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The First Race @ Glen Helen 6-Hour GP – Dirt Rider Magazine

By: Courtney Sullivan

Monday, May 4, 2009

Team 55; thanks Lori and Breanna for an awesome experience! (and for putting up with me!)/></a>
<p class="wp-caption-text">Team 55; thanks Lori and Breanna for an awesome experience! (and for putting up with me!)</p>
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<p>For many of us riding is just a hobby. It’s something we do casually on the weekends with our friends in the desert or the woods. Sometimes, if we’re lucky, we can jet to the track on a weekday and burn in a few laps. And if we’re luckier still (or determined enough), we might enter a race or two in hopes to live out our secret dreams of being a big name rider. I’ll admit, I’ve had those “how cool would it be…” dreams just like anyone else, but whether it was a fear of failing or a lack of know-how, I never entered a race. That all changed one afternoon after reading an e-mail from Jimmy Lewis.It was Friday, and I was getting ready to go ride for the weekend with my family and meet up with some guys and gals from the DirtRider.com forums. I signed into my e-mail before I left for one last check. There was a message in my inbox titled “Riding GH 6-Hour GP” from Lewis, Jimmy. I opened it thinking I had received it by mistake, when I saw the opening:”Courtney, Would you like to ride on an all-girl team at the Glen Helen 6-hour GP on the Dirt Rider CRF250X from the torture test?”My immediate reaction was, “WHAT?!” I wrote Jimmy back with my enthusiastic response explaining that I would love to be a part of the race as long as no one on my team minded that I had never raced before. The panic set in shortly after I clicked “send.” I was going to race my first race a week from Sunday; it would be a Grand Prix at a track I’ve never been to, on a bike I’ve never ridden, for six hours, with two women whom I’ve never met. Oh, and they both hold national titles. Just what exactly was I getting myself into?Sometime over the weekend, I received an e-mail from Lori Conway, my new teammate. Lori is an expert desert racer with the number one plates to prove it. She is fast…actually, really fast, and clearly knows how to handle herself in competition. Her infinite amounts of knowledge really helped to calm me down before the race. She works for Honda R&D and was the person who orchestrated our whole team. We exchanged phone numbers and proceeded to chat about our riding backgrounds, the race, the course, and our team. Our other teammate was Breanna Jones, daughter of AMA Hall of Famer, Gary Jones. Breanna is also amazing on a bike: fast and consistent. She was the anchor of our team, and rightfully so; she rides Glen Helen often and knows her way around. Did I mention she’s Miss Teen California? This girl is multi-talented on two opposite ends of the spectrum. I felt like I had some high expectations to meet.The week leading up to the race flew by. Before I knew it, Sunday morning had come and I was jumping in the van at five a.m. to get to Glen Helen by seven. I was informed to look for a red F-250 and a black Sprinter van with the red Honda Wing painted on the side. I finally got to meet my teammates and see the bike I would be racing: a Pro Circuit-Honda CRF250X from the Dirt Rider Torture Test. We found our pit spot, signed in, got our transponder, and got ready to race.While we were unloading, people stared at the new Honda Sprinter van; after all it is pretty cool. With its custom paint job, and plethora of tools and parts, it was difficult not to come and take a look. I started to get really nervous about the whole race: I didn’t belong here among these talented women with a Honda van as my pit! It didn’t help that Lori kept introducing me to people as “the girl Jimmy Lewis said could handle it.” Now I knew I had some big shoes to fill. I tried to relax, but I couldn’t help but wonder if the pros always felt so awkward having everyone gawk at their pits too.At the riders’ meeting, we were told that the course was a little over eight miles long and faster than previous years. It started with a short motocross section that led up into the hills for some ridge riding. From there, the course dropped down a steep down hill into a ‘corkscrew’ designed to slow riders down before attempting to climb a set of stairs up to a bridge. After the bridge there were a few short corners that set us up for a fairly steep climb back into the ridgelines. Once at the top, we would encounter silt beds, silty hills, and some single track through the trees. The trails opened up into some pavement followed by a few tunnels, hills, and pit row. At the opposite end of the pits, there were some flat-track turns, small jumps, and a sand wash. The course ended with the endurocross section, complete with logs and Earth-Mover tires, before restarting.The start was Le Man’s style and the five teams in the women’s class would start in the fourth row of the six. Lori decided to start, I would go second, and Breanna would go third; each of us would ride for about an hour and then we would switch. Lori had a great start and was a head of a lot of people coming into the first turn. Unfortunately, a rider in the row ahead of Lori crashed going over the first jump and broke his leg. By the time Lori came through, flaggers were waving the riders to the right of the jump and a bottleneck started to form. Things only became more congested at the corkscrew when a rider went down trying to climb the stairs. After that it was mayhem as almost every rider trying to attempt the stairs crashed or looped out: any run they had at the staircase was eliminated by the mass mounts of people trying to cram close together. I saw all of this in the first five minutes of the race; she hadn’t even hit the logs yet! Just how am I supposed to stay calm when people better than me were crashing left and right?
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Breanna brings in Team 55 with a strong finish./></a>
<p class="wp-caption-text">Breanna brings in Team 55 with a strong finish.</p>
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<p>Fortunately, when it was my turn to ride, Lori had some good tips and information about the course that calmed me down. I jumped on the bike with butterflies in my stomach ready to give it my all. The 250X handled wonderfully. It had ample power and I was impressed its responsiveness to the throttle. It was smooth and easy to control, and very maneuverable. It was very clear this bike had some work done to it and that it would be a great bike to ride for the day.I made it to through the first section with out a hitch until coming to the endurocross section. I conquered the first log with out any complications, but the second one proved to be a bit more of a challenge. I tipped sideways and scrambled to get the bike up before getting run over. Lucky for me, in this section you could be helped out if you needed it, so Breanna and my brother were there to get me up and over. Almost immediately I noticed something was wrong. The throttle was way too sticky. I figured I could manage, so I just kept going.My throttle got progressively worse very quickly: it was either all on or all off. By the time I hit the silt hills it took all my strength to twist it in either direction. I even ended up stalling in a silt hill since I was unable to keep my engine revving. Apparently when I fell on the logs I bent the hand guard, which was preventing the throttle from twisting.Being new to racing, I didn’t know you were allowed to leave the course to fix your bike and restart where you left off, so I rode out over seven miles of an eight mile course with a locked throttle. The entire time I couldn’t help but think I was letting my team down by going so slow. I pulled into the pits frantic to explain why I was so late and hoping to give my forearms a rest; working that throttle lead to insane arm pump! The throttle was a quick fix and I was off for my second lap. This lap I could focus more on actually racing instead of just getting back to the pits. I quickly realized the scariest part of racing is the faster people passing you. I distinctly remember being passed by Robby Bell and thinking I had no business being on a course with guys like him.Upon completing my much quicker second lap, Breanna jumped on the bike. She got in three laps in the time I had gotten in my first two. She definitely helped our team make up the lost time from my sticky throttle. Like a true WORCS rider, she would come through the pits, grab a water bottle on the fly, and continue on. With her third lap completed, Lori jumped back on for one more lap. In what seemed like the time it took for me to put on my helmet and gloves, Lori was back to the pits. She had hauled on this one! She decided to only do one lap and let Breanna and I get in the extras. So, once again, she warned me of the rough conditions that lay ahead.Just as Lori had said, the course was eaten up. The hills were rutty, the silt was deeper, the ridges had tons of squared edges, turns had multiple berms, and the dust was terrible. Fenders, sprockets, and hand guards riddled the course as a true testament to the increased complexity of the course. Apparently, some poor fellow on a Kawasaki was missing a perfectly intact front fender; for the life of me I can figure out how that happened! But, despite the more difficult conditions, my lap times were better. In fact, my final lap of the day was my fastest time.Eager to get in as many laps as we could, Breanna left the pits one last time. We knew she could definitely get in two laps before the checkered flag, providing nothing went wrong. It would be a race to get in three. But, true to form, she was consistent and got all three laps in. She pulled through the finish line just after the checkers dropped. Our total number of laps for the day was thirteen: Lori completed three, I completed four, and Breanna completed six.With the race over, we loaded the bikes back into the Honda Sprinter and set off for home. My first race experience was amazing; it was nothing I expected it to be. Instead of being terrified the entire time, I actually had a lot of fun. I managed my stress and held my own on a new bike. My times weren’t the best, but they weren’t as terrible as I thought I had done. I even got the whole race experience: everything from a tricked out bike to a company van in the pits. Our final standing was second place. Not too bad in my opinion; especially for my first race. So, how about that 12 Hour?</p></div>

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