The unofficial 2008 WUDI X non-event non-homepage.
Jim Cook aka Wudsracer
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E-Mail me at:jejb@att.net to get on the list.
NEW stuff
Jeb's ride report
End of NEW stuff
Here's a link to the board. Look in the Ride Headquarters forum.
Here's a page with hotel information.
Here's a page with maps and driving instructions.
Brock Creek trail map
1/1/08 - I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a great New Years. The only new thing is that Jim is looking into hotel discounts, permits and the porta potties. Remember we'll all need to throw in a few dollars to pay for the potties and the permit fees.
The 10th annual Wudi ride is going to take place at the Brock Creek (BC), Arkansas public riding trails NE of Russellville, AR. So the same area as last year. See the links on this page for directions and GPS coordinates. The festivities will center around the weekend of the February 23/24, 2008 this time. Normally, the riding starts on Friday and goes through Mon or Tues. This is a public riding area, though, so folks can start and end whenever they like this year.
This will be a different kind of Wudi than we've had in the earlier years. BC has about 35-40 miles of single track trails and it's almost entirely fairly challenging. Big gnarly hills, lots of rocks, lots of off cambers, etc. Even the ATV trails you'll see on the maps are not really beginner friendly in a lot of the riding area. I'd say this is a B rider or better kind of place if you're going to have any fun. Not very kid, wife, beginner friendly. I love the
place to death but it's not for everyone.
We have a designated camp area but you'll have to drive down an ATV trail/forest road to get in there. Big camping rigs will not want to even try to get back there, at least if you like your rig. My RV is sure not getting in there but my suburban and trailer will make it. Once in the camp area, if we park amongst the tight-ish trees carefully, we can hopefully get 20-30 rigs in there. If it gets full, we'll just have to overflow into some of the other camp or deer camp areas that are dotted around the riding area. But those will be a mile or more from the main camp.
On the other Wudi trips over the years to these areas, temps have been mostly from near freezing at night to 50/60+ during the day. Last year was pretty nice weather, highs in the 50's and 60's. Altitude will be up to 3000' so no rejetting should be required. I've ridden the BC trails a lot and they're a lot of fun but sometimes challenging riding.
We will only have the trail maps to use for trail navigation unless you hook up with someone that knows their way around. The maps are good, though, and it's not hard to find your way around. The Forest Service folks that run the park have told us no arrowing. They are adamant about no races at BC or anything that looks like a race, but will allow this ride if we pay for a permit and out houses at the camp area. We will have arrows on the road close to camp to show the way into camp.
You should run very heavy tubes in both tires. I've run Pirelli MT16 rears/MT18 fronts there with great results. When it's wetter like it has been lately, I've used my old MN standby of Mich S12 rears/Dunlop 756 fronts, mostly because I still I have a big stack of them, I guess. But they work very well, too. There are a lot of sharp rocks here so you'll tear up whatever kind of tire you bring.
These annual WUDI rides happen each year to let the northern types, aka Yankees, get some winter riding in. The only riding they get to do at that time of year is on snowmobiles. WUDI stands for WUDsracer Invitational. "Wudsracer" is Jim's user name on the rec.motorcycles.dirt usenet group, which is where I first got to know him. I moved to NW Arkansas in 2005 from MN but Jim is keeping the tradition alive. It's only open to all ya'lls who can come so it's not much of an invitational, actually.
These events started when Jim Cook extended an invitation to my Yankee self and friends to come down south and ride. He's since come to regret the offer but he's too much of a gentleman to turn the northeners down when they come begging each winter. It's grown from there into whatever it is now. This is NOT a full blown spodefest.
There is a little gas station/store in Jerusalem, if you need it. Jim says the closest place to BC is Hector, about 13 miles from camp. Keep in mind that Arkansas police love their radar guns and like giving out speeding tickets (I call them 'revenurs). Jim had warned me about it for years but I still got a speeding ticket my 2nd day after moving down here in '05. 5-7 over is okay but you're on borrowed time much above that on non-highways.
We can use the "Talking Smack" forum for the Wudi ride discussions.
Here's a link to the board. Look in the Ride Headquarters forum. You'll have to get an id if you don't already have one but it's free and easy to do.
I put up a jpg map from my GPS software to hopefully make driving in a bit
easier for those that don't have a GPS. You can't see the town of Jerusalem on
the map but it's due south of where the track starts on the map. It is at:
Wudi Camp GPS Map
I made 2 GPS tracks and several waypoints. I put them on my website. Click here and save the file to your harddrive. It contains a track from exit 83 off of I-540 in Russellville to Jerusalem and then one from Jerusalem to the main Wudi Camp. I also marked some alternative places to park bigger rigs that we went by on the way in. Send me an email or post on the Talking Smack forum if you have issues, questions, etc about the GPS info.
The road into camp from the Austin Trailhead is a very gradual downhill slope pretty much all the way to camp. You really don't notice it until you're on the way out so it's not much of a slope. Lots of little water bars and some puddles, if it's wet.
If everyone parks smartly, we will be able to fit 20 or so truck/trailer rigs like mine in there. There is an access path running around one side of the camp and down the middle. It's not a huge area but, if we use it wisely, it should work pretty well. There was very good cell reception there (I have Sprint but it was roaming). Just one fire pit, though. And I'm sure the rangers won't want us just making fires willy-nilly at each camp spot.
I've got a few questions last year about larger RV's so I want to continue to emphasize that I strongly recommend against trying to get a big rig into the main camp area. I have a 40' DP that I'll take offroad to dirtbike events but I would not dream of trying it in this case.
The RV park that is closest to BC is a couple of miles west of Jerusalem and is called Clear Creek RV park. Looks to be a pasture kind of camp from driving by it at 55mph. I marked that on the above GPS file, too. We have not been able to contact the owner so not a lot of information about it, I'm afraid.
Jim Cook, for those of you who didn't know, owned Smackover Motorsports in scenic Smackover, Ark where he sold GasGas dirtbikes and parts to many very happy customers. I think most of you already know but the dirt bike world took a big hit last year when Smackover Motorsports closed their doors. A huge loss for all us enthusiasts.
Email me, link at the bottom of the page, if you want to get on my e-mailing list for this event.
Post your questions and suggestions on the Smackover Bulletin Board that I linked to above.
Links:
Click here to go to the 2007 WUDI IX web page.
Click here to go to the 2006 WUDI VIII web page.
Click here to go to the 2005 WUDI VII web page.
Click here to go to the 2004 WUDI VI web page.
Click here to go to the 2003 WUDI V web page.
Click here to go to the 2002 WUDI IV web page.
David Jones' RMD page: http://www.spodefest.net/rmd/index.htm
This web site was built by John Brunsgaard aka jeb.
E-Mail:jejb@att.net
