stairs just before dawn.

Night riding is really a trip. Even though you’re on the same trails you were on in the daylight, it’s a totally different experience. It’s like one minute you’re feeling so peaceful and the next you’re remind yourself not to panic. It’s really strange being out in the wilderness alone in the dark. The headlights cast really strange shadows as you go by, and sometimes it looks as though the bushes are moving. Every now and then you might see glowing eyes of some curious critter (hopefully they don’t jump out in front of you). And there are almost always photographers camped out on the course. You don’t know they’re there until you’re blinded by a flash as you come through a corner!
I almost forgot how much I love night riding. The 12 Hour was a lot of fun and we were all stoked to get a finish. We didn’t place very high, but we had fun, didn’t have any breakdowns or injuries, and we all left the next morning still speaking to each other. So I’d have to say that was more successful than plenty of the other endurance races I’ve done!

(right) 5:15 A.M. - our team celebrating our finish at the Glen Helen 12 Hour Endurance Race.

This week it’s back to the grind. I’m actually glad to have a quiet week in the office with no grandiose plans for a while. It’ll be good to get caught up on some stories and let my body get some rest. I’m sun burned, I have sore muscles from head to toe, blisters on my hands, poison oak on my arm, bruises on my thigh, a cut still healing on my knee and I’m in desperate need of a pedicure. And then there’s that dirty Beta still sitting in my garage... ugh.
Such a tough life! ;)

Garage Grumblings

Spending time in the garage is definitely not my favorite. It's too often boring and/or frustrating, and always ends with dirty, chewed up fingers and grease stains on my arms. But when I get a new part or accessory, it's not that hard to motivate myself to run down to the garage and start wrenching away. It's like a new toy that you can't wait to play with, so even with the busted knuckles and black fingernails, it's worth it the next day.
There's a certain time of year, however, that makes me reluctantly drag myself into the garage, more demotivated than ever, for a painful day of turning wrenches. That time of year is when our long-term bikes have to be returned to the manufacturers. Before we hand them back we have to put all the stock parts back on, clean it and service it.
I knew it was coming. My phone buzzed on my desk and it was Tim Olson from Yamaha. I knew why he was calling... and that's why I didn't answer. Two hours later he called again. Damnit. There was no denying the inevitable. It's time for the WR250 to go back to Yamaha.
Of course, it could be seen as a good thing since this means that we'll be getting the new models soon. But it's never easy to give up a bike you've grown comfortable with and had so many good times with. This WR in particular has been in my possession for two years. We've been to the desert, the mountains, the track, we've done endurance races, we've tumbled down rock piles, we had silly days where we just spun donuts until we fell down. We rode rock faces in San Diego, we nearly burned up the clutch trying to climb sand hills in Cudde Back, we splashed through streams in Arroyo Grande and sat atop incredible mountain tops in Arrowhead. This was even the bike I took on my legendary Malcolm ride!
Sure we had some rough times. We had busted fork seals, plenty of smashed levers and some substantial front fender damage from going over the bars on more than one occasion. Okay... more than four occasions. But I also had some of the best two-wheeled times on this WR in the last year and a half. I had my best race EVER on this little guy at last year's VCMC Enduro Qualifier in Gorman. I still enter the intermediate class in off-road races, and this time, not only did I win my class, but I overalled the women's expert class too! The first woman expert rider finished over ten minutes behind me. Smack down!!!
But like all things do, good or bad, my time with the WR has come to an end. My only time left with "Papa Smurf" would be in the garage putting all the stock parts back on. It's like moving day, or cleaning up the morning after a party. It's like moving the morning after a party. It sucks that much. Yesterday was that day and I reluctantly washed, serviced and tore down the WR250. I took off the steering stabilizer and mount, hand guards and the Motion Pro variable rate throttle kit. I remembered all our good times together as I inspected the battle damage - bruised plastics, bent radiators, busted hot start lever perch (that was from last year's Glen Helen 12 Hour). The chain hung in there really well. It was definitely beat, but still spinnin'... ah the miles on that chain.
We skipped through meadows, we climbed Paiute Mountain Peak, we weathered the craziest flash flood I've ever witnessed, we soldiered through dusty races in triple-digit heat and icy cold mornings which made us both grumpy. But our time was up.
Parting with this little guy wasn't easy. He peered at me in my rear view mirror as we headed down the 605 toward Cypress. "Where we going today?" he asked. I hadn't the heart to tell him it was all over for us.
Phil Collins' touching ballad "Against All Odds" came on the radio and I could no longer hold back my sorrow. Tears began to well up in my eyes as I approached the Yamaha warehouse. (Okay, I made that up, but it was still a sad moment.)
Goodbye my little WR. I will always remember you and treasure our time together. At least until I get a new one and have even better times.

Texas, Arrowhead and Betas - oh my!

At last, here it is. Your window to my world. My outlet for the random things I do and the even more random things that go through my head. Not only is this a great way to keep up with where I've been and where I'm bouncing off to next, but it's also going to be a good way for me to remember what I did last week. Sometimes even I can't keep up with my own schedule!

Last week is a prime example of how much running around I do. On June 4th I headed to Texas to cover the AMA Motocross National (big pro race) in Freestone which is about an hour south of Dallas. It was over 100 degrees and reeeeally humid. (I heard some people saying it was 108 but I don't know if I believe that.) I'd been hearing the horror stories leading up to the race so I made sure I was ready. Bathing suit, shorts, flip flops and I didn't even bother to dry my hair; I just put it up in a clip. Call me crazy but it felt kinda nice to me. Of course, I love the heat and when you're ready for it, it's not that bad. If I had to be racing in that, well... that's a totally different story. But I was sitting in the shade sipping my cold water so I didn't have anything to complain about.
Anyhoo, the next day I had plenty to complain about. Long story short, I missed my flight which was at 6:15 A.M. I know what you're thinking - sleepy Jean was running late and missed the flight - but that wasn't even the case! True, it was my responsibility, but for once, I wasn't just running late. I got a little lost on the way to the airport and then had a fiasco at the rental car drop off, got on the wrong shuttle to the terminal. Not only did the bus take forever to close the damn doors and get going, but I mistakenly thought the buses all went to the same place. Turns out only one goes to each terminal and I was headed to C when I needed to be at E.
"Okay, no problem," I thought. "I'll just take that handy little train thingy that goes terminal to terminal." Wrong. You have to be checked in to use that and I needed to be at my terminal to check in! So I sat out on the curb waiting for the airport shuttle that takes you around. The wait time said, "10 min." I was biting my nails as it counted down and relieved when it got to 2 min., but it stayed on 2 min for about 10 more minutes!
Finally the damn thing comes and I get on. If you've been to DFW you know it's about the size of Delaware and takes forever to get around. You seriously have to get on a freeway to get to the next terminal, so it took some time, as well. I had originally arrived at the airport about an hour early and with no bags to check I thought I would be fine. Well I missed check in by about 5 minutes.
Yet again, I thought, "No problem. I'll just get on standby for the next flight." Well, I didn't get on that one. Nor the next one, the one after that, nor the one after that. Stuck in Dallas, I was! This story goes on and on and I just don't even want to remember that misery. Actually the only miserable part was that we were going to print the next morning and I had a five-page story due and we're required to be in the office at 7 A.M. on Monday. I didn't end up getting home until 2 P.M. on Monday after going through Vegas to LAX and having to take a $70 cab ride to Long Beach Airport to get my truck. Ugh!
So my week started off with a staggering sleep deficit and it didn't get much better for the rest of the week. But that's the way it goes when you live life by the seat of your pants!

On Tuesday we headed up to Arrowhead to do some riding up in the mountains. It was a gorgeous day and the trails were amazing. It's always fun to get out during the week because you can ride all day and not see any other riders. We stopped at this creek crossing that looked like a movie set. The creek opens up and it's deep enough to climb on the rocks and jump in. And the water was surprisingly warm. So yeah... we had to take a break and go for a swim!!! I've never done that before but I've always wanted to! I thought my jersey would be wet and dirty for the rest of the ride, but to my pleasant surprise it was not. In fact, I even felt kinda clean at the end of the ride! haha
Tuesday night we met up with our photographer and piled in my truck to head up to San Luis Obispo. We had plans to meet up with Beta and ride the new 400 RR at a private ranch in Arroyo Grande the next morning so to make the most out of our day we went up Tuesday night and got a hotel. We didn't get in until midnight so it was another short night.


Wednesday morning we all met up for breakfast and headed out to the ranch. I had been there once before in December for some riding and photos and we had such a blast. Our only complaint was that it was on the winter solstice - the shortest day of the year! Well this time was much different. We had plenty of daylight and we were done before the sun was.
The shoot went well thanks to the lovely and talented Kato (our photographer's name is Mark Kariya but I've always called him Kato). We got some great action shots with some pretty incredible scenery. As planned, we hurried up and whipped through photos so we could get plenty of riding time in. There was one really nice creek bed shot that was working out pretty beautifully. I can tell when Kato is on to something because he gets that funny look in his eye. He had me doing pass after pass through this rocky creek bed, then I'd climb out, go back around and drop back in. Again and again and since I knew he was really getting something good, I kept plugging along as tired as I was. Each time I went through I was tracking water and dirt onto the river rocks so it was getting really slippery and tricky so I had a couple small crashes in there. Not the end of the world, but getting up, lifting up the bike and getting going again really saps your energy. So I was whupped and that was only our first shot!
We had several more angles to shoot from after that so I was effectively worn out. The photos turned out great (thank goodness) but underneath my shiny new helmet and sharp-looking gear, I was dripping in sweat and fighting to hold my little noodle arms up (gotta have those elbows up for the photos)! In the end, it was a great day at the office. Yes, I'm spoiled rotten and I thank God for it every day of my life!
After two full days of trail riding in the mountains, I was seriously beat - both figuratively and literally as I had several tip-overs on Wednesday. We sat down to a nice big dinner at Chili's in Arroyo Grande - there's nothing quite like a big steak and a brownie ala mode after a full day of riding.
By the time we got home, unloaded, showered and into bed it was 2 A.M. And of course, I had to be up and in the office at 9 A.M. Thursday morning. It sounds grueling but at that point, I hadn't been in the office since the previous Thursday so I couldn't exactly ask for it off. It's alright, though. Like the saying goes - you can sleep when you're dead!

On Friday night we got ready to head back up to Arrowhead for a second helping. We had such a great time and wanted to do more exploring on Saturday. Well, after my little "accident" on the beach cruiser, our plans fell through. I was trying to hop up onto a curb - like I've done 1,000 times on a bicycle - but the front wheel never came up, I guess! I hit the curb and went completely over the bars, landed on my head (fortunately on the grass) and busted my knee open on the curb! It wasn't until I was looking up at my friend next to me and wearing the bicycle as a hat that I realized what happened. Yeah, I'm an idiot. That will probably make this year's "top-five stupidest things I've done" list. And I wasn't even drunk! Granted, I wasn't sober either... but I for sure wasn't drunk enough to make a mistake like that. Maybe I just had too much motorcycles on the brain. My friend Jerry swears he saw me try to blip the throttle. I really hate crashing. I swear, I don't do it that often, but for how much I ride, it seems like I always have bruises and scrapes all over me (many of which aren't even actually from crashing - just from riding). I've definitely had my share of crashes and at this point, I've gone over the bars more times than a pole-vaulter.
Our change of plans on Saturday took us down to Kurt and Laurette's house, which is always fun... and then painful the next morning. It was an indulgent night of wine, cheesecake and the best pizza I think I've ever had. The next morning we raced from Laurette's house (in Temecula wine country) all the way back to Orange County to get Jerry to the airport by 10 A.M. (made it!) and I continued on to my mom's house in L.A. for Vicki's baby shower and then dinner at Jim and Alice's.
I was totally zonked by this point - and starting to feel that beach cruiser crash - but I had to stay for dinner to spend some quality time with my babies! Matt and Erin and the kids came up, which is always a treat.
Ten o'clock Sunday night I finally crawled into bed at the end of my marathon week. It was a blast - like they always are - and now I think I'll spend the next two days sleeping. I need to get all caught up by Friday when I start all over again. Friday morning I head to Budds Creek, Maryland for another AMA National Motocross race and then I'm staying the week for a Kawasaki new bike intro (more riding and more photo shoots). I'll have a few extra days in between events out there, so perhaps I'll go spend some time at the Capitol and in the Smithsonian!