Safety
There was a time when safety on a dirt bike rarely crossed my mind. In fact, before I had children, I'd say I gave safety about as much thought as I now do to training (that is to say: very little.)
But as I've aged, the subject has crept into my mind more, steadily embedding itself deeper and deeper into my consciousness with each time that I frantically pin the throttle on my 450 to lower the rear-end high above a hard-packed double.
Naturally, the 20-year-old me wouldn't find much interest in what the 27-year-old me has to say on the subject of safety. Truth be told, the 20-year-old me might even be ashamed of what the 27-year-old version of himself thinks when it comes to track construction and safety equipment. But screw you, 20-year-old me--I think this is an important topic, and, not to be patronizing, but I've been a few places you haven't. So sit tight and daydream about your airy, responsibility-free existence if that helps you through this.
Now then.
When I stepped to the top of the new Pro/Intermediate double at Mustang this Sunday, I frowned a weary frown. It's not that the jump wasn't doable--it was just that it was a perfect storm of dangerousness for anyone who miscalculated it. It was downhill and high-speed, and face of the second jump was steep enough to make a freestyle guy cringe. In my mind, I could already imagine the crash that awaited anyone who made a misstep.
"We're opening up the new section for 15 minutes," Shane Kisman, one-half of the team behind Mustang, said to me midway through the afternoon.
"I want no part of that new section," I said matter-of-factly. And it was true. While if the same jump had been sitting somewhere in the hills, I might have eyeballed it, I didn't think it had any business on a racetrack full of kids, many of whom are all too eager to earn the badge of burliness in front of their buddies. Not going to check it out was my small act of protest.
Still, the voyeur in me wandered down to the track to see what would happen. Sure enough, the second rider to try it--he was following the first--made precisely the kind of mistake that I had grimly envisioned when I had walked to the lip. I watched as he came up a few feet short, bounced a terrific swap, and disappeared behind a berm.
I didn't need to walk any closer. I could guess what shape he was in behind that berm.
But I did walk closer, cursing a little under my breath. When I got there, he was shouting in pain and holding his leg. I could only shake my head.
Let's not delude ourselves: you can be hurt anywhere on a motocross track at virtually anytime. But as I watched the scene, a question burned in my brain: in a sport where danger exists anyway, why do we need obstacles that punish the hell out of kids who make so much as a momentary lapse in judgment?
Some make the argument that we need obstacles of this sort to advance local riders, that we need to raise everyone's game by including weighty challenges on our tracks.
But as I stood and watched the kid scream, that argument seemed as lame and lifeless as his bike laying on the side of the track.
The truth is that there are plenty of ways to challenge riders without putting them in needless danger. Casing a jump should cost a rider a few tenths of a second--not six months in a cast (incidentally, ever try getting faster in a cast? Not the best way to go about it.) And the guys who are truly serious about getting fast--those who we imagine we are building these jumps for--would probably receive a higher dividend from practicing their turns anyway (that's where most Pro races are won and lost, after all.)
I fully realize that young riders will disagree with me on this. There's not much you can do to stop kids from pushing the envelope on their bikes, and they relish the opportunities to try big obstacles (at least until those big obstacles bite them.) But the promoters and officials of our tracks should resist going too far in trying to cater to them. If they don't, more kids are going to get hurt than need to. And for many of those kids, those obstacles will have the opposite effect of helping them progress. In all likelihood, some of them will never set wheel on a racetrack again.
As I was leaving for the day, I talked to Shane about the jump again. We went back and forth a bit, but he eventually said he'd take another look at the jump. I hope he does. I don't think they built the jump to hurt anyone, but I don't see any merit to leaving the jump in its current form. There are plenty of ways to build something challenging in that option section will separate the fast from the slow--without punishing those who get caught in between.
And get well soon, Zach Cochran. Two broken legs is surely no fun, but you'll be stronger and wiser when you have healed.
