Jumper's Ralley 2001 Chronicles

`How I spent my summer vacation`

I left Marshall, Va on Wed. 6-20-2001 and headed towards Belle Plaine, Mn. It was a cool and clear day as I wandered through the Va/W.Va. mountains. I stayed on the back roads and passed through Burlington, W.Va. and blew the horn at Depity Dave as I passed by. 1375 was running like a champ and the S.E.G. was in full force (Shit Eating Grin).. Got on the I-68 to I-79 to I-70 and hit the Ohio border in style. Cruising through Ohio and getting a suntan is my idea of fun. Made it over into Indiana and up through Indy when I began to notice a different tone in the exhaust note. I proceeded to continue until I was running on fumes trying to beat a mother of all mothers storm. I stopped at the gas station and the bike was running rough/stalling... HHHMMM... I thought... The X sounds a bit like it did last summer when the throttle bracket broke and did all the damage to the front cylinder (Burnt Exhaust Valves and a cracked head) I sat the storm out for a few hours and hit the road to the next big town, Bloomington, IL. Once arriving I determined that the bike was indeed running like shit and that I had better come up with a better plan of attack. Got a cheap hotel room and thought about my options. After a good nights rest I decided that I would continue to B.P.... Only.. In a GIN-U-WINE PENSKE RACING TRUCK!!! Yup... I rented a truck and bought some straps, loaded the X up and headed to B.P. via Albert Lea... Now lesser men would have turned back and gone home, but I was determined to get there and hang with this great group of Xer's that are a part of the X family. I arrived in Albert Lea to a host of X people that welcomed me with open arms and cold beer!! We hung out there and talked and discussed options about what I could do. Well... Having spoke to Dr. Dave earlier in the day, I had a plan... So.. I headed out of A.L. and on to B.P..... Next page please

So... I arrive in B.P. around 10:30 P.M. on 6-21... I beeline it to Andy's to see whats shaking. I arrive and am greeted by Bobby B.and his lovely wife, Linda, 'Ol Pancho, Jeff from Fla., Big Al and a few other Xer's... We talk/drink/laugh and carry on til it gets late. We depart the bar and a few head back to the hotel and a few head over to Dave's house for a few more brews. Dave greets us and invites us in for some "Garage Life".. A few more topics were bought up and discussed. Dave offered to let me use his personal tools and his house to work on 1375. I accepted and said I would come back in the morning to get started. I also vollenteered to help his deck builder until he returned from the office mid-morning. I left his place feeling no pain and headed to the back roads of Belle Plaine and the "Penske racing truck motel" Got up a few hours later and checked into the Belle Plaine Hilton, 3-S (shit shower and shave) and wandered back over to Daves. I got there and he was out so I showed up to the job foreman and informed him I was here to help build the massive 10' x 12' deck! Welllll... It didn't take Brian two seconds to give me a hammer and a bag of nails and instructions of what to do... So I'm hammering away.. talking... Big Al wanders out to help, but first he is heading to Tina K's for breakfast and will be back later. So we build on... (Big Al never did make it back... Something about a girl etc...) Cappy comes by too... A problem with his bike that he and Dave are looking at. Dave gets there a few minutes later to supervise the deck crew and help Cappy. Once finished with that chore, We pull 1375 in and pull the tank and spark plugs to do a leak down and compression test... It doesn't look good... 150 in the rear cylinder and 70-75 in the front... We do the leak down and you can hear air leaking past the Exhaust valves. Shit. What do I do? I can get parts shipped from our stock of parts in Va. but... If we were to tear into it and I needed a head, well.. I'd be shit out of luck.. Yes,there are plenty of heads in the factory a mile away... But.. I sure as hell was not going to ask Dave to break the law and get one for me... Besides.. I was on vacation and really did not want to spend it wrenching and tearing down the X... Would have if the parts were available... But they weren't... So... Thursday afternoon rolls on and We continue on the deck .... Next page please

I bail out on the deck gig and head back to motel room for a nap..(Ya.. I know...Ga-Waaa!!..Hey.. I was tired!) Got up an hour later ready to go! Headed up to Andy's and started to party! Hung out there and had a few... Shot the shit with Chris (556, Blue skies) Mike H.( printer xtrondaire... did the posters and shirts.. I think), Ken B. ( Geez Ken... sorry about taking over your cooler Sat. night... Ahh... I was buzzed??).. We proceeded to try to drink the town dry, but they knew we were coming and stocked up pretty good. Chris and I wandered next door to "Two Hotties Bar" and continued our Pool contest from last year... Score = Jumper 1... Chris = 2, Total for the two years.. Jumper = 4, Chris = 2 ( I claim a foul because there was this good looking B.P. girl that was interupting my concentration!!!) Needless to say... I'll be back next year Chris... With my blinders on!! We closed the joint down at 1 A.M. and headed home to the motel to sleep and get ready for the big goings on at the factory Friday morning. I was awoken by the sound of a few early risers on X's and knew I had to get out of the crib and get going over to the factory. Got a cup of coffee and headed over.. Bobby's "Sledgewood" was in the atrium along with 3 early X's , 001, and an American X (Brown, sharp looking) I headed inside and got a front row seat for Daves tech talk and Heatons speech. G.W. spoke first... E.H was looking for stragtic partners to help get them back on their feet... they spent about 4 months time doing that... It did not seem to work out the way they wanted and the have changed focus to look for investors instead. G.W. admitted that he has had past legal issues and that it is part of the business that he is in. Next up was Dr. Dave and he went over the transmission problems and the things they are doing to fix. Proper warm-up and high R.P.M's (3000) are paramount to keeping them going. They have shipped a hand full of bikes and motors to an engineering firm in the U.K. The firm is about 50 % of the way through testing and modifing this project. Most likely when they are done there will be some major and minor changes done to the engine and bike. Next Page Please

Dave fielded a bunch more ?'s about various subjects and then the group split up... Most went on the run to the Antique M/C show... A few needing repairs headed up to Donahue's in Delano.. The rest stayed for the One O'clock tour of the factory... Now... This tour was much better than last years tour... Dave went into alot more detail about the way it operated... We toured the line... Then we toured the Warehouse where there ARE rows and rows and bins FULL of parts... For some reason Dave kept a close eye on me to make sure I did'nt slip down row 1 to do a little head shopping... Shit... So freaking close and yet so far... Any way... Off to the Paint "booth".. What a fantastic operation!! We saw the behind the scenes of it.. The massive ovens... the pinstripping robot.... Around the corner to the Haz-Mat containment and Processing area... Then over to the Welding area where this really good looking Coon-ass used to work welding our frames.. She is one tough looking Cajun gal and alot of fun to talk to.. Chris was her name... Wow!... She can weld my frame anytime!!! Wait! She did!... Never mind... A few of us wandered over to some parts cages where there were some early test/prototype engines... The we snuck a peek into the R & D to see what was hiding there... Well.. I'll tell you... There was a bike on the lift.. It had a bigger front tire on it... there was a row of X's all lined up.. some were beat up pretty bad... Kinda like they were rode real hard and put up wet... We did not get too far into R & D before we were caught and put back into line... hehehe... Then it was out of the factory and "through the metal detectors" What??!! You don't believe me??!! Would YOU let a bunch of part's hungry X owners in your warehouse full of parts and not search them on the way out???!!!hehehe... Any way.. A few stood around and shot the shit for a while.. I headed up to the fairgrounds and got registered and picked up my bag of loot... Next Page Please

So... Here it is Friday afternoon and I get this bag of Rally stuff. I have got to hand it to the folks that worked so hard to make this a sucess.. I got a couple of high quality T-shirts, A cooly cup, some stickers... But... The "Year book" was the highlight of the package!!! This was one nicely laid out picture book that had alot of time and effort put in it. It was great to glance back and see all the folks that made it last year... See who put on some grey hairs... And just re-live the good time past! I would highly recommend YOU contact the Pioneer Chapter and see if you can get one!... I made my way out to Bobby's set-up and helped myself to a few beers and talked X's... Denny W. out of WI. was having a bit of trouble with his bike and it was determined that he would take it to Delano in the morning and drop it off for them to fix. I gave him a ride up to Chaska and then headed South to B.P. for another night of Beer , Fun, X's,Live Bands and an all around good time with my fellow Xer's. In town I ran into Jim (snowy_91) and yacked to him for a bit. Also ran into Tim B.(superxtim),Phil from PA. (snamrock) J.C. from MO. (nxlst2) Rich and Colleen fron AZ.( spanish word for two x's?) Old Bob (this guy would help out anybody,anytime,anyplace) Evil Bob and his lovely gal Irene, Chris from MO.(cjwest) and a host of other Xer's too. Any who... Sitting in Andy's having another cold one... sitting at the bar checking out all the people I spot this tall drop dead georgous blond in red leather pants looking at me... coming towards me smiling..HHMMM... TERI!!! (curvedolls) WOW!!! I had met her briefly at last years rally and had E-mailed and talked a few times over the past year... Geez!! If the women in MN. are as good looking as her, I'm packing my bags and am heading North!.. We talked and had a few laughs about all the broo-ha-ha on the boards... Smart lady... And.. She owns an X too!! What more could a guy ask for?? Also ran into Russ from TN. The first thing out of my mouth was "Did you bring any moonshine???" He chuckles..Yep.. Banana...I'll tell you what... I don't know where he gets it... But smooth??? Smooth as glass... None the less... A couple of us headed over to Daves to check out the finished deck and to break it in... Russ bought some of his 'shine and we all took a few slugs and passed it around.. YYAAAHHHHOOOO!!! Mountain Dew!! Then it was back up to town to listen to the bands and close down the bars... Which we did again!!... Next Page Please

OOOHHH!!!! Sat. Morning... Moving a bit slow... Got up... 3-S... Headed to the Fairground for the big day! Lots of Xer's all over the place! Bobby's tent was hopping... Jeff from Fla. was inside the barn with his lasar etched products he was selling... A few folks were in the work area checking belts,tighting this and whatnot... Waz,Cappy,Phil(xandbar) and others were polishing and cleaning up their rides getting ready for the show... There were three classes... Custom, Touring, Stock... All winners in my book! I wandered around and talked parts with a few of the guys... Showed the inventory list that I had with me... Took some great pictures and just was grooving on the whole scene... The day was progressing along nicely when it dawned on me that I had better get my ass back over to Daves house and put # 1375 back in the Penske Racing Truck so I can bail East early on Sunday morning. So Bear(N.E. Wisc.)and I got in the truck and blasted back down to B.P. to get the bike. Got to Daves garage where he was deep into fixing Williams bike that was running fine then just died.. No spark, but would crank...(Later that evening I asked Dave what was wrong with it... I think he said it was a crankshaft sensor and a bare wire) Check those wiring harnesses, Boys!! So.. Bear, William and I load up my bike and head back to the Fairgrounds where the games had already begun. Now I'm a betting man and my $$$ was on Chris (556) and his lovely wife Colleen to sweep it like he did last year... But... There was the Steve factor... I got to see the final heats fot the slow ride... Folks.. It was tough... Chris won his round... Steve won his..The last run was a tough one... There they were ... inching along... At a break neck crawl... Chris... Steve..Chris..Steve..Chris..OH-NO!!! Chris put his feet down!!Oh well.. Theres next year!... Back at the tents the mood was getting better as the day went on... O.K. Corral was cooking up a storm and we were getting hungry.. Denny and I made an Ice and Beer run and got back in time to hear Tom and Chuck hollaring about dinnertime... We ate..We talked.. We drank a few more beers...As the sun started its journey into the night, Russ and I grabbed Kens cooler and headed to a shady spot closer to the grand stands and proceeded to set up a V.I.P. area (Very Intoxicated People) We invited all that passed to have a beer and hooted and hollared as different people got there door prizes and awards... Next Page Please

Welp... The night was getting in full swing. Nils from Sweden had a happy glow on his face.. Evil Bob and Irene were getting a little cozy... Teri was looking as beautiful as could be.. The band was trying to get people on the dance floor... Jenny Hanlon, Chris "coon-ass" Horne and Cami all came down from the twin cities where they work at an Easyriders store... A more fun bunch of Gals couldn't be found... They were cutting up and having a great time as the sun set and the bonfire was lit... The only thing missing was "Wild Bill"!! Folks stood around the fire keeping warm(sun went down and it got real cool out) A bunch were on the dance floor having a ball... Others were off in groups talking about everything... The night wound down and Denny and I headed into B.P. for a nightcap (Like I needed one!HA!) met some more Xer's at Andy's as we closed it down and headed to Daves, where we had one last beer and I tried to flirt with Coon-ass and Cami..( Yeah!! Like right!!Fat Chance!! HA!) Back to the B.P. Hilton where morning came too early... Loaded up the Penske Racing Truck, Got Denny and I on the road... Dropped Denny off in Madison, WI. and drove all night and day back East to Elkton, Va. to Jamies (Duoglide62) house, dropped off # 1375 and picked up # 1968.. Headed North and dropped of the Penske Racing Truck (with another 2037 miles on it) and came home to Marshall... Tired as a dog... Happy as a clam... Even though my bike was broken and I didn't get to ride, I had a great time with an even greater bunch of friends... Jumper P.S. Thanks to the following.. Randy & Val, Chuck,Tom,Mike,All the Pioneer Xers... What a great job! Dave Danielson, Thanks for offering me the use of you garage, tools, even your bike! Your one of a kind no matter what the "boards" say... HA!