WET DIRT FEST

Glen Helen held its inaugural Dirt Fest ATV gathering this weekend despite a serious rainstorm. As it turns out, ATV riders like the mud and the event was held with a moderate turn-out of ATV and UTV enthusiasts. Most of Saturday’s event were somewhat modest in attendance. This included factory demo rides from Can-Am as well as spontaneous events like the “Baja Drags” which pitted riders against each other in side-by-side lanes.
      The weekend’s main event was almost a wash out. The opening round of the Yamaha Quad-X series by STI was hammered by rain on Saturday night, resulting in a flooded motocross track. For the most part the riders were anxious to ride anyway, and practice was only delayed by about an hour. The only real casualty was the Can-Am factory race team which pulled its entry. In truth, the Can-Am guys were never expected to show up as it wasn’t in their schedule for the race season. But it was still disappointing for fans who wanted to see defending champion Dustin Nelson go up against the likes of Chad Weinen, Jeremie Warnia and Josh Frederick.
      The race was sloppy as expected. The first moto holeshot was taken by rookie pro Justin Jones who had practiced wet-concrete launches the day before. Nelson passed him in the first turn and Beau Baron came by a few laps later. For the rest of the race, Nelson and Baron stayed evenly separated while Jones battled with Oregon’s Ethan Thatcher. Jones held on for third.
      The second moto was almost dry by comparison. Time it was Baron with the holeshot and Nelson close behind. The two of them waged war until Nelson finally came out ahead. Thatcher was third this time ahead of Jones.
      Most of the riders who attended were pleased with the event an vowed to return next year. As for the Glen Helen staff, they have big plans for the 2012 running of the Dirt Fest, and those plans don’t include rain.

For more results, go to www.glenhelen.com