AMTRA.com.au

:)Gidday all,
Here's the "Chickens" report on Phil's Marysville, Level 1/2 Ride.
After a brief stop at the Healesville Bakery for a quick brekky and running into Phil & a few of the lads, my partner in crime XDIRTX & I made a bee line to the Dom Dom Saddle car park. It was full! 22 riders in total had rocked up for Phil's legendry ride...& Phil you are a legend!. The mountain tops were covered in an eerie misty cloud, which soon broke open to a beaut blue sky and the temp was still cool...(at that stage) :-X Headed off thinking, yeh pieca-a-ps after the last ride...well true to Phil's style of trying to assess & improve everyone's abilities..whether gumby or gun rider..lets's just say, Marysville rides must throw a few suprises at everyone, every time?...sure did to me and I have a few trophy bruises to show for it this time round; & for the record, don't think just because the girly is going on the ride, that it will be made easier, to quote Steve.."Yeh, we thought because Marls is going on the ride, it will be safe for us to go on it"  :-[ We had a bit of a mixed bag of tracks thrown in, from every AMTRA ride I have ever done..(which now runs at about 6 I think)...so haven't been scared off..yet :o
We did nice cruisy fast trail, single nanny goat trail, long narrowish slippery hill climbs, some quite steep (check out Milktoast's video in the other section...it's awesome), an unbelievable marbelly hill climb that both David & I crashed on (we had nearly got to the top by the way!). Thanks to our co-riders for riding our bikes back down the hill then up again for us...that's one baby i'm going to master next time! The downhills were challenging but managable, but some of those ruts & bogholes, did swallow you whole if you weren't carefull..I don't get to see much of the action up front, but what I do see is flying one wheel action (Mr P), The Rat hauling his DRZ650 through the most challenging of terrains with ease...It's just unbelievable all the different size bikes that are taken through this stuff & how everyone's riding ability improves with every ride ;).. We did the river crossing a couple of times which was great & tailman Leon had a huge shower in that one (reckon he needed it to cool down..thanks for your great help Leon).. Everyone is just so helpful and patient with us level one riders and we really get to learn heaps...I would like to think I'm improving & giving everything a crack!. They don't even hang it on you (not to your face anyway) when you're bit stuffed and literally sit on your bike and tip over on it ::). We rode for about 4 hours and ended up at the Narbethong Roadhouse to refuell bike & body. A few of us knew we'd had enough & were told of a nice little quick way on a track back to the carpark without having to ride part of the Black Spur. The rest of the weekend warriors continued on...I'll leave it to one of those chaps to finish the story. Thanks Phil & AMTRA for another excellent day out ...Until the next ride...
Cheers...Marls ;D
(sorry, no pics this time, but reckon the video tells the story)

Let me apologise in advance for forgetting and getting everyone’s names wrong.


This is my first ride from the black spur car, which is why I was late.  I arrived and the car park was pretty full despite the weather forecast was for temperatures in the mid 30’s.

Phil gave the usual briefing which I missed and we set off with 32 riders.  We started off with a couple of flowing tracks with a few descents, just enough to give everyone a shake down! 

The first stoppage occurred at 2.2kms with a DRZ250 it seemed like a fuel related problem.  Myself and two other stayed with the bike while the other did a quick loop before picking us up.  First port of call was to drain the fuel bowl, if you have ever tried to train it on a drz250 you’ll know what a pain in the ass it was.  There is a oil hose or similar going from the head at just the ride angle to make it nearly impossible to get an alley key on the drain bolt.  So I finally loosened the drain bolt and turned the fuel on to flash it out but nothing came out.  (insert name here) opened the tank to make sure there was really fuel in there and it started also flowing out the train.  Problem solved, kinked breather hose.

We rode to the end of the track and met up with the rest of the group who had already lost two members who decided trail riding wasn’t for them and we set off again.

We had a fairly slow pace due the size of the group, it was great to see Peter ROSS out and about showing no signs of injury.  With plenty of re-groups it was a good chance to try out some other bikes.

The dust was the real killer of the day, it was the worst I’ve ever seen it.  At times it was very difficult to see any obstacles on the track.

We did around 60km before lunch in Narbethong.  By this stage it was very hot, I couldn’t drink enough!  We were left with 13 riders for the afternoon ride.  We headed for some tracks that Paul and Phil cleared before the bush fires last year.  It was pretty slow going I could feel the bike heating up at every turn and me as well.  At the end of the track we all had a good rest.

I think it was the final straw for some of the guys it was about 3pm and most of them decided to leave at this point and we were left with five.  We took off at a quick pace and went up some of the hills that you wouldn’t even attempt in the wet.  (insert name) on the TTR250 was having issues on some of the steeper uphills, the bike kept stopping.  The ttr and one other ‘sorry’ headed back to the cars.

So this left us with three!! Phil, myself and Mat.

So off we went with some more big hills, Mat really surprised me with how he kept pace up some of the hills on the ttr.


I think Phil got sick of me following him because he waved me past, I took off and had a ball the dust was all behind me and the track was all mine.  I enjoyed it so much managed to spear a branch through my boot.  It was a pretty close call, it pierced the side of my boot, taw a hole in my sock and wedged itself next to my foot.  It only scratched my foot but a few millimetres across and it would have been a different story.  Phil and Mat caught up and we continued on.  We got another few kilometres and I puncture my back tire.  It was pretty easy to spot because half the branch was still sticking out of my tire.  Maybe I should be running bridgestones anyone got a contact? 

Given the time of the day, and the temperate I couldn’t be bothered changing the tube.  My tire was at the end of its life so I decided to limp home with it as is.

We got back to the cars at about 6pm having done a total of 140kms.

Thanks again to Phil for leading another great ride, the black spur is a great place to leave from.  Thank you to all who came, the beginners to the gun’s it’s the mix of riders that makes the ride was it is.

Phil Randall WR250R – Ride Leader
Peter Ross FE570
John Bacon TC450
Aarryn Savage WR450
Geoff Wickes KLX450
Marlene Schewko Sherco 2.5
Fred Schewko Gas Gas 450
Eric Lama TTR250
Matt Creasey CRF450
Darrell Clark WR450
Andrew Wratten DR650
Darren Hornsby KTM450
???????? Un readable
Gerard Blamphed
Steve Wiseman
Mick Zantrouint KTM525
Steve Elvord
Warren Haanel
Leon Van Kollenburg WR450 – Morning Tailman
Chris McCran WR450
Matthew Law TTR250 – Afternoon Tailman
David Tucker

Great report Guys, keep them coming. Will

Hey Marls I hope those trophy bruises were
from your trophy fall, not the trophy dink
I gave you ;D ;D ;D

Gidday Eric,
Yeh, you did good dinking me out of that pooty track..had lost my mojoess by then  ::) Now I know who to ask to dink me out of trouble in future.. ;D
Cheers,
Marls
(ps never offer to be tailman!)

Steady on Marls remember I said I am a
happily ??? mrried man ;D

Oops seem to have lost an A in there somewhere ???
Shows that typing and drinking dont mix :P
                                           

I didn't know that Happily & Married Man went together ??

Ahh, convince your better halves how much fun dirt bike riding is, buy them a bike, then they can come on the level 1 rides too!...us girls could all then hang out at the back of the pack....then everyone's happy!
I did a 2 hour, $60, see if you like it course a few years back at Ride-Tek & the rest is history  ;D

If Im allowed to go riding Im happy ;D
If Im not allowed >:( Im divorcing her
problem solved ;D ;D

Sorry Marls I do it for the break, we have 5 females at home plus my 3 sisters I need some bloke time!

Mmmm.... I worry about you, Brad-er-ley!!

 ;D

Man handling !!

Maybe he needs a Man-equin!

 ;D

Man-Kini

To__oo many wo-men in my life need some down time from the whole scene! Yes  your worries are accepted!!! But there is an upside!

I bet Dr Brads on FaceBook !!

:  FACEBOOK = GAY.

Hey that's FUNNY because I don't have one!!!

You don't have a C0ck, i was born with mine just like most of the Male's that ride bikes. But if you would like to donate your Gonads, here is the phone of someone who is missing a set 04133589342.

I forgot a bit of the ride report.


Shortly into the afternoon ride Mick (i think) ktm 525 snapped the subframe on both sides just behind where it mounts to the frame.  So the only think holding the back of the bike on was the exhaust and wiring.  He didn't fall off, it just broke.

He struggled on for a while and a few other rode his bike for him but you had to constantly stand on the pegs.  He was one of the ones to leave asap in the afternoon group.so