Enduros

ENDUROS

COMPETITION GUIDE

Enduros add the element of time to difficult riding. The idea is to hold a pre-determined speed average over all sorts of terrain. Riding at a 24 mph average doesn't sound too difficult until you try to hold that speed up and down hills, through knee-deep mud and slop, fording streams, climbing rocky slopes, and slaloming a bike with 30-in, wide handlebars through a forest of 3.8 trillion saplings growing exactly 28 in. apart in every direction.

Enduros vary in length and are held in various parts of the country under as sorted sanctions with different degrees of difficulty. In the arid Western deserts, family enduros with easy loops and slow speed averages are popular. Even small playbikes are suitable for family enduros, but tougher AMA enduros require serious enduro machines, often motocrossers with rudimentary lights (many enduro courses include or cross some sections of public highways and some require street registra tion), speedometer/odometer, and clock for timekeeping purposes.

AMA National enduros leading to the championship might cover 100 mi. for a single-day event or 250-300 mi. over two days. The top 10 or 15 riders in the coun try are classed AA and compete against themselves fOr the national championship. AA riders in motocross terms would be Pro class while the A enduro classification correlates to Expert class. There are also B and C rider levels.

What makes time-keeping important and enduros interesting is the placement of secret checkpoints along the course. A rider may come flying over a blind hill only to find a checkpoint equipped with a large clock and scorers.

The scoring is based on a rider's minute which is when he left the start after "key time." If an enduro starts at 8:00 a.m., about four riders will be waved off the line at 8:00; another four will follow at 8:01; another four at 8:02, etc. If a secret check is located 40 mm. into the course on the basis of a constant 24 mph average speed, then a rider leaving the start at 8:00 should arrive there at the actual time of 8:40, but the clock at that first check will read 8:00 (the starting time of riders on that minute). As long as the time shown on the clock reads the same as the rider's starting time, he is on time and loses no points. If he arrives late at a check, he gains a point for each minute he is behind schedule. If he arrives early, burning the check, he gets two penalty points for each minute early (although some enduros a! low riders a one-minute early grace pe riod). The rider with the lowest score at the end wins. If two riders tie, the rider arriving at certain tie-breaker checks clos est to the middle of the minute (as in arriv ing at 8:00 and 30 sec.) zeroes the checks. Seconds early or late count for tie-break ing purposes.

The 1980 AMA ationaI Enduro Champion in Dick Burleson. He was also the champion in 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978 and 1979.