I rode the annual Sooner Adventure Ride (SAD) yesterday for
121 miles of gravel and dirt roads intermixed with several single track routes
plus some interesting features I’ll describe in this post. The link to the
organization that held this event is provided below.
My son Jeff got me interested in this event a couple of months
ago so we both did our on-line registration and started planning the logistics.
Since he lives in the Tulsa area I drove over Saturday morning pulling my
trailer with my new KTM 350 EXC-F on board and all my gear in the back seat.
Early (real early) Sunday morning we took both our trucks and headed to
Chandler, OK which is about 12 miles from the start of the roundtrip OK ride;
i.e. Seaba Station Motorcycle Museum. Well worth the side trip to see this
museum.
This is a well-planned event and evidently been held for a
number of years but this was both Jeff and my first time to participate. Since we
both like being early on most things we arrived at the Chandler Wal-Mart
parking lot well before sunrise even though we only had 12 miles to ride to the
museum and didn’t need to be there until 8 am with the ride starting at 10 am.
We weren’t sure there would be parking for our trucks and my trailer at the
museum so we decided to park in Chandler. As it turned out there was plenty of
parking at the museum; something to remember for next time. As we unloaded our
bikes and started gearing up we saw several other groups doing the same thing
so we weren’t the only ones worried about the museum parking.
We arrive at the museum shortly after 8 and there were
already a number of bikes/riders there and the numbers continued to grow up to
the rider briefing at 10. The estimated number of bikes is somewhere in the 70+
figure and they were comprised of many mid-size dual-sports with a few 250cc
but what was more surprising, a large number of big adventure bikes. I was
getting a bit nervous wondering how this many bikes would start and keep out of
each other’s way while on the route. We met up with a friend of Jeff’s, Russ
(riding a Husky 701) and Russ’s friend, Jay (riding a Honda CRF650). Jeff was
riding his Yamaha WR250R and we four decided to ride as a group.
This was my first organized motorcycle rally so didn’t
really know how they were accomplished. For those as uninformed as me, I’ll
explain how this one was planned based on the rider briefing given by the
organizers.
1
The ride would officially start at 10 am with
lunch and drinks provided at the halfway point with return to the start via a
different route.
2
Riders could start at any time after the rider
briefing so to my great relief, a motocross start wasn’t planned.
3
A GPS GPX file wasn’t available but a paper
route description was provided with every turn identified and miles between
turns.
4
On the route, each turn would have an orange
arrow posted with orange tape a short way past the turn to verify you were on
the correct path.
5
The single track sections, and there were
several, would have an alternate bypass suitable for the adventure bikes or the
less skilled dirt riders.
The riders started to depart in small groups or single
riders but there wasn’t a mad dash as I had feared. We had been told that from
the start, 1 mile down the road would be the first single track section. We
four agreed we would take the single track and rode off. As we took the single
track section, Jay or Russ was in the lead with Jeff then me in the rear. I had
200 miles on the KTM at this point and only about 50 of that riding gravel/dirt
roads. The single track was nothing more than a marked path through the trees
with many short turns and twists with the ground quickly being stirred up by
the previous dirt bike knobbies. I tried to keep up with my group but quickly
fell behind and out of sight. I eventually came to a sharp 90 degree turn to
the right with an immediate climb up what looked like a small levy. I swear it
was 10 feet high (probably more like 5 or 6 feet) and made of loose dirt and
grass with a bike and rider laying on the left side of the trail. I immediately
powered up to attempt the climb and made it almost to the top but had overpower
my KTM and the front wheel lifted enough to loose directional control and fell
to the right side of the trail on the incline. We now had the trail totally
blocked and other bikes started queuing up on the trail ready for their
attempt.
Bike drop #1 - I was attempting to lift my KTM and somehow
get it to the top of the levy when a young guy, who was taking video of the
riders at this spot, asked if I wanted him to do it. I said yes and he made it
look easy by dragging the front wheel towards the top, lifted the bike and
after starting the engine powered it up the rest of the way with the front
wheel in the air. I was very grateful for his help but later at the lunch stop
I heard him talking about all the carnage at this spot and I realized the
organizers knew this would be a spot to strategically place a video camera to
capture carnage for their web site! I made it back to the main road and
continued with the rest of our group.
Lots of dust is one thing I can report. During Jeff’s and my
TAT ride through northern OK last August I thought I had seen all the dust OK
could provide. I was wrong. There is plenty of dust in central OK as well.
We then came to an interesting feature which was a large
rolling pasture that had a winding path mowed through it until it came to a
creek and trees. This was the start of single track #2. I had decided that
single track was not one of my strong points and told my riding buddies that I
was taking the bypass and would meet them on the other side of the single
track. As they rode down into the creek bed I continued on the mowed path back
to the road and immediately came upon a big muddy spot that extended completely
across the road. I saw no other tracks so wasn’t real sure I was on the right
route but after rechecking the paper route description, realized I had to be. I
was about to attempt a crossing in the least intimidating spot when I did
notice a tire track at the very edge of the mud but on a sloped surface that
didn’t appear to be very stable. Rather than go straight into the mud I decided
to try this narrow route along the side. I had just started when I hit a rut
from a car and the bike stopped and the engine died. I can barely touch the
ground on a flat surface so I expected I would drop the bike into the mud because
the ground towards the mud sloped significantly away from my dangling foot. I
managed to get the bike leaning to the high ground on the right and saved it. I
restarted the engine and his time powered up much more with the result that the
front tire lifted slightly and the rear tire drove me across the last bit of
mud. Problem was I almost hit a bunch of bushes on the other side due to the
excessive speed. At least I wasn’t laying in the mud. I met up with my group a
short time later down the road and we continued to the next single track turn
off.
We had been briefed that the route would take us over a
closed bridge but that a clear path had been made to the bridge. When we got to
this spot we could see the single lane old steel girder bridge above the weeds
but could not see the road across the bridge or what the ramp looked like to
get to the bridge. It was a single path that descended into a gully then a left
turn up a dirt ramp to the bridge. Problem was all you could see was the decent
with a blind turn towards the bridge. Russ and Jay took off down the gully. BTW
these two guys are very good dirt bike riders. Jeff and I were on intercom so I
said go ahead and tell me what to expect when I round that blind turn. Jeff
sped off and disappeared around the corner. A few seconds later he told me “it
wasn’t too bad” and it would be a sharp turn then an immediate climb to the
bridge but to be sure and “NOT RUN OFF THE BRIDGE”! What does that mean? I
started my run, made the turn and here is another dirt hill to climb with the
top not visible from the bottom. I powered up and again the front end became
light but I made it to the top. When I reach the top I was going way to fast
and that’s when I could see that I was heading directly towards the side of the
bridge with maybe a 10 foot drop with rocks at the bottom. I somehow managed to
get the bike shut down and the front wheel back on the surface on the single
set of boards that ran across the bridge. It was one of these old single lane
wood floor bridges with two sets of boards for the tires to ride on. That one
scared me since going off the side was not going to be pleasant.
Bike Drop #2 – We continued to the next single track
entrance which was a dirt climb off the gravel road to the pasture where the
single track began. The dirt climb had a deep rut caused by water erosion that
left a narrow strip of dirt to ride to the top with a bunch of brush and a wood
fence post to the side. The other 3 made the climb and sped off. I was tempted
to take the bypass but decided no guts no glory so I made my approach to the
climb. Once again the bike’s front tire lifted slightly, I lost directional
control and crashed into the brush and the fence post. Do you see a trend here?
The others were gone so I’m alone with my bike on its side against a fence
post. This was the first time I had actually tried to lift the bike off the
ground by myself. It was no problem and that’s why I bought this bike because
it was 60lbs lighter than my CRF. I found no damage and moved the bike onto a
clear spot, restarted the engine and went back down that damn hill to take the
bypass to the lunch stop.
Lunch was being provided at one of the organizer’s work shop
and it was great meeting and talking to a lot of the other riders. A big shout
out to Robert H. I even met a few that were older than I am. Most of these guys
have ridden dirt their whole lives so what I expressed in the previous
paragraphs is probably vey humorous to them but everyone was very good about it
and offered lots of helpful suggestions.
After lunch we all headed back in small groups or singles
for the ride back to the museum. Not much happened on the way back since it was
all gravel/dirt roads except that I’m eating dust like crazy in the back plus
we were riding 45-55 mph on these roads. Several times I almost missed a turn due
to the dust with a barbed wire fence straight ahead. In fact, Jay did go off
the road into the ditch at one sharp turn but managed to get stopped before the
fence. We completed the ride somewhere around 2 pm.
Back at the Wal-Mart parking lot, Jeff and I loaded our
bikes and I decided I was going back to Little Rock rather than spend the night
in Tulsa. I took off my very dusty riding clothes and boots but kept on the
shorts and T-shirt I had worn under them even though they were also full of
dust. I arrived home at 9 pm, unloaded the truck, took a shower and told my
wife how much fun we had.
Conclusion – The ride was good except for my terrible riding
demonstrations. I have got to get control of the power on this bike. It is
significantly more powerful than my CRF but more importantly is that the
throttle is instant on. Every time I had an issue with a climb it was because I
had too much power and the front tire would start to rise. I’m sure I was
probably not leaning forward enough to counteract this but it all happened so
fast I couldn’t say yes or no to that. On the roads and at speed on
gravel/dirt, the KTM is exceptional. It does seem to be pretty skittish with
the front end jumping around a lot but it still keeps going forward. I assume
this is why I see lots of KTMs with the front stabilizer installed. I did get
some advice from one of the riders about remapping the fuel injection system to
reduce this throttle problem I’m having and that does seem to be a viable fix.
I have yet to get a solid answer how this can be done on my KTM but it will
probably be the next modification I do.
P.S. I must add one more thing. My wife has accused me of
embellishing my stories and as you know wives are always right, aren’t they?
The events I stated here are from my perspective only. I’m sure most of the
riders thought this was an easy ride and feel I’ve blown the seriousness of the
climbs way out of proportion and they are probably correct. In my defense in
the last 5 years I’ve ridden motorcycles to Yukon Territory (2012), the Arctic
Circle (2014) and 3000 miles of the TAT (2016). But all those miles were on
roads of varying condition, some very bad conditions but no single track. I
last rode a real dirt bike some 30 or 40 years ago. I hope to get better at it
but for now I’m pretty bad.
P.S.S. It’s the next day and I was planning on taking out
all the comments that made me look like a fool or a rookie but finally decided
it’s my Blog so I can write what I want. You’re reading the original version as
a result.
Here’s a great video of the ride posted by one of the
organizers:
Thanks for the write up! I haven't seen much about this ride. Any chance you can share your GPX?
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