Roselawn, Indiana Hill&Gully Enduro this Sunday

[Bob Brooks]

I haven't seen any threads on the Roselawn enduro yet, which surprises me. Anyone planning to go? I've never ridden an enduro, but I'm planning to try it on Sunday, along with Anne, and two of other buddies. We're going to try to get on same minute and ride together, see what it's all about and make it a fun ride. Look forward to seeing some of you there.

 

[Layton]

Bob,

I'll be there.

I'm comming over on Sunday morning. I'd rather go Saturday night and stay over but someone else is driving and he wants to leave Sunday morning.
The forecast for Sunday is 80 with a 30% chance of showers. Thats about as good as can be expected this time of the year.

They will probably let you ride together. Roselawn isn't hard, its just long with quite a few whoops. If you are riding together for fun then you will have a good time.

I'll look for you. I'll be in a blue Dodge extended van. Looks like a church van!

Watch out for the bares. ;)

 

[VOR 492]

Hey Bob, We meet at one of the Fox Valley H/S The Roselawn Enduro is always fun, they have a great 10 mile loop in the woods on the nuddie camp, which is usally run twice. And a good sugar sand section in the miller woods. and a few whoops like layton said.
Stop on by I will be in the Large Starcraft Toy Box

Bill

 

[FlyinRyan]

Hey Bob about time you guys tried an enduro, you'll love the giant trail ride!

I'll be there, had to pass up the National Enduro in Colorado. We'll be camping. Look for me in the morning and we can try to signup togther if you want. I can at least try to explain what is going on while we ride.

A couple of notes: The sign up line can get long at Roselawn so try to get there early. Also bring a spare gas can, they have one gas at the start and one gas out on the course that they typical take a gas trailer out to.

See ya there.

 

[Layton]

Bob and Anne,
It seems we lied, that was not what we expected mostly due to the weather!
I wrote a little report and posted it below. Now lets here from the rest of you. :)

What a experience! Roselawn's enduro turned into a real enduro.

The day didn’t start real well when I drew a 13 for our group. It seems my riding partners felt a later number would be better. (Little did they know at that time. ;) )

The first section was through the nudist colony. It was hot, tight, and full of mosquitoes. Oh yeah, I did see two bares in that section. As bad as the bugs were I was surprised to see any.

The second section was long and started with a long series of whoops to tire you out before you ever got into the woods. I actually had a lot of fun in this section plus it started to cloud over and cool off just a little. We got to the gas stop where the club was kind enough to provide water, which was a nice touch. Unfortunately there were even more mosquitoes then at the start.

After a nice break it was off to the next section. What an adventure. Right off the bat there are swamps everywhere. With the early number they were rideable but I have to wonder what they were like for the later riders. Then the sky got blacker and blacker. I mean it was so dark in the woods that you really did need a head light to see where you were going. I can truthfully say that in over 30 years of off road riding I can’t ever remember a time when it was that dark in the woods. As we were finishing that section it strarted to rain, not bad at first but enough to let you know it was coming. We stopped at a reset along the road and soon it was raining really hard. There was nothing you could do but stand there and get wet as there was no shelter of any kind. The wind was blowing so hard that bikes were tipping over. Our minute to leave came and went somewhere in the middle of that storm but we didn’t go. You couldn’t see anything. Finaly we took off on the road and went back to the start. Even that was difficult because it was still raining hard. I hate to even think of what it was like back in that last woods section during that storm.

I didn’t like the idea of not finishing but the guys I came with wanted to go back and even more important, I would have had to ride the rest of the event with no goggles and I didn’t like that idea. When I was younger it wouldn’t have botherd me but it’s not worth loosing an eye over a “maybe” trophy. At least not to me.

Anyway, I had fun which is what it is all about.
:thumb:

 

[Bob Brooks]

Yeah Layton, it was an experience yesterday, that's a fact. I rode up a little ride report for some of friends earlier this morning and I'll paste it here and let you know how our day went...

<<Well, the Roselawn Enduro was good and bad yesterday. Don, Brent, Anne and I decided to ride the enduro since none of us has ever done one before. We all rode on the same minute and decided to make a fun, group trail ride out of it. The day started out well. The weather was good and the course was fun, but tight. The first 9-mile section was especially tight and technical. The trees were really close together and there were lot of downed trees from all the recent storms, so we did a lot of log hopping and maneuvering around the bigger trees. The terrain was real similar to the riding in Michigan except it was much tighter. The trees were thicker and closer together and it was all tight singletrack.

After the first section, we did about a three-mile road section and then headed back into the woods. The next section was more fun than the first, in my opinion. Anne rode well until the last couple of miles of the second section and then she got really tired and started making a lot of mistakes. Finally, we reached the gas stop, which was supposedly a little less than halfway through the 75-mile course. At that point, Anne decided to pack it in and call it a day. She was spent at that point and I didn’t think it was a good idea for her to continue (particularly since she's 3-months pregnant), although she wanted to. After we filled up with gas, she hooked up with a couple of other guys who were also dropping out, and the three of them took roads back to camp. She had a good day…probably 35-miles or so of really technical riding and the best decision she made all day was electing NOT to continue on with Brent, Don and me.

After the gas stop, things got really interesting for us. The weather took a huge change. It had been sunny and humid all morning but then it got really dark and gray and the clouds opened up. The rain came and it was just a torrential downpour with thunder, lightening, high winds and the whole nine yards…very hurricane-like conditions. We rode for several miles in absolute driving rain and it actually wasn’t too bad. The worst part was vision. It was dark in the woods at that point and with wet goggles, none of us could see anything so we had to take off our goggles and ride without eye protection, which really sucked. I can’t tell you how many times I got poked in the eye with leaves and tree branches. My eyes are still flushing out dirt and sand this morning.

Things got really interesting when we reached a point in the trail that involved a water crossing. The water crossing was probably a piece of cake before the rain came, but it was a bear by the time we hit it and we all got stuck in it and had to help each other through. Immediately after the water crossing, we entered a literal swamp. The whole trail and area was under at least two-feet of standing water and it was like that for probably two miles. It was like riding in the Florida everglades. It wasn’t that bad if you kept moving in the water. You basically had to keep some momentum up and look for any vegetation, which meant there was higher ground. But if you tried to stop, hit the brakes or pulled your clutch in, you would sink and run the risk of getting stuck. Don got his Gas Gas buried at one point in the swamp and it took the three of us probably 15 minutes to get him out. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a bike stuck quite that badly where it took three men that long to wiggle it out. At one point in the swamp, we reached a deep water crossing that had a wooden bridge crossing it. The water was so deep from the rain that the wooden bridge was buried. That was an interesting ordeal...one of us had to stand on the bridge in the water so that we could walk our bikes across it.

After fighting through the swamp for two or three miles, things got better. It was still wet, but the sand was thick and while there were puddles everywhere, they weren’t deep and you could ride around them or through them with no trouble. Once we made it through one particularly long section and hit the road again, we decided to pack it in and head back. By that point, we had been riding for hours and still had a long way to go before the finish. Poor Don was so tired by then that his bike was riding him and he was also having some bad leg cramp problems. With the trail conditions and the shape that Don was in physically, I think we would’ve run out of daylight before we finished. So, when we got back on the next road section, we rode back to camp and called it a day. When we got back to camp, most of the field had already left for the day and we learned that nearly everyone had dropped out before finishing.

All in all, it was a good time and I was glad we went, but I’d like to try it again under more reasonable conditions.

 

[rda]

i made it a little further then you guys. I finally threw in the towel at the 98 mile mark. I actually started the section after that mile, but once I got into the woods I started floundering around and realized that I wasn't having any fun at all anymore, so why go on? I have finished enough 'survival' runs in my life that I don't need to prove anything to myself anymore.

you guys need to come down for the matthews, IN dualsport this weekend. If we don't get anymore rain, it should be great. the best part, no sand! Roselawn never has been one of my favorite runs because of the sand, but I usually have enough fun in the less sandy sections to make up for it. That wasn't the case this year though! it was good up untill gas though I guess.

 

[WaltCMoto]

WOW, that was a tough one. Bob, what minute were you on. I would be with Don on this one. You guys are all troopers for coming out smiling on this one.

Congrats to Anne and Bob on the 1 in the oven.

 

[Layton]

Originally posted by rda
I have finished enough 'survival' runs in my life that I don't need to prove anything to myself anymore.

you guys need to come down for the matthews, IN dualsport this weekend. If we don't get anymore rain, it should be great. .

That is exactly why I quit when I did. When I was younger I never quit until I houred out. (and that wasn't often) Now days I ride for fun. I didn't think riding in the rain with no eye protection would be a lot of fun or even very smart so the heck with it.

I'm planning on attending the event at matthews. I tried to start a thread on it earlier but got no response. How much rain have you had? Is there a lot of single track? What's the camping like? My wife is planning on coming with me and if there are a ton of mosquitoes like Roselawn had then we will just go to a motel.
If you want you can email me at lerickson@nobel-net.com or start a new thread and tell us more.

Thanks!

 

[AnneBrooks]

Thanks, Walt! We were on the LAST minute, so we barely got through to the gas stop before it started to rain. When I started on the road the monsoon started and was that scary! It was pouring hard and there was lightnening and thunder on both sides of me. I was scared to death! When I finally got back to the van, Kodiak (the smart one) was inside the van, dry. Morgan (the collie) did not fare so well--he got his leash wrapped around the canopy and had to hide under the van. He does not like storms either, so he was shaking--poor puppy! Oh well, I would try another one, but not when they are calling for a monsoon!

 

[FlyinRyan]

I thought about you guys (Bob, Anne and group) when I was at the gas available and it starting raining, then pouring. I rememebered that you guys were on the last minute which put you guys in the swamp during the rain. I thought they are not going to be happy with us for telling them this is was a fun enduro. Glad that you guys made it out ok.

As for me I knew we were in trouble when our bikes got knocked over when the winds came. Like an idoit AA rider I charged on in the pouring rain. I rain-x'd the goggles and went into the next section. The goggles only lasted about 2 miles, then all the leaves and sand were stuck them so of they came. Then I lost my brakes and most of my vision and went down a few times. After that I say a friends dad and borrowed some brake pads and went into the next section 3 minutes late. Could tell not many people had gone on as there were no trails. Most of the arrows had folded over and were hard to see. Rode the rest of the sections with no goggles, not much fun. The trails actually weren't bad as the sand sucked up most of the water. They did cut us off at the end, we didn't ride all the of the nudiest colony, only about 1 or so. Was happy with that as I didn't have much brakes left and 9 more miles with no goggles wasn't going to be any fun.

I ended up 4th AA, 4th Overall I think.

And I would recommend the trail ride in IN this weekend. If this is the one that the enduro club puts on, they have some great / fun trail.

 

[rda]

layton,

we have had quite a bit of rain over the last few weeks, this event was actually supposed to be held 2 weeks ago but was postponed due to flooding. It did rain a little yesterday. I havn't heard the forecast for the rest of the week though. If it's wet, it will be slick due to the clay down here. It doesn't get as bad as the southern ohio clay though. They have a website at http://www.muddobbersmc.org/ you can check it for the latest info.