Saving the Salt

[TrickyDicky]

I have been going to the salt since 1953 and there has been 4 years of rain outs.

Trivia question: apart from last year, in which years was Speed Week rained out?

[jdincau]

Trivia question: apart from last year, in which years was Speed Week rained out?

Complete rainouts in 1968, 1982 and 1983 that I know of. In addition 1965 and 1980 only had 3 mile courses

[dw230]

I remember all of them. '82 we never left inspection at the airport, '83 there was NO Speed Week, try to find a 1983 program, hint - none printed. We did not leave Los Angeles. 1984 was looking better, although we were out in October. Course all set, came out of dinner on Saturday night to full blown rain storm. Moved the start line down two miles to a three miles course, left the pits in the original location resulting in a 2 mile drive to start line. Lasted 2.5 days and we were gone. 7 of us picked up the whole place that afternoon.

DW

[jacksoni]

I remember all of them. '82 we never left inspection at the airport, '83 there was NO Speed Week, try to find a 1983 program, hint - none printed. We did not leave Los Angeles. 1984 was looking better, although we were out in October. Course all set, came out of dinner on Saturday night to full blown rain storm. Moved the start line down two miles to a three miles course, left the pits in the original location resulting in a 2 mile drive to start line. Lasted 2.5 days and we were gone. 7 of us picked up the whole place that afternoon.

DW

Yah, I was there in '82..
"84 first year with my 'liner. Set 1 liter record with 2/4 pistons, short course only. Put other 2 pistons in, set 2 liter record. Only using 2 gears on first 3 gears on second (of 4) so off to local junk yard (no longer in existence) found a lower gear ring and pinon and was in process of changing that to try to get to 200 (went 193) when it rained again. Oh well. To hairdryer  in '85 so never got the NA 200 number I was looking for.

[JoeRider677]

I'm a relative noob to LSR and I love the history and the adventures, I'd like to make a few more of them myself, my impound stories from 2011 are still strong. My story from 2014, pretty lame.

Honest, real condition of the salt? I'd rather fly out there and look at the water or whatever than drag my junk 2500 miles, feed and house a crew to turn around.  I'm guessing it's pretty bad, years that things look good there's a lot of chatter.

[mbuk]

The salt might not be good and it might rain, but we will still be there. If I didn't do things because something might not go right then I would do anything. So lets all keep are fingers crossed for a good Speedweek and if the temperature could be in the 70's then the wife will be happy to.

[desperate]

It was a bit of a bummer last year, for the 10 teams that brought their bikes from the UK, but guess what? Our container with all 10 bikes has returned & is back on US soil. We're all flying out on August 3rd to collect them & drive up from LA, so it had better not be raining again! My Indian is raring to go 

[greenjunk]

So is this the subliminal let down? http://www.sltrib.com/home/2709833-155/speed-week-is-in-danger-again

[makr]

 

[SPARKY]

   both eyes

[wobblywalrus]

Check with Delvene before you give up and send your bikes back to the UK.  Last year they found a high and dry place to fit the BMST track.

[jimwebb]

With all due respect. I hope SCTA makes a decision sooner rather than later. We work all year for Speed Week and our team has more junk than ever ready to go this year. Short course, long course... BUT... we still have a long punch list and more financial commitments to make very quickly to get there with all our junk on time. In 2003, it was "the best salt ever", but I drove the long course w/o being able to see for two miles since I was driving on dirt washboard.With all the desire for participant safety, I really hope SCTA-BNI does not force the issue. We can all go jump around and make the standing water evaporate, but we cannot deposit new salt to race on. I hope any decision is made sooner rather than later.
And yeah, I'm bummed.

[flak monkey]

With all due respect. I hope SCTA makes a decision sooner rather than later. We work all year for Speed Week and our team has more junk than ever ready to go this year. Short course, long course... BUT... we still have a long punch list and more financial commitments to make very quickly to get there with all our junk on time. In 2003, it was "the best salt ever", but I drove the long course w/o being able to see for two miles since I was driving on dirt washboard.With all the desire for participant safety, I really hope SCTA-BNI does not force the issue. We can all go jump around and make the standing water evaporate, but we cannot deposit new salt to race on. I hope any decision is made sooner rather than later.
And yeah, I'm bummed.

I agree wholeheartedly with this. As one small part of the Brit teams travelling over we've all sunk a lot of our personal funds into getting there again this year, despite the cancellation last year which we all understood to be 'one of those things'.

It would do everyone, from all areas, a favor if there was a clear cut yes/no in the next few days as that gives us time to at least try and cancel flights, hotels and van reservations and try and recoup some of the money we've already committed. Sadly for things like shipping costs it's way too late. Our bikes arrived in the USA last week, and we will all have to suffer that cost irrespective of the decision made now. But for all of the other costs we might be able to get some of those $1,000's recovered. Anything much past the middle of this week is going to be too late.

I really hope for everyone's sake that the event can go ahead, we've all worked long hard hours, and put a lot of money into getting there again already. Plus we really think we can get our class record. But we'd all rather know sooner rather than later.

[Stainless1]

Well kids... in a perfect world we all know what the weather will do before it happens... 
 
So if it rains a day or two before the meet, like it did for the Test n Tune,  or SpeedWeek last year, it just gets canceled.  Unfortunately most of the racing salt resides across the road, ready to be loaded on rail cars and shipped to God knows where.  With very little salt left, even a minor rain will shut down the race course.  Years ago we had enough salt to overcome a storm, we could be back to racing in a day... sometimes two.  The SCTA had that thought last year... but the rain just kept coming. 
While we all would want a lot of warning of a cancellation, I suspect the SCTA will do due diligence before they call the race that supports their racing the rest of the year.  That means they will do everything in their power to make the race happen... I expect they will find a course and unless it rains hard a couple of days before will not cancel the meet.
Keep your pants on... it's over 3 weeks away

[flak monkey]

Yeah, but we aren't talking about the weather here... we all know and understand that.

The information at the moment suggests that there's just not enough salt to race on, either in terms of thickness or area. If that's true then that won't magically fix itself in 3 weeks, rain or shine...