Chill White (left) checks in with Paul Krause (right), an expert in the field of off-road racing.
I asked my riding buddy Paul Krause to give me some insight to riding in Portugal; he rode the ’99
ISDE there. I can’t even begin to list all of Paul’s racing exploits, he has raced and won just about everything there is in the desert including Baja, Best in the Desert, National Hare & Hound,
Dakar, ISDE qualifiers, plus many other things. In fact he is pretty much an addict, not that it makes him much different than the rest of us, he’s just been better at it than most.
Howdy Chilly,
Congratulations on making the ISDE team again!
I was lucky enough to ride the 1999 Six Days in Portugal. We raced just outside of Coimbra (about 30 miles east of Figueira Da Foz). The City welcomed the ISDE with open arms. There were banners, flags and flyers scattered throughout and everyone was excited for the event. Coimbra is hill side city set alongside of a river. Each morning we would make the 45 minute drive up the hill to the parc ferme. As usual parc ferme was loaded with spectators and ISDE enthusiasts. There was never a shortage of visitors to the Team USA’s pit area. It is unbelievable how much attention our US racing receives worldwide, and most of these motorcycle racing fans just wanted a chance to meet the riders and see the equipment that they had been reading about.
Days 1 – 4 the terrain was great for a desert racer, mostly open faster trails that either went uphill or downhill. The ground was hard packed and rocky, a little like riding in the hills of Utah, Idaho or Northern Nevada. It seemed that we would ride two or three sections working our way up and then one section coming straight back down. Some of the downhill’s were steep enough to have riders bulldogging their bikes down. During the first four days it was very hot, dry and dusty. In fact a couple of the special tests had to be either rerouted or thrown out because riders were getting stuck in silt and visibility was so low scoring was inaccurate. Day 5 everything changed. The weather cooled and the rain came in. It didn’t rain a lot on Day 5 just enough to knock down the dust and make the rocky trails slippery. The Portuguese promoters also changed the course, bringing us much closer to town on Day 5. The uphill’s zig zagged up through residence lined dirt roads and trails. The downhill’s consisted of steep drops between hillside terraces. Some of these drops we actually rode down stairways. These stairway drops were loaded with spectators and because of the wet slippery conditions they witnessed a lot of crashing. Fortunately all that was hurt was the rider’s pride. Once we got to the bottom of the hills on Day 5 they ran us through rocky river bottoms. These river bottoms weren’t quite an X-Treme Test, but they still required some pushing and shoving to get through. Day 6 the rain hit hard. The final motocross test was to be held close to town at the base of the hills so the track quickly flooded. Everyone raced their final moto, with some only making it 1 lap around the track. The promoters were forced to leave the final moto times out of the overall results as the bikes were so muddy scoring was impossible. In the end I had a good ride, zero route points, no major falls, and a silver medal.
Some of my favorite Portugal stories and memories:
Prior to the event my wife Jennifer and I were walking special tests. We met another rider walking alone and started up conversation. It turned out that our new friend was from Greece. He and his Mom formed the entire Greek contingent at the event. When Jen and I asked our new friend’s name he said something completely non-comprehensible and then shook his head and said “my name is Bill”. Bill understood the rules of the race, but did not realize that each day there would four or five check points per loop where he would require service. Once Bill realized that his Mom was not going to be able to keep up with him to offer support at each of the check locations he was worried about even finishing the race. In the spirit of international completion and friendship Team USA adopted the Greek Team (Bill and his Mom) and lent them support for the entire week.
While the terrain during the ISDE can some times feel like racing Dakar it can quickly change as Krause learned in '99.
As I mentioned above Day 6 was a mud bath. Because of our travel schedule the container had to be loaded the same day as the final moto. On the way back to parc ferme after the final moto most of the mud was washed away from the rain on the highway. However in an effort to make sure our bikes were clean we found a shallow river and started doing speed runs up and down it. The river runs cleaned the scooters up very well and provided some great grins and giggles. Loading our shipping crates and the container in the pouring rain was another story. Everything was soaked and we knew that nothing would be unpacked for 2 to 3 months, so every can of Multi Purpose Lube that we could find was sprayed on everything we owned. I can tell you that when my crate finally made it home there was a musty smell, but thankfully nothing was growing inside and my bike was not corroding away.
Finally, after closing up the container doors around Midnight we returned to the City to celebrate the successful conclusion of another Six Days. The details of that night are just for the memories of the participants.
I am envious that you will not only be attending the 2009 ISDE in Figueira Da Foz but racing it. Good Luck, enjoy and I look forward to hearing your stories when you return.
Ride on,
Paul Krause
www.paulkrauseracing.com
www.aircleaningtechnology.com
