The 2016 United Sidecar Association Rally in Hotchkiss, CO

I attended this year's USCA National Rally held in Hotchkiss, CO.  Quite the mellow but enjoyable event, with a varied and extensive showing of sidecar rigs of several makes and models.  Of course, Ural sidecar rigs made a respectable showing as well!

Most of the attendees camped in the Delta County Fairgrounds where water/coffee/tea and lemonade were provided 24x7 and we got fed Breakfast and Dinner on Saturday.  Good grub and there was even musical entertainment!

On Friday, went for a late lunch/ride with Dan Kearney and Randy Fritch (Colorado's premier URAL dealer) to a place near Crawford, Colorado.  Afterwards, we checked out a canyon road recommended to them by Dana Williams, the organizer of the rally for this year.

 Dan K. and Randy F.

 Dan's motorcycle and Randy's and my rig wait for us at the top

of the cliff's edge.

The gravel was quite large and loose along this road, made

for some interesting turns if one didn't slow down.

CCJon, from Riding the Horizon fame attended the rally and brought along his spiffy new KLR Sidecar Rig: The Grey Phantom:

CCJon's Grey Phantom

photo courtesy Jay B.

Jon graciously let me do a test ride of his rig, and it was great!  Good power, handled well, stopped well and I am sure it'll do his planned ride through South America with ease!  This KLR sidecar option may be something worth looking into, don't you think?

This morning we had the Top Dog Parade of Hack Dogs, riders and their dogs lined up for a quick parade and the winner was voted on by the rally attendees.  This year, the winner was Newt, Mr C.O.B.'s dog pictured below with Dave Hooker, aka Mr COB.

Newt and Dave Hooker aka Mr. COB

 Met Scott, a Denver area Uralista with a cool Retro sidecar rig

with a rather skinny monkey.

Since there's not many sidecar related things cooler than a dog in a sidecar, here's some of the other contestants from this morning:

 courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

There was a "show and shine" competition, but I missed it as I was helping set up for the sidecar games portion of the rally.

The games ended up consisting of two events:  Sidecar Jousting and Blindfold Obstacle Course.

The jousting event involved negotiating gates formed by traffic cones, which forced the rigs to do slalom turns and then at last second line up for an attempt to spear through and collect three colored rings.  The course was on loose soil which made it that much more challenging.  We didn't do it as a timed event though, people get too "competitive".  The three teams that gathered all three rings were then lined up in front of the audience in the stands and clapping determined who won.

Tehya and Tim in "Dad Plaid"

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

yep, that's a Burgman

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

courtesy of  Scott Kirkwood

 courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

 courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

 Liz and Dave Springer

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

 Deana and Jay

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin (great angle shot Tim!)

 Tie-breaker runs involved spearing a plastic cup and keeping

it speared on the "lance" until the point was raised fully 90 degrees.

Here's Deana and Jay

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

The second event involved blindfolding the sidecar rig driver, and the monkey passenger issued directions to negotiate a series of traffic cone gates and slalom course.  It was quite the interesting experience, driving Scarlett, my 2014 Patrol Sidecar rig without being able to see, while fellow Uralista Dan Kearney issued instructions from the sidecar.  Alas, we didn't make it into the finals.  In fact, when we swapped places and Dan did the driving, he had trouble hearing me and we ended up running over three of the cones!

BMW 1200C with sidecar in the Blindfold Obstacle Event

 Tim L. and his daughter Tehya

 Yours truly and Dan Kearney,
after our "amusing" performance
courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

Deana and Jay on the Blindfolded Obstacle course

courtesy of  Tim Laughlin

 Deana and Jay pose as the victors of the jousting competition

striking respective poses much to the delight of the audience.

 A cool trailer spotted at the rally, towed by a Goldwing Trike

Sunday morning saw the whole fairground abuzz with packing up activities by the rally attendees.  I grabbed some coffee and a donut and broke camp with minimal fuss.  Goodbyes and final chats were done all around, and then Dan Kearny and I headed out together to ride back towards Denver.

One small issue after a few miles though, the pusher wheel's brake pads grabbed the disc and caused me to lose power again.  I'd adjusted it out before but apparently there's more to the issue.  I pulled into a gas station's parking lot and removed the parking brake bracket and spring, completely disabling the parking brake....I was then able to push the rig back and forth, before, I couldn't.

Backed out the adjustment nut as much as I could and basically had very little pusher brake capability, but the front brake would do fine for the rest of the ride.

Near the summit of McClure Pass on CO 133.

Capable of 55 mph+ again, we rode towards Carbondale where we tanked up with fuel.  Dan K. then showed me the turn for another Cottonwood Pass, or County Road 113 which would take us up and down for several miles, most of it dirt, and only one wrong turn to the town of Gypsum, thereby bypassing the slog to Glenwood Springs and quite a bit of I-70 super slab.

The view we saw when we made the wrong turn, great mistake eh?

We got on US6 and rode parallel to the I-70 Super Slab from Gypsum to the town of EagleVail where we stopped for lunch.  

Lunch over with, we got on the I-70 slab and rode it to a traffic jam about 3 miles west of the Eisenhower Tunnel which crosses the Continental Divide.  We crept forward in the hot sun, along with a million cars it seemed until about a mile from the tunnel when Scarlett stalled and I pushed her to the side of the road since she was overheating.  Dan's motorcycle was overheating a bit too, in spite of being a water-cooled motorcycle so that should give you an idea of the conditions we were riding in.

Perhaps 10 minutes later, Scarlett had cooled down enough and we joined the slow moving mass of vehicles inching our way to the tunnel.  We made it there with no further issue and we then rode mostly "downhill" from the Divide, with a couple of additional slow downs, to the Georgetown exit where I got more fuel.

We stayed on frontage roads from Georgetown, avoiding the I-70 slab all the way to Idaho Springs where I parted ways from Dan K who would be taking the Virginia Canyon Road from Idaho Springs towards Blackhawk where he lives in the mountains.

I got back on I-70 and traffic cooperated all the way back to the Denver Metro area where temperatures reached over 99 degrees Fahrenheit at this point!  It was a long hot slog at 55 mph along C-470 and the E-470 toll road but Scarlett and I made it back home by 4:30PM with no further issues and no heat stroke on my part.

I called the Ural Dealer, Randy, and we made plans for him to consult with URAL either tomorrow or Tuesday and coordinate a time when I can take the rig up to him to perhaps replace the pusher brake caliper or the brake master cylinder or both, hopefully under warranty.

I also need to replace the front wheel bearings it seems but that task I can do myself I think in the next day or so.

Scarlett went over 38K kilometers during this rally's riding.  About 500 miles of riding total.

Note: I hope to add more photos from other Uralisti as they find time to process what they shot....will advise via a comment.

Here's a great video from CCJon, his blog is here:  LINK