Corralitos 100 Desert Race, NM, Mar. 17-18

[placelast]

Friday Mar. 16th

Sign up 3-6 pm

Saturday, Mar. 17th

Sign up opens 10 am - most of the day

Pre-ride Sunday's course (on Saturday) fee is $10, 11 am – 2 pm; 1st hour for bikes, 2nd hour for quads, last hour for everyone of all skill/class

Saturday mini/short course fee: $30

Sunday fees: expert ($60; 3 loops), pro-am ($50; 2 loops), amateurs ($50; 2 loops), novice ($50; 1 loops), ironman (graduated minis; $30, 1 loop)

50s, 60s & 80 mini and quad mini, pre-ride (separate) mini/short course 11 am-noon, race: 2 pm

Mom's race: 3:30 pm (mini/short course)

Mini trophy awards at 4:30 pm

Sunday, Mar. 18th

Prayer meeting: 7 am (don't laugh: you may need it, though it's not mandatory)

Rider‘s meeting: 7:30 am

Race begins at 8 am in this order: expert, pro-am, amateurs, novice, ironman

Pre-entry forms must be postmarked no later than Mar. 10th

AMA sanctioned event; membership (available at event for $39) required to compete

Sunday Course Information

35-mile loop on BLM, State, and private lands
Trails, some sand, rocks and several turns
Course cutters will be disqualified; observers will be posted, as will checkpoints
4,500’ elevation
RV undercarriages must be pre-washed

Pit Area

12-miles west of Las Cruces off of Interstate 10. Exit Corralitos/127. Turn left over freeway then right on frontage road. Over cattle guard, then right onto dirt road. Follow arrows and ribbons.

Information

Badlands ATV and Cycle, 505-647-8333
Entry form, map, and flyer at http://www.nmdrc.com/

 

[oilspot]

Had to work today so I missed the action out there. I got to take my 3yr old son out to watch the pee-wee's race yesterday afternoon.
A lot more people out there and a way nicer area than I imagined. My son's super excited to go out there with his pw50 and hit the kids track.
Looking forward to hear how it went today!

 

[placelast]

It was a blur of a weekend.

I got there Saturday @10:30am to sweep the entire course although was assigned specifically to the back, far 6-mile loop near the railroad tracks. This was added over last November's course. I waited for all of the bikes to come through before I did the loop. Everything looked fine and the course was getting burned in as opposed to when the promoter and I first went though exploring 6 weeks ago. No ribbon was down, and I did not need ot add more.

After the last bikes I went back to camp and reported back to the promoter all was fine although an arrow needed to be added to the section after the first checkpoint in a fast wash as many were missing a turn. He suggested I go back out and seek some observers/flaggers at a dangerous G-out as they had extra arrows, stakes and a stapler. They did in fact have the goods so it was back to the wash, and after a few fast passes, I found the perfect place for an arrow and drove it in with a rock.

After the last of the quad preride thoiugh my section I headed back to camp as it was quite warm and I wanted to save some energy and enthusiasm for Sunday as I will be sweeping at least two loops (70 miles).

Back at camp a family of eight vehicles - three bikes, four quads and one Kawi Mule went off for a preride; their son's were going to race the next day. The promoter and I was contemplating their ambitious plan, and to raise their chances of returning I volunteered to follow.

On the first rest stop the Mule looked for a way back as one of the wee passengers was getting car sick. I led them to a power-line road and with simple directions back to camp. The others soldiered on.

At the second stop we regrouped and I suggested some shortcuts so as to not overstretch their abilities. Several times I overtook the front runners and took the lead as needed to avoid the rougher sections. For the most part they could do it on their own due to our ribboning and arrows.

Once back at camp they thanked me immensely, and let out a sigh of relief, 28 miles later. With that I left for the day as that was enough.

Sunday I arrived just in time for the rider's meeting to hear the promoter talk aboiut the hazards and such. He asked me to follow the last novice out.

The last novice was a girl riding a CRF150. I came upon her and another helping her out at the first G-out. She fired it up right away but was having problems on the turns and such as the course was getting pretty beat up; having small wheels doesn't help. She refused my help several times, and I was glad the experts were far ahead.

I would stop occasionally as rocks were finding their way onto the course seemingly out of no where; many required two hands. We cleared the rocks off on two days beforehand mut I suppose these are from all the soil displacement with the first pass of racers. Some ribbon needed to be rehung where shortcuts (a no no) were taken; one of the helpers suggested using paint guns to tag cheaters but we decided against it for liability reasons (dang cheaters! we'll get no fun in return).

The guys at the first check (10-miles out) were having a kick of a brunch with their liquid beverages, and it was only what, 9:30 am? I passed on their offer.

I was keeping an eye on her until stopping at the next check (mile 20). Then I heard her stop and left to give her a hand, but by the time I got at her last fall she was up and going.

Later I came across a guy with a flat; I used large cable ties to secure his tire (so that it can live another day) and gave him directions back to camp. The experts were beginning to lap me which caused no small concern within for the last novice I was watching.

Then there was another with a fouled plug a few miles later but he said he uncle was going to return to help. At the next checkpoint (20 miles) they said she had made it through. I ended up catching her but stayed a safe distance behind so as not intimidate. Meanwhile all of the experts had passed us and the amateurs were passing. About that time my front felt odd like I was losing air; sure enough, so I spun off and took the roads to camp.

Checking into the scoring trailer revealed my last novice hadn't made it yet, so I downed a sandwich and changed into Sahara gear as it was getting close to 80 out. I put some air in my front tire and it held for a while; the promoter suggested I take his spare 450sx out instead. Before leaving to sweep the quads, I checked again and my nocie rider did make it in. Yay!

I made bar and lever adjustments to the 450 and fueled it up. Starting was problematic as it has a high-compression piston, no 'lecky start, and I'm a beach weakling. Eventually I got it started but the clutch was way out of adjustment; I never did get it right as it must have had a juice leak; more on that later - stayed tuned.

Man, this thing has POWaaarrr! It revs fast like mine although does so with authority - you had better be ready. The suspension is way too stiff for my lame arse pace but can take any hits with authority and minimum fear; just goes to show you how much difference fours years of suspension development WP had done.

Between the clutch the way it was and touchy brake, I stalled it too often and learned to not use the brake to bring the back around like it needed to be with this monster. It had a tall seat too, and as such I ended up sitting more than I should have which means I am still sore today.

I came upon a broken quad about mile 18. He said his father was on a far ridge in the distance on another quad, which he pointed out to me, so I cut the course to meet up with him. That was a big mistake as the cross-country route I took was rock-ridden, I was on a super-snappy-engined foreign bike, and that without a clutch - talk about stoopid! Somehow I made it to the far ridge, only to see the quad way in the distance headded back to camp. So I flew done the ridge as best I could, and cound a road back to camp. Making the turn in a lock/slide fashion 9cool! look at me, the flat-tracker!) I found myself hitting the ground; turns out I got one tire on each side of an abandoned pipe. The bike was okay but I had a difficult time getting it started. In between breaths I realized my ribs were brused, arm scraped, and jesery wasted. That was not good, and knew it was time to retire.

Back at camp I let the group know their rider was still out there. It's good I had loaded my bike earlier as I did not have the energy nor desire by then.

I checked in with the promoter and he said all was fine and thanks for the help, especially all the weekends leading up to this one.

Rider turnout was over 200. Results can be found tomorrow at NMDRC.com.