Road Hogg MC Holds Annual Motorcycle Rodeo
Monday, June 27, 2005
The Road Hogg Motorcycle Club held its annual rodeo this past weekend at their clubhouse in New Madison, OH. The gates opened up Friday evening so participants could set up camp and relax the rest of the evening.
One of the first things you noticed when you arrived was the Yamaha hanging about 50 foot up in a tree. That's not something you see everyday and I, never having seen such a thing, found it a bit surreal.
Saturday afternoon featured field events including an obstacle course, slow race, tire toss, barrell roll, barrell toss and bite the wienie.
The Obstacle Course
The obstacle course was in the shape of a "U" and the object was to get thru the course completing as much as possible.
To start out, you held three large washers in your left hand and tried to drop each one in a bucket as you rode by. Then you proceeded to ride over a seesaw, make a right hand turn and weave thru three cones, make another right turn and ride over a plank. To finish the course, you had to grab three golf balls sitting on top of cones and drop them into a bucket at the end.
The first guy to go thru the obstacle course, did it perfectly. He made it look soooooo easy! The second guy dropped a washer into the first bucket and then smashed the next two into smitherines. His attempt to recover from a bucket caught under his bike sent him sideways and down he went! The crowd was roaring!
After seeing an experienced rider go down, I lost my fear of embarrassement and gave it a try. It was not near as easy as it looked. I didn't make any washers, did fine over the seesaw, smashed a cone, rode over the plank and managed to grab a golf ball, but missed dropping it into the bucket. As poorly as I did, I still managed to bring home a ribbon, tying for third place. Not bad, I think, for being a new rider.
The Tire Toss
The tire toss looked a bit too much for me so I sat it out. Each guy had to carry three 21" motorcycle tires on their shoulder. As they rode past a cone, they had to drop the tire over the cone without knocking it over. Not an easy task as only one guy was able to put a tire over all three cones, and that was after a couple of attempts.
The Slow Race
Next up was the slow race. The object was to be the last bike over the finish line without touching your feet to the ground. With four bikes lined up, I looked at my opponents and said, "Don't you guys let this little girl beat you." My feable attempt of intimidation didn't work and I failed miserabley!
The Barrell Roll
Rolling a barrell and keeping it in your lane looked as if it could be quite a challenge. Things seem to be going well and in one second the barrell hits a rough spot in the ground and off it goes, right into the path of another bike. It looked to me as soon as you had it rolling pretty good, the faster you went the better off you were in getting the barrell across the finish line. I missed out on giving it a try because it started to rain.
The Rains!
A few of us thought the rain would pass but man were we wrong. It was one heck of a storm and it lasted for about two hours without letting up. Sure am glad I wasn't in a tent. About fifteen of us made it to the barn and after we realized it wasn't going to stop anytime soon, a brave soul weathered the storm to go get his cooler and a radio. He was the Hero of the Day.
The Barrell Toss
After the rain let up, the events were started again with the barrell toss. This was a big guys challenge and he simply had to toss the barrell as far as he could. One of the funniest parts of being a spectator, was watching the guys swaying back and forth who were watching the guy getting ready to throw the keg.
Bite The Wienie
It takes two to bite a wienie, a rider and passenger that is. A hot dog smeared with mustard was hung by a string. As the bike rolled under the dog, the passenger had to lean up and try to bite off as much as possible.
The mustard makes it slippery and you have to be quick and right underneath it to be able to get a hold of it. Those brave girls had mustard all over their faces!
The evening wound up with a bike show, the jap bash (the bike droppring from the tree), awards and great music by the band, Continental Rose.
The field events were a blast and I'll be back next year to take another run at them.
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The power switch broke on my camera during the rain but you'll find a few more and larger images in the biker pics album.
