What: A trip to Texas to moto! Who: Me (Chris Smith), Mike Wade, Jamison Holt and Rod Burger, all Dirt Rider members When: 2-11-05 to 2-18-05 Where: My crazy uncle's place in Austin as a base of operations, lots of other riding areas Why: Cause winter sucks and it was 85 degrees there!
First off, you have to hear about my Uncle Dude from Austin Texas. He's over 70, but owns 2 street bikes
and drives a 300+ hp Formula Firebird that's very nice. Every time I drive it, instead of
the usual response when you loan out a nice car ("PLEASE BE CAREFUL WITH MY BABY!"), he says,
"Slide them tires!" My first memory in life is taking a ride in his brand new Corvette.
Anyhoo, I've been down there 4 times to visit (2x with my brother on out streetbikes,
once with my whole family in the car and last October by myself on my new streetbike
by myself. The weather is great, the roads are great, and you
won't find a better host than my Uncle Dude. He has been riding since the 50's and actually
was involved in starting the sport of motocross in Okinawa when stationed there
in the 60's. There's a plaque on his wall from the people of Okinawa, thanking him for that
Of course, back then it was called scrambles. He actually motocrossed a Triumph 650 twin.
So, yeah, he's a little different. We've always been very close, but more so in the last 10 years.
It all started when Jamison and Rod got to scheming about a winter ride.
They'd been talking about going somewhere warm to ride in the winter for years.
Rod mentioned that he'd heard me talk about my uncle in Texas and Jamison emailed me
and planted the seed. I initially said there was no way, but then it just
started sounding really good. I called up my uncle and asked if he would consider bunking
4 rambunctious "Boyz from Illinoiz" and he was immediately all fired up. Every
couple days, he would email me and ask how our plans were coming together. We
had to do a lot of that, but finally the big day came.
Here's some pictures to start with to introduce the folks.
From the left: Jamison Holt, Mike Wade, Rod Burger and me, Chris Smith (aka webguy).
Again, from the left: Local guy/cousin Harvey, our host and my Uncle Dude, aka Lew Gregg
and me, the tourista
Mike, loading up
Rod, standing there with his new baby, 05 CRF-450, THE bike to have.
He broke it in at Cycle Ranch and let me ride it, it's CRAZY.
SOOO easy to ride, great handling and suspension, I gotta have one.
My cousin Roger rode up from Houston to visit
If you take a picture at exactly the right moment, you can make someone look really dorky.
I apply this advanced technique in this picture of Rod.
On Wednesday, those guys went riding, I stayed home and visited with Dude and nursed my wounds
and we headed out around 11 the next day. Other than my injury, it went pretty darn good.
My uncle liked my friends and my friends liked my uncle. Dude wants to make it
an annual thing. I may have to stay married though!
