Letters
LETTERS
UTAH LAND, A SECOND LOOK
This is a rebuttal to Mr. Ulrich's very well documented article, "They're Opening Up Land in Utah," (CW, Apr. '74).
It seems that the information Mr. Ulrich derived from Mr. Ted Tuttle and other officials from the state of Utah, was and is very much a hypothesis; a tentative assumption made in order to draw out and test its logical or empirical consequences. A layman would sum it up this way: Mr. Tuttle sure sold someone a bill of goods!
I am the commander of the Weber County Sheriffs Motorcycle Patrol; search and rescue is our job. I have been a member of this group for four years. Also, I am a member of the Iron Ponies Motorcycle Club (Hill Air Force Base). Furthermore, I am on the board of directors of the Big Horn Four Wheel Drive Club. I am an ex-motorcycle dealer. I feel that I have been around motorcycles and Utah long enough to tell it like it really is.
If you live in the northern portion of Utah, around Salt Lake City or Ogden, there are very few trails to ride in the mountains. These areas were made by the Forest Service with aid from various local civic groups. The state does not maintain any of these trails.
The city of Ogden ran the cyclist out of the foothills by means of the old scare tactic. There were and still are some great areas for our youngsters to ride. Ogden tried to find a place out of the city for cyclists. They never did find a place nor did they try too hard. Our Parks and Recreation (Mr. Tuttle), went out to an area called Little Mountain with the idea in mind that it might be a great place for RVs. They decided not to use this land because it is a small 30-degree knoll in the middle of the Great Salt Lake salt flats. Even the rabbits won’t live there! There is no water—salt water, maybe.
I recently learned that Ogden city fathers talked the state into making a RV area anyway, around 10 to 15 miles out of town. The state lost this land!
Now if you go south to the canyon lands, Arches National Park, etc., you can find a lot of jeep roads that run around most of the canyon parks. Most of these are in a federal park. Yes, the state has a neat motorcycle park just out of Moab, Utah. This park is called Slip Rock Trail. I have to admit it^^not too bad, except for one thing. Yapare on pure sandstone all of the time.
In order to get around this area, the state has painted white lines. It has been so long since they were painted that the weather has worn them off. You need a map to get around (we couldn’t find a map). This park is about 340 to 400 miles from the larger populace of the state.
Our Parks and Recreation decided the RV people needed a place to go, so they opened up a park called the Sand Dunes. This is an area of straight sand, just like you find in the good old desert.
Your article states that 70 percent of Utah is comprised of federal land. Here are some facts and figures compiled by the Utah Outdoor Recreational Agency, United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Utah State University:
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The most intriguing aspect of recrea tion in Utah is the great variety of terrain and climate. The sad thing about our recreational program is that, of the 52,969,690 acres of land that Utah comprises, only 653,000 acres are spe cifically set aside for state and federal parks. This represents only 1 .3 percent of the total state land acreage. Nearly 87 percent of state land is used for some type of agricultural production, with 13.4 million used for grazing.
By the year 1985, more than 1,096,000 acres of additional land will be needed for outdoor recreation. Our state had a chance to buy a large section of land called "Desert Land and Lives tock Ranch," which consists of appr xi mately 200,000 acres. However, turned this wonderful area down.
As for the roving patrol referred to in your article, most of the rangers who patrol on bikes have just learned to ride. In all the time I have been riding, I have never run into any of these people out patrolling. I ride a 125cc, but I'd like to see one of them catch me! That is the way most of the bike riders feel, be cause the Parks and Recreation has no plan to give them for their money.
I do have to agree on one issue-that is the budget cutbacks. I, along with others from this state, find three reasons for the budget problems.
1. Our state has a general fund. The biggest portion of the money for this fund comes from Fish and Game, Parks and Recreation, but these divisions never receive back what they put in. The money is distributed to all agei~s.
2. Mr. Tuttle cannot get the st2Wo back his program because it is not working as well as he thinks it should.
3. Parks and Recreation is trying too hard to cram the program down our throats. For example, Mr. Tuttle and a few of his park rangers decided to make a little money for their program. So they went to a few races on private land and tried to collect $5 for RV registra tion. They got away with it a couple of times until they ran across a couple of people with knowledge of the RV law.
"Think of it! Just drive up to the gate of your neighborhood state-oper ated-and-maintained MX track, flash your $5-a-year ORV registration, and race! It could happen," says your arti cle. That's right, it could happen. I'm not holding my breath! I may turn blue in the meantime, for as far as I can find out, there are no such areas yet. Mr. Tuttle sure is right about r biggest challenges to overcome, which are financing and exaggerated fears of local residents.
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You can bet your sweet hippy tha all of the work the Parks and Recreatior did to help the Cherry Creek problem was to feather its own nest. If the rac wasn't put on, they (the state), woulc lose $5 a bike from those not alread3 registered. The race was on, and it wa~ wall-to-wall park rangers.
As for Dave Eccies, he is a heck of a nice person, but don't you think he had to sum it up the way he did? Come to our state during the summer months. I will take you to some of those so-called neat areas.
Jack M. Goddard Ogden, Utah
TAKE THAT, ROSENBURG
First off I would like to say th t I'm first and foremost a dirt rider, M d a little desert, the rest is just inbetween. I ride a 1972 Yammie 125 MX, but I recently seized it. I would like to thank Paul Szmonski for partially stating my views. This concerns not only your 175 shootout, but the attitude in general towards dirt bikes.
You don't get to know dirt bikes by riding them to the nearest McDonalds and taking pictures, or by making maybe a pass or two at the drag strip, then reading the factory brochure and faking a dyno report. If you want to make a great test, one that will be meaningful to your readers who need the information, you should take a tip from Dirt Bike, or maybe their illegiti mate offspring, Mo tocross A ction.
Race the bike every weekend like you want to thrash it. Tell every problem you encounter and why it happ . If applicable, ride it on the street the week. I mean back and forth to the corner store, just to get in the miles. Give it the amount of maintenance that an average rider/racer would give it. Less. Mistreat the poor little thing.
Get riders of different abilities. Put beginners on it, factory racers and everybody inbetween (within reason). Not just around the pits either. Don't be afraid to get dirty! And show it. Do it for three or four months, then give it an accurate dyno. If the bike can be made noticeably different with 50 or 100 bucks, do it. Tell the details, price, how to and where. Above all, THRASH IT. Since you and Paul Szmonski are separated by several thousand miles, I will extend the challenge. You name it, MX or desert, equal bikes, any time.
Al Rosenberg Canoga Parl~alif.
The 1 75 Comparison test (Ch~'Apr. `74), has generated as much or more correspondence than any piece we have done in recent memory. But y our letter, Alan, is tops. Boy are you screwed up.
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No, you don’t get to know dirt bikes by riding them to McDonalds for photo sessions, and we didn’t. But if you’ll take a look on page 52 of the March ‘73 Dirt Bike and see what you find.... Heavens, why if it isn’t a trail bike, a Honda, in fact, posed in front of an “Over 10 Billion Served’’ sign. Tsk, Alan. You should have written that portion of your letter to Dirt Bike. They’d probably laugh at it just as hard as we did.
And please let us know where you got the idea that the dyno test on the 1 75s was a fake. There was no dyno test at all on the 175s because the machines are not competition-ready items ¿altor are they advertised or sold as such.
And the same goes for the ludicrous idea of racing those bikes. Any of them would have to race in the 250 class because of their displacement. And, in such an environment, they would all have to be labeled “pigs. ’’ Or is that what you’d have us do in the first place just because they aren’t capable of berm pulverization, fourth-gear wheelies and eight-foot roostertails? The machines are sold as dual-purpose mounts, usable on the road, and usable off the road; but designed explicitly for neither.
We did ride them on the street, just as you mentioned. Did you actually read the test? It mentions that the bikes were used as daily transportation to and from work.
When it comes down to testing motocrossers, we do race them. That mcænesium-engined Husqvarna 250CR f^^he same issue was flogged about in some of the most ridiculous mud you’ve ever seen, and took 2nd overall. But we took care of maintenance afterwards, just like any owner of a $1400 piece of hardware would.
Motorcycles that are sold as all-out racing machinery, with power and handling characteristics designed solely for that purpose, are run on the Schenk Dynamometer at Webco. Yamaha International has duplicated the Webco setup in its racing department, where the machines of such motocrossers as Mike Hartwig, Tim Hart and Pierre Karsmakers are tested. You have heard of them, haven’t you?
Motorcycles that are designed to be streetable and also fun in the dirt are tested under these circumstances. If they succeed moderately well at Jmth exercises, then they are good.
Racing machines are raced, and they had better be able to perform as well, if not better, than the machinery against which they will be competing. If they can, great. If not, then we say so.
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You would like to see magazines flog motorcycles, regardless of their intended purpose, for several months without even a modicum of maintenance, and then take them to a dyno before writing a road test. What do you think would be left of a machine after such an ordeal? Anything from a Yamaha 100 to a 450 Maico Radial would be a heaping mass of junk. They wouldn’t put out enough horsepower to fall out of the back of a pickup truck. Of course, you would then have us label the machine with four-letter wording reminiscent of pre-pubescent, junior high school terminology for bodily secretions and/or functions.
Our staff needs no defense when it comes to riding ability, either. But just to let you know, we have among us the following. A professional road racer and dirt tracker. A Class C short tracker, road racer and, most recently, enduro buff. A two-digit plate-holder in the desert, and a two-time Greenhorn Enduro finisher-most recently on the very same XL175 that won the Comparison test (the article on the modifications carried out is upcoming, just like we said it would be in the test. Or did you skip over that part as you did almost everything else?).
Also we have a former number one Expert trials rider, who is currently an Intermediate class motocrosser. If we can’t bring out flaws in the performance of a bike, then neither can 99 percent of the people who will buy that bike.
We aren’t the slightest bit afraid to get dirty. But most of our staff testing is done during weekdays when there aren’t too many people out riding. And then there are the Sunday races. Maybe if we stayed back in the pack and ate dirt we’d look dirty enough for you, but, you see, we like the view better from the front of the pack. Sorry we can’t oblige you.
We won’t formally race you Alan, because if we did, then every other guy who thought he was fast would be crying at our doorstep for a duel. But if you go to Saddleback, or Indian Dunes, or Rawhide Park, or Carlsbad, or any other riding area and we’re there, either riding personal machinery or testing a bike for the magazine, we’d be more than happy to bang handlebars with you.
By the way, how are you going to race against us when your 1972 125 Yamaha is in your garage, seized up like an arthritic elbow? Or is your bike just to the point where you consider it ready for a magazine road test? —Ed. |5
