Thanksgiving day 1974,
I was a late bloomer when it comes to motorcycles. I was 20 years old in 1974 when I bought my first motorcycle, a 1973 Yamaha MX250. My roommate Randy had bought a new Can-Am 125 MX a couple months earlier. In those days you could ride on the vast expanses of Fort Lewis military reservation. We were on our bikes every weekend ripping around and racing each other. We thought we were getting pretty fast. We had been going to some of the local races as spectators and started to think, “l can beat those guys.”
Bought all the proper gear and joined the AMA.
The plan was to race our first race at the Friday Night Scrambles at nearby Strattleline Park.
“We need a little more practice so go out to the reservation Thanksgiving morning and get a couple hours in”.
We parked at the usual place at the end of a paved road at the reservation boundary. Tank trails headed in from there. Unloaded the bikes, put on our gear and fired up the bikes. We would clean out the bikes by running up an down the paved road wide open a couple of times.
Randy took off first winding out the Can-Am with me a few seconds behind. He came to a stop on the right side of the road. I had just hit fifth gear an was flying when Randy decided to turn around. He turned right in front of me. Well I had only been riding for a few months so I just hit the brakes hard. Randy saw me coming about that time an stopped sideways in the middle of the road. I was sideways too at that time but no where near stopped. My rear wheel clipped his front wheel. The collision launched me into the air. I was flying for what seemed to be a very long time. I landed on the pavement, bounced hard a couple of times and ended up on my back in the ditch. I just laid there for a bit thinking I must be hurt. I slowly started moving an was surprised that I didn’t seem to be hurt. I looked back to Randy who was still sitting on his bike, didn’t even knock him down.
I got to my feet and when I went to pull my gloves off I discovered that I had been hurt. My right hand had been badly broken.
We loaded the bikes up in the truck and headed for the emergency room. By now the pain had set in. The X-ray reviled 3 broken bones an a dislocated knuckle. A couple hours later the bones we all set back where they belong, supposedly, and I was sporting a new white cast.
Randy raced that Friday night and did fairly well if I remember, pain meds made things a little fuzzy.
It would be a couple of months before my first race.
Bob.
Victor