What an adventure we had this weekend! Evan had the plan to head up to Lucerne Valley to watch the Lucerne 250 race and meet up with some guys from Dezert Dimes. We loaded up around 7 and hit the freeway. Around 10 we stopped in Wrightwood to meet up with Wild Will. He pulled in around 10:30 after a little run in in some traffic on the 15. Apparently in bumper to bumper traffic, someone cut though a gap and barreled into him at about 25 miles per hour. He has a Ford Ranger PreRunner truck, caged in the back. The guy that hit him was in a brand new Mustang, and his car went straight up under the back of his truck, burying his mustang up to the windshield. His rear tires were literally lifted off the ground, so he couldn’t pull off of the mustang. The guy had to floor it to get out from underneath him, and apparently he had just got his car out of the body shop from a previous accident!

We left wrightwood around 11 and made it up to victorville a few minutes later. From there it was 45 minutes of driving through the middle of nowhere without a light to be seen for miles. After three wrong turns down dirt roads, we finally stopped and pulled up directions on my treo. Thank god for 21st century technology and GPS. Finally rolled in to the main pits around 2am, and could not find any of the DD guys. (Bad directions were due to one of them being completely blasted). We bombed around the pits for a while before staking out a campsite on top of a nearby hill. The wind was so bad (up to 13mph) that it took another 30 minutes just to get our tent up, but once we had it set up, a good 30 pack of coors light eased the pain from the trip and we hit the sack.

I woke up around 6 am and checked out the sunrise, which was pretty awesome from the hilltop. I sat on the back of my truck and checked out the start of the race. The mountain we were on was right next to the track, so we had an awesome view of the trucks bombing straight by us. There was a professional SCORE racer, pistol pete racing in one of the trucks, and there was a helicopter following his truck and video taping it. These guys were shooting down the straightaway by our campsite at what must have been nearly 60mph, which is pretty sweet because there were tons of whoops down that straightaway.

When everybody was finally up and we broke down our tents, we headed down the hill and found the rest of the Dezert Dimes Crew. Bruce was there pitting for TunnelVision motorsports which was running a ford ranger, but the broke a valve spring at mile 6 on the first lap, and didn’t even get to race more than that. We broke out the dirt bikes and headed out a place on the track called The Wall, which is the biggest jump on the track. Trucks would bomb down this hill and hit that jump and get insane amounts of air. We chilled at the wall for a couple hours and watched truck after truck bomb over that jump, and met a bunch of people who race other trucks.

After riding dirt bikes for a couple hours after that, we decided to pack up the bikes and head out around 4. I decided to take one last run on my bike, which was a bad idea. Never take your last run. I decided to mob up “Gnar Hill”, the biggest one in the area. I got up to the top, but bombed out coming back down and fell hard. I caught my leg on the exhaust pipe, burned a hole in my pants, and still have some of the melted fabric stuck in my leg. Oh well, you win some you lose some.

Overall, it was a sick trip, good times with good buddies, and some great riding in the desert.

LINKS:

http://picasaweb.google.com/icgrist/Lucerne250MDRRace

Youtube Video

Tonight the whole crew is heading up to Lucerne Valley for the MDR Dezert Race. Evan, Anderson, Cam and I are leaving SD around seven with two trucks, three dirt bikes, a shitload of beer and in search of good times.   We’ll be meeting Wild Will off the 15/210 for a DD Caravan up to Lucerne.  A bunch of guys from DezertDimes.com will be up there pitting for a race team and we are going to be camping with them. Race starts around 8am, and we are going to mob around the dezert and watch the race from “the wall” which apparently is one of the hugest jumps on the course. I’ll be back sunday with some sick pictures I probably won’t remember taking. Oh, and and check out what these two idiots were saying:

Fadingfastsd (10:56:29 AM): im so pumped

Fadingfastsd (10:56:33 AM): this is gonna be awesome

Fadingfastsd (10:56:40 AM): cant drink tho

Fadingfastsd (10:56:51 AM): ive got a really bad cold, been sick as shit

DurtySanchezzzzz (10:57:44 AM): Dude, you guys are both pussies

DurtySanchezzzzz (10:58:06 AM): I have been sick too, and I’m drinking

DurtySanchezzzzz (10:59:37 AM): What’s the point of going to the desert if you aren’t drinking

DurtySanchezzzzz (10:59:46 AM): What a waste

Fadingfastsd (11:01:30 AM): fuck you assfuckmo

Fadingfastsd (11:01:36 AM): ill outdrink your ass

Fadingfastsd (11:01:39 AM): that was just a test

Fadingfastsd (11:01:40 AM): pussmo

DurtySanchezzzzz (11:02:44 AM): A test aye? Ya right, I’m sure you’ll accidently “forget” to bring beer tonight, then steal 1 of mine and drink half and pass out bitch

Fadingfastsd (11:03:04 AM): fuck you dirtbaggler

Fadingfastsd (11:03:22 AM): i was born in the desert and raised off the sweat of indians and backbones of rattlesnakes

Fadingfastsd (11:03:41 AM): i piss cactus needles and shit scorpions motherfucker

DurtySanchezzzzz (11:04:00 AM): Hahahhaaha

Fadingfastsd (11:04:02 AM): i can live off the land longer than daniel fucking boone

Fadingfastsd (11:05:03 AM): I can smoke peyote for 6 days straight, complete 2 vision quests, and build a teepee before you can get your tent out of the bag

Fadingfastsd (11:05:06 AM): desert rook

DurtySanchezzzzz (11:05:48 AM): Ya right, the closest thing you’ve ever done to the mdr experience is sit behind a screen and watch videos, you couldn’t survive living without a computer alone for more than a day

Fadingfastsd (11:06:14 AM): we’ll see rookmo

Fadingfastsd (11:06:20 AM): ultimate desert challenge starts tonight

Fadingfastsd (11:06:34 AM): the ultimate test of mountain mans mettle

Fadingfastsd (11:07:15 AM): if you don’t have complete confidence in your truck and survival skills and equipment you won’t last a day out there

DurtySanchezzzzz (11:07:34 AM): very true, I finally have other people there to witness your truck barely being able to keep up

DurtySanchezzzzz (11:10:37 AM): Just so you know, I will not help you tow your giant hunk of shit back down the hil when it breaks
DurtySanchezzzzz (11:11:08 AM): Or help your peg legged pos out of the sand

A Montana cowboy was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture  
when suddenly a brand new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him. 
The driver, a young man in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban Sunglasses  
and YSL tie, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, "If I tell you exactly

how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will you give me a calf?" 
The cowboy looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his  
peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, "Sure, why not?" 
The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects  
it to his Cingular RAZR V3 cell phone, and surfs to a NASA Page on the  
Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite navigation System to get an  
exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite  
that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. 
The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports  
it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. 
Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image; has 
been processed and the data stored. 
He then accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected Excel  
spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes,  
receives a response. 
Finally, he prints out a full-color, 15 page report on his hi-tech,  
miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the cowboy and says, 
"You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves." 
"That’s right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves," says the  
Cowboy. 
He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused as  
the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car. 
Then the cowboy says to the young man, "Hey, if I can tell you exactly  
what your business is, will you give me back my calf?" 
The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, "Okay, why not?" 
You’re a Congressman for the US Government", says the cowboy. 
"Wow! That’s correct," says the yuppie, "but how did you guess that?" 
"No guessing was required", answered the cowboy. "You showed up here even  
though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already  
knew, to a question I never asked. You tried to show me how much smarter  
than me you are; and you don’t know a thing about cows…this is a herd of 
sheep.

Now give me back my dog.

John Glenn said this that should make you think a little:

There were 39 combat related killings in Iraq in January.
In the fair city of Detroit there were 35 murders in the
month of January. That’s just one American city,
about as deadly as the entire war-torn country of Iraq

When some claim that President Bush shouldn’t
have started this war, state the following:

a. FDR led us into World War II.
b. Germany never attacked us ; Japan did.
From 1941-1945, 450,000 lives were lost …
an average of 112,500 per year.

c. Truman finished that war and started one in Korea
North Korea never attacked us .
From 1950-1953, 55,000 lives were lost …
an average of 18,334 per year.

d John F. Kennedy started the Vietnam conflict in 1962.
Vietnam never attacked us.

e. Johnson turned Vietnam into a quagmire.
From 1965-1975, 58,000 lives were lost ..
an average of 5,800 per year.

f. Clinton went to war in Bosnia without UN or French consent.
Bosnia never attacked us .
He was offered Osama bin Laden’s head on a platter three
times by Sudan and did nothing. Osama has attacked us on
multiple occasions.

g. In the years since terrorists attacked us , President Bush
has liberated two countries, crushed the Taliban, crippled
al-Qaida, put nuclear inspectors in Libya , Iran , and, North Korea without firing a shot, and captured a terrorist who
slaughtered 300,000 of his own people.
The Democrats are complaining
about how long the war is taking.
But Wait  
It took less time to take Iraq than it took Janet Reno
to take the Branch Davidian compound.
That was a 51-day operation..

We’ve been looking for evidence for chemical weapons
in Iraq for less ti me than it took Hillary Clinton to find
the Rose Law Firm billing records.

It took less time for the 3rd Infantry Division and the
Marines to destroy the Medina Republican Guard
than it took Ted Kennedy to call the police after his
Oldsmobile sank at Chappaquiddick.
It took less time to take Iraq than it took
to count the votes in Florida!!!
Our Commander-In-Chief is doing a GREAT JOB !
The Military morale is high!
The biased media hopes w e are too ignorant
to realize the facts
But Wait  
There’s more!

JOHN GLENN (on the Senate floor - January 26, 2004)
Some people still don’t understand why military personnel
do what they do for a living. This exchange between
Senators John Glenn and Senator Howard Metzenbaum < BR> is worth reading. Not only is it a pretty impressive
impromptu speech, but it’s also a good example of one
man’s explanation of why men and women in the armed
services do what they do for a living.

This IS a typical, though sad, example of what
some who have never served think of the military.
Senator Metzenbaum (speaking to Senator Glenn):
"How can you run for Senate when you’ve never held a real job?"

Senator Glenn (D-Ohio):
"I served 23 years in the United Sta tesMarine Corps.
I served through two wars. I flew 149 missions.
My plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire on 12 different
occasions. I was in the space program. It wasn’t my
checkbook, Howard; it was my life on the line. It was
not a nine-to-five job, where I took time off to take the
daily cash receipts to the bank."
"I ask you to go with me .. . as I went the other day…
to a veteran’s hospital and look those men …
with their mangled bodies . in the eye, and tell THEM
they didn’t hold a job!
You go with me to the Space Program at NASA
and go, as I have gone, to the widows and Orphans
of Ed White, Gus Grissom and Roger Chaffee…
and you look those kids in the eye and tell them
that their DADS didn’t hold a job.

You go with me on Memorial Day and you stand in
Arlington National Cemetery , where I have more friends
buried than I’d like to remember, and you watch
those waving flags.

You stand there, and you think about this nation,
and you tell ME that those people didn’t have a job? < BR>
What about you?"
For those who don’t remember
During W.W.II, Howard Metzenbaum was an attorney
representing the Communist Party in the USA .
Now he’s a Senator!
If you can read this, thank a teacher.
If you are reading it in English thank a Veteran.