Ballard race report

[wadedawg]

WOW! This was the only race I've been able to participate in all season and did I pick a good one. I love the technical off camber trails,roots, and trees so close it rubs paint. The dirt was perfect on 2nd race and with the dirt pushed to the outside it made for some awesome corners. I followed the Jr's the first hour then rock and rolled the 2nd half (atleast in my opinion). Too bad day 2 got canx but I guess that gives every one a few days to lick their wounds and plan an attack. It was good getting to visit with my FMHSC friends. Kudo's to the owners, workers, sweeps, and everyone else who made this event happen, GREAT JOB! I will be watching race results and reading the forum from Washington.

[shredder]

Randy (Wadedawg),
You show up and hold this this huge grin all day. Your such a great guy to be around and I sure enjoyed hangin and BSin with ya since all the excitement I got was cheering on my class mates!

Mr Stickney finally shows up on the radar for sure! Mr. Joray just pounds it out every lap and laying it down and comes thru with like 8 minutes to go and stops and starts thinking if he should go or not....Then we all see ol Steve Stickney come rolling thru and BOOM! 1027 lights another candle and he is gone! ha ha ha! what a rush that was. Nice job Steve and I've got the feeling we are going to be seeing more of each other as the year unfolds and by the way I spent more than a while at the clipboard with your son and you have yourself a real winner there too!

I could see the perfect storm brewing as Todd (1063) was going to get of piece of Mr Joray (1027) himself...even if it was going to be a small one! Todd comes out of the woods in the coveted 1st place position on lap one and John even more determined for some payback, well ya just never know - ya know? So when John comes thru in lap 2 in 1st and yells out "I GOT HIM!" and when Todd didn't come out of the woods and come thru scoring and I hear Todds bike was towed out, I starting thinking...WOW those two dude are having the proverbial shoot out at the OK corral! They playin for keeps! Holy Cow!!!!,,,,,...............well it turns out all is good and well and Todd is OK. Turns out he just had a mechanical problem. I will expect you to explain to me in detail Mr Sexton how a mechanical contractor ends up having a mechanical problem take them out of the race!!!!!
BTW Mr Ed ... don't think I didn't notice you having a pretty good day putting out some lovin yourself. Nice job Ed! You looking pretty solid.

One of my hero's is Macon and wow....what can I say? It's an honor to watch you lay it all out there my man. WOW. Another hero of mine is ol #121 and to tell you the truth ya scared the hell out us Zack. I'm glad your going to be ok. That was ugly my man but it reminds me of just how fast you guys are going. wow.

I do want to mention that ol Silva's hair was on fire and his a$$ was catching! Man he was aggressive every second of every minute of every inch of that track and man you pounded it out too. You HAVE to post because I just gotta know what happened out there. You were not taking any prisoners all day and I saw Chad getting the elephant gun out and going after you! He must have hit a bullseye. Man watching you dudes fight it out would have been good on pay per view. wow. I tried to catch you as you were leaving but I could tell you guys wanted to be on the road already....(your a friggin MONSTER!!!!)

542 and 606. I don't know you guys but as I was writing down your numbers I noticed you both had to be smoking the same crack pipe because You pulled away from your respective classmates and never looked back. Man that was a rush too! Thanks for an exciting day at the scoring tent.

Oh! if no one has told you yet, a father and son team...I think it's 34 and 311 (Shafer's?) your heads are on the wrong bodies!!!! Well, or maybe your transponders are backwards, or it could even be switched visors but I almost got a headache keeping that straight but the cool handed ladies in the trailer made short work of that minor imperfection.

I am looking forward to racing this track even if it is going to be backwards. The same track seems totally different when you run it backwards. Does Husky offer reverse gears for the 310?

Well once again sorry so short, I just didn't have much to say. I spose I coulda made it shorter, I just didn't have time!


I know we say it so much it's like beating a dead horse but Thank You Dan, crew, landowner, food folks, sweepers trailer ladies and all who work to make this happen.

[Ed M]

Even though the 40 Vet class was slated for the late race we decided to go early enough to get a decent parking spot, it would also allow us to check out the course on the early practice lap. Being one of the first ones out for practice the course was slick, tight, not quite burned in, a number of wet log crossings, and some very tight trees.

Watched the start of the early race, then put the chairs under some shade trees, kicked back and relaxed watching the young guns as they came through the scoring area. Happened to see one rider go over the bars on his approach to the scoring lane, not sure what happened but hope he is okay. Macon Ezell is a stud, 20 minute lap times says it all.

Second practice was much better than the first, course had tacked up, some interesting passing lines had developed along with a few ruts, and there were a couple bottlenecks at some of the tight tree areas.

Got a decent mid-pack start, however it started getting a little tight going down the first downhill three riders wide so I decided to back off a little. About one mile in a rider got hung up in one of the tight tree sections holding up several riders while a number of us were able to get by using an alternative line from the morning race. Not too far down the course there was a left handed down hill corner followed by a left handed uphill, again I was able to use a faster line that had developed during the morning race to make the pass on two more riders. It was so nice to be able to race without a hint of dust. Even the numerous log crossings seemed to have tacked up and all was good. I came through scoring after my first lap and was surprised to see I was in fifth, got an encouraging yell from Shredder and off I went.

Midway through my second lap I saw Todd Sexton walking and talking to a sweep rider hope he is doing ok. Thanks to the riders that made passing easy, this has to be one of the tightest, technical courses this series has run in awhile, being patient in the tight areas paid off in spades. Oh and I forgot to mention there were a few rocks but nothing like Walters or Collins. Coming through scoring I was up to 4th and stayed there during the remainder of the race.

On my fourth lap, I started cramping up and had to stand up for almost half a lap. Every time I started to sit down my right leg would start to cramp. Needless to say it made for some interesting cornering, I slowed down then crashed on an uphill section. Getting the bike going and up the rest of the hill took away a lot of my energy. Rode in survival mode for about a mile hoping no one was going to catch me, then was able to pick up the pace again.

Thanks to Dan and everyone involved it was great fun to ride that course. Mentally I was ready for day two, physically I’m not so sure.

[advbeach]

Here's the short version for you Shredder and this wont be as entertaining or has long has your excellent race reports.
Lined up between Chad and Tony. Race started well, tucked in behind Chad and stayed with him, almost making it past at a couple spots. I was finally able to squeeze past at the first big creek crossing. Chad went left and I took the straight line up the bank and came out ahead. From then on I was pushing it hard and didn’t have any major problems. First two laps went well and didn’t feel pressured by anyone, I new the gang wasn’t far behind. Third lap I started getting sloppy and making a few mistakes. Fourth lap is when it went south, Chads camelback full of RedBull must have kicked in. I hear a bike behind me and nobody screaming for me to move out of there way. I new that was a bad sign. I think this was right before we entered one of the open pasture sections, where we came upon another rider and Chad went by us both taking a few bush’s with him. Chad was moving, I was thinking theirs no way I can keep this pace up and it turns out I didn’t have to for long. Chad took a line I hadn't tried before and I followed. I see him duck under a good sized branch or maybe he went around it. Either way I tried to go under it at a pretty good pace. My head hit the branch and ejected me straight off the back into the dirt. I did the usual jump up and make sure nobody was watching routine, got the bike picked up and blasted off. I wish I could have made that last lap a good battle with Chad, maybe next time.
Thanks again to everyone that make these races such an awesome experience! Looking forward to Ballard #2.

[shredder]

Well Silva if it makes you feel any better (and it won't) I'm thinking that the branch that took you out might be the same one that took Mr Sexton for a ride into the wild as well.


WAIT....well...now that I think about it ...It does explain why Chad came through the pits and picked up a rolled up blueprint of something, a tape measure, hatchet, some rope and a huge 36" black round ACME hole. Next thing I know Dudes are going down left and right!!!! And no one every saw Chad with any of this gear I'm talking about, yep...just ask around and I'm positive no one will calibrate my story about the weird gear....yup

Seriously - thanks for posting - it's all guys like me have right now. I do plan on running the next one so you 40 vet dudes don't hold your breath waiting around for any more happy juice from me cause I'm all out!

It was only about 7 riders that went through scoring time after time after time at Ballard drenched in excitement, just dripping with enthusiasm and leaving behind a trail of whoop a$$ like I've not seen in a while. I guess that's why it's better that I'm out in the woods chasing my seat than at the scoring tent jotting down bike numbers.

[TEAMBRAWNER]

Well here I go again got fourth in the hole shot Felt pretty good until about 3/4 way though the fist lap lost my rear brakes That's Funny I bleed the boy's bike before every race but I guess mine didn't need it ha ha. . but I managed to some how stay in 2 place and even pass for the lead just after the start of the second lap but it would be short lived as One of the many 45 degree logs would have its way with me. I actually never went down but the bike did I think Tim Hughes got to see it? must have been funny Nice job by the way Tim. After that it took the wind out of my sails and I just coasted for a 6th place finish. I was very skeptical of the track at practice but after the 1st lap I liked it It will be fun to try it again on the 8th, One thing is for sure I will bleed my brakes also this time but I don't know if it would have helped. I got very tired at this race . So I guess riding races only is not going to work this time I'm feeling OLD.
P.S. Zack is doing good but did suffer a severe concussion and still dose not remember anything about the race not even the drive up to the race only time will tell.


Thanks to Letko cycles
Thanks to Dan and crew
Thanks to the land owner
And thanks to everybody at FMHSC for making racing so much fun.

[swedishfishmx]

Some pics are up on FB, but as far as crash photos this is it. Unfortunately when people crash, they tend to watch the crash and not take photos.

[Pumpkinpatch]

Some pics are up on FB, but as far as crash photos this is it. Unfortunately when people crash, they tend to watch the crash and not take photos.

Kudos to your mom for staying behind the lens that long!
Hope Zack heals fast and doesn't rush back too fast.

[shredder]

I can think of a hundred funny things to post to that photo but I'm not. Zack take care of yourself young man and come back when your ready.

[swedishfishmx]

I can think of a hundred funny things to post to that photo but I'm not. Zack take care of yourself young man and come back when your ready.