Crutcher’s Corner | Enjoy The Summer Sweat
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As we all watch the core temperature continue to rise the same way nuclear engineer Anatoly Dyatlov did, we have two options: Pretend nothing is wrong and continue the course of action, or flip the plexiglass covered gigantic red button and drop the fuel rods into the cooling pool to prevent a meltdown. No, none of us are facing a literal nuclear meltdown, but my goodness does it feel like the country is headed for a socio/economic Chernobyl.
Us Americans have a luxury Anatoly didn’t have, one that is also as much a curse as it is a blessing, and that’s information. We are afforded such opulence that it oft feels like an entitlement, a constitutional right to be in the know. The problem is that information can be corrupted as easily as a few whispered words can be in a classroom game of “telephone.”
Intelligence in its actionable form comes with a coin toss, a fun exercise of decision. The more you know, the less you understand. For some reason, those that don’t know shit are the first to stand up and exclaim how right they are. It’s no wonder that our country is stuck in a feedback loop of paralysis by analysis, and every time the media catches the ability to riff on something pervertable for a 24-hour news cycle, the bass-ackwards S.O.P is to put their foot in the floor, shift into reverse, then turn around and look.
Oddly, the tiny spec of real estate that the powersports industry occupies has complete and total tunnel vision right now. Sure, the Nationals are indefinitely temporarily on a postponement and the pro end of the sport is suffering at the hand of what scholars have observed from the beginning of time and philosophers have written on just as long, which is that anything’s greatest strength is also its greatest weakness. In our blip, it’s us, the fans. The races cannot be run without us, but right now they can’t be run with us. Meanwhile, as I write this on Thursday morning there are three new KTM 250 SX-Fs on dealer floors in the United States. Pit bikes are completely sold out. The online retailers are a day or more behind on fulfillment. Sea-Doo PWCs, Maverick SXSs, and hell, even Yamaha generators are being loaded up en masse.
Outdoor activity as a whole is up, but in a less organized fashion than before. Doing anything in the open air has gone from an afterthought to a priority, especially to anyone furloughed. I have been spoiled with a public riding area of high quality just 30 minutes from my house. Usually, Oakland (a borough in Topeka) is prime riding from October through April, when the overgrowth is dead and the foliage has laid its leaves to the ground. The summer months at Oakland, however, are a nightmare of 8’ tall weeds, triple-digit temperatures, and riding conditions you’d find at a concrete mixing plant. Racing in the Midwest has been popping off with a bit of a cloud overhead, damn-good-and-well knowing at any moment our gatherings could be shut down. Take a moment and appreciate the local promoter busting his bag to give us somewhere to ride and race, or better yet show appreciation by going to the races and handing your money over to the people that provide us a place to do our favorite pastime.
Earlier this week, my friend Scott invited me to come ride a new corner track behind his house. It’s a simple formula: farm field + tiller = motocross. There are no wickedly large jumps, no watering system of any sort, and no bells and whistles of any kind to the track. It’s moto in the rawest form, laid out on a terraced hillside. While pounding out sessions under Scott’s supervision with three of his students (he operates a moto school) under the boiling sun, I was having a connection to my days on a minibike. In prehistoric times I once had a small moto track behind my dad’s house on which I would burn tank after tank. Two friends of mine, Mike and Chance, would come over and the only problem in the world was the sunset- which meant riding was over.
Motocross is not a complex thing, although we sure can make it out to be such. I recommend that this weekend we go into riding with an intention and to be mindful that it’s just dirt bikes in a field. Whether that field happens to have hosted a Des Nations (RedBud has a big AM race this weekend) or an oval around two piles of sticks behind the Dollar General in Anywhere, USA, let’s celebrate that no matter what Executive Order any Governor may write, the memories made on a dirt bike will keep us glued together as friends just lookin’ to escape the nonsense. Exercise that freedom to do so as we celebrate our nation’s sovereignty this weekend.
As you finish this sentence, you will notice there is a button on the upper right side of the device. To see someone that needs to ride a dirt bike, smash that thing without Anatoly’s hesitation, and stare until your eyes refocus.
