Updated - 12/10/2005 - Shaun drones on and on and on about Mini O's....

To The Right Coast

 Ok so we get back from the trip to California, and I have exactly one week to get the truck ready for the Mini Olympics. Well, I would have had one week if Dave hadn’t decided to take the 18 wheeler from Glen Helen to Paris and ride all day. I heard he was the fastest over 30 novice rider there! Well needless to say it was a crazy week getting prepared for Florida. Our bikes didn’t come in from Honda, so we were scrambling trying to get some bikes for my new riders. John Starling bought some 85’s and was trying desperately to get them dialed in for Justin. Clyde Mays did the same for Brandon. Sean Hackley bought one 250F and we borrowed the others from some of my friends here in Houston, (Thanks Blake Revels!!!!). Terren O’Dell is also new to the team, we borrowed Zeb Smith’s bikes for this race. Zeb was hurt at the Branson race and would not be attending. (he will be better and railing again soon). The coolest thing about that is the boys are really good friends, Terren even ran Zeb’s number 63 at Florida. I thought that was super cool so I wanna send a shout out to Zeb and Terren, you boys are awesome.

The trip to Florida would start off ok with me following the 18 wheeler in my truck pulling my 44 foot trailer. My wife was following us cause she was going to spend Thanksgiving with my mom in Florida. So we are less then 100 miles out of Houston when Dave starts passing this greyhound bus. Just as he passes it he turns on his blinker and shoots across the 8 lanes and off the highway. There was nothing we could do but wave at him as we passed. 100 miles into our trip and Dave ditches us! I called him and said,” what’s up”? He say’s,”I Had my blinker on”. Whatever, at least we can’t get lost cause I know the way. Driving across east Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi was pretty wild. We were amazed at all the destruction from the recent hurricanes. There is no way to describe it, you just have to see it. There were people still living in tents everywhere, it was pretty sad.

I got a phone call from Eddie Ray, he was going to Davy Milsaps’s and wanted to know if Vann could go with them. I asked Vann if he wanted to go and he said,”Heck yes I do”! So Vann got to ride at Milsaps’s house while we continued driving.

We get to Florida and Dave actually passed us. He called us somewhere around Gainesville, and said,” He was needin some fuel”. Just as we caught him, he gets off the highway and just turns right down some two lane road, thinking……..I don’t know what the heck he was thinking but I know he was kinda trippin when he had to turn that big-o truck around in somebody’s front yard. AND he never got any fuel! We got to the track and got everything parked. Then we went to town to do some grocery shopping and eat some lunch. The lunch thing went fairly well, we went to the Pubix to shop. Dave, Josh and I were at the deli getting some lunch meat when this older gentleman walks up next to me. All the sudden this hideous, nasty smell just started burning our noses like ammonia. Dave and Josh all run off laughing and pointing at me. The old guy is just standing there, looking all confused; I guess he was used to his own farts. Then Dave just runs off with the cart, I mean he was running up and down the isles and laughing like he had just watched the Dave Chappelle show. Josh and I are left trying to get our stuff and carry it in our arms. Dave runs by the end of the isle laughing all the way. I didn’t know three grown men could have so much fun in the grocery story.

Back at the track, we got all set up and then we all walked the tracks. The supercross track was awesome, a little more mellow then years past, but the whoops were huge. The motocross track was basically the same but the giant step up known as the elevator was gone. It was now a smaller step up. That was pretty cool cause a bunch of kids wrecked there before.

Everything was set up and really practice did not start until Monday so that meant we had a day to kill before everything got wild. Eddie and Jessica were there (the motocross version of Nick and Jessica on the Newlyweds), so we loaded up the truck and went to a supermoto slash go kart track. We also met a friend of Eddie’s who’s name was Brandon, I guess these guys had raced supermoto before, cause the first thing Brandon said was,”It don’t even hurt when you crash”. We got there and got all suited up, he was in all leather, and I was in my Troy Lee designs motocross gear. After a couple of laps, I started to kinda get the hang of it. At first I wasn’t even taking my feet off the pegs. So I slowed up some so that Brandon would lap me and I could take some lessons by watching him. He passed me and sure enough I started getting my feet off the pegs and even sliding it a little into the corners. The pace was getting a little faster, and then faster, and then Brandon throws er down like a dirty rag and wads it up right in front of me! I thrust my hands up in victory and did my cool down lap proclaiming, I am the champ! Then I asked him if it hurt now. Josh did like a million laps and was really starting to get the hang of it. He was really pitching it into the corners. Then it starts sprinkling a little. He comes into the corner right where we are standing, pitches it in there and runs right of the track and into the grass. He slid across the grass and catches the run off road, that some how stood him back up. Narrowly escaping a big Brandon like crash. He turned right into the pits and was done for a while.

Then the go karts came out Vann was in the first wave, he was so slow. He got lapped on his third lap. I stood on the side of the track with my hands above my head like an angry mini dad. Finally he comes in and I ask him,” What’s up, you look like a girl not wanting to get dirty at a mud wrestling contest”. He says,”I had it floored”! After further inspection we found out that he couldn’t reach the pedals. We fixed him up with a pillow and he did much better.

Now the big boys go out. It was Eddie, Jessica, Brandon and my self. Josh was scared cause he was hooked on the super retard thing and it was raining a little. Now these we not your average go karts, these things were pretty fast. We traded the lead a bunch of times and we went of the track a bunch. Jessica went so far off the track, she was in the grass. I was cutting one corner and the dirt would fly over my head like a cloud, nobody behind me could see! When we were done, Eddie told Josh, ”If yer gonna go out there again, be careful cause there is dirt and rocks all over the track”! Josh walked back to the truck all bummed out and changed his clothes.

Practice was on Monday. At these nationals you get very little time on the track. Usually three or four laps is all you get. Vann and I have been talking about it a bunch. He went out and by the second lap jumped everything. I was stoked, as was he.

The supercross races were going so fast, we were late for Vann’s first race and didn’t get to draw a spoon, he had to start all the way on the outside. We weren’t late for the next one. All our riders were doing very well Justin Starling, Brandon Mays, Tyler Bowers, Terren O’Dell, Adam Chatfield, Ashley Fiolek, Jase Lewis, Ronny Jackson, Sean Hackley all qualified for their mains up front. The track builders did their best to make the track safe. In one section there was a small triple, a tabletop, and then another tabletop right after that. Well somebody jumped from one tabletop to the other making one huge jump. It was insane, and once one kid did it, a bunch more did it. Jase Lewis was the first victim, he was leading his race when he came up a little short and got thrown over the bars breaking his collar bone. Next, Tyler Bowers was leading the four stroke class when he jumped it in lapped traffic. He tried to correct so as not to land on another rider and landed on the side of the jump. It was one of the scariest crashes I have seen. He was knocked out for a long time. He finally came to, and they flew him out of there in a helicopter. Turns out he only had a bruised spleen, but he was very lucky.

Then just as I thought things couldn’t get much worse, Sean Hackley wrecks on like the second lap of his race. He was in about 5^th or 6^th and he wrecked in the whoops. He was ok and crawling of the track so he wouldn’t get run over. A flagger was in front of him when another rider ran off the track hitting the flagger and Sean, breaking his collar bone.

Geeze two days into it and three of my best riders hurt. Ok now for one of the funniest things I have seen all week. Jimmy Albertson was in around 4^th or 5^th and charging. He went through the whoops and I guess missed his brakes sending him over the berm and right into a photographer. He hit the guy square on knocking him out of his shoes, and his pants. Jimmy scrambled back to his bike as fast as he could, leaving the guy standing there with his camera in his boxers. All I could think was, I hope he got the shot!

Everything was going a lot better with our 85cc riders! Terren O’Dell was tearin it up. This was his first ride on the Honda’s and they were borrowed on top of that. Josh spent a bunch of time on the bikes, including splitting the cases on one just because it looked like it needed it. He ended up putting new bearings in it plus a top end. Then Terren went on to win the Supermini class on that bike, both supercross and motocross. That was way cool!

Brandon Mays was at the front all week as was Justin Starling. Vann struggled with starts. He never drew below a 25 spoon. He did holeshot and led most of the 85cc 7-11 stock consi in supercross. He was passed on the last lap, but ended up second. Good enough to get in the show. He is still learning.

The motocross all went good again for Terren, Brandon, and Justin. Terren won two Classes.  Brandon ended up third in both his classes. Justin got a couple bad starts in his finals and crashed a couple times. He is a great rider with a big heart, so I am sure he with turn it all around. Adam Chatfield was riding awesome. He won the first four stroke moto. But in the second he started in about third. They were going through the S turns right before the drop off, when the guy in second crashes. Adam ran right into his bike, between the rear wheel and the fender, and got stuck. The other 30 or 35 riders behind him started pilling up like a train running into a brick wall. He never fell, but he just started getting deeper and deeper in the pile. They finally got freed up and Adam did the best he could but only mustered like a 12^th.

I was really stoked for all my guys at Florida. Looks like, this is going to be one of our best years. We have some great riders and some great families.

Now we get to go home!

Oh yea, I am on my way to Arizona for a week.

But that will be another story. All I can say is…….. HARD ON EQUIPMENT!

Updated - 11/17/2005 - Shaun summarizes the vet nationals....

Third Coast to West Coast

Once a year we here at Honda of Houston put together a trip that is just for all out fun and we invite every single old guy we know to have some fun with us. We actually do this every weekend, but this time we loaded them up in our truck and took them across the country. This is the 21^st annual White Brothers World Vet Championship, held at Glen Helen in San Bernardino, California. 22 riders over the age of thirty accepted the invite, so we loaded up the truck and headed to Beverly, hills that is, swimming pools, movie stars.

This is my story and you can take for what you want but most of it really happened.

We left Houston and it was Naveen (factory mechanic for Josh Grant), Dave (factory truck driver for Honda of Houston), and myself (factory uuh other truck driver?). As we headed across the country we were making some pretty good time, even though Dave has to potty every 20 minutes. He must drink two gallons of water an hour! We stopped to get the truck washed and heard the same old story from a truck driver, about how he used to have a CB 350 and he flipped it over backward at 160 miles an hour. Then as we were standing there a couple of truckers were working on the lights on his truck. I noticed that the trailer number was 21, so Naveen distracted the drivers while I cleaned off a spot and stuck one of my number plate stickers on the truck. We got the truck cleaned and then headed straight to a dirt road leading to my good friend Bobby White’s track in Phoenix, Arizona.