Jimmy Lewis Rocks

[turkish]

Nearly a dozen advriders descended upon Primm, Nevada this past weekend to participate in a special version of Jimmy Lewis Off-Road Riding School. In addition to the normal course, we also got to spend an extra day with Jimmy and Heather out in the Dumont Dunes. It was an incredible experience and many thanks go to Jean-Luc for coordinating the event.

We knew we'd need sharp knobbies for the class, so Lone*Star, Jean-Luc and I trailered our bikes to Primm. No "trailer queen" comments please.



R-Dubb relaxes in the parking lot before the first day of class.



Rad says, "Hi!"



The first drill, practiced in the parking lot, was to balance on the bike and move it around without using the handlebars. Lone*Star gets a little carried away and has flashbacks of riding a bull.



After a brief lecture, we're off to the dry lake bed for a day of drills.
We were pretty busy the first day and there wasn't a lot of time for pictures.

Jimmy demonstrates the techniques on his GS ADV. The surface of the lake bed is quite smooth in places with predictable traction that's good for sliding. Here Jimmy shows us how it's done:



The counterbalance drill had us hanging off the bikes while riding in a tight circle:



At the end of the day, we did some drills around cones. Here's Jimmy again getting sideways on a student's bike:





Ricardo goes around the same cone...



For the second day, Jimmy took us out for a ride in the hills. The first lesson was how to ride through sand. Pretty much everyone was apprehensive about riding through the sandy trail just outside the dry lake bed. I was too busy picking my bike up to take pictures of this part. Hopefully, some of the other guys will post their take.

After the sand, we went up into the hills. The terrain was fairly easy with rocky sections now and then. We'd stop from time to time and Jimmy would demonstrate how easy it was to climb steep walls and then come back down again.







Sometimes the ground was too soft for a sidestand, so Jimmy demonstrated alternate ways to park your motorcycle:



The obligatory front braking drill:



When we stopped for lunch, Sasha told the story of the big rock he collected with his right cylinder. Not only is the crash guard slightly rearranged, but the lower plug wire was barely hanging on, and several cooling fins were damaged.



Rocks not withstanding, Sasha impressed everyone in the group with his smooth control of the airhead. Graceful, efficient and effective, the guy is poetry on two wheels.

Jimmy took us up a fairly steep trail so that we could practice our clutch and throttle control. I crossed the first few sections without incident, but got stuck in a rut where I quickly buried the rear wheel of my KTM. Jimmy came down and told me to get off the bike. In a couple of seconds, he had the bike out of the hole and was heading up the trail. He rode to the top and then came back down only to park the bike in exactly the same rut that I got stuck in originally. "Now you do it," he said. Bastard.

This hill was really steep and while some of the other guys were taking a break, darmahman, standing to Jimmy's left, said, "Hey Jimmy, would you be able to ride down a hill that steep?" referring to the raw slope right behind him. "Sure, why not?" said Jimmy. Kirkmoon says, "We could all get to the bottom of that hill. The only question is whether we'd be alive when we got there."

Just to prove the point, Jimmy hops on the 950 Adventure S (which he's not even remotely able to flatfoot) and points it down the steep rocky slope. No road, no trail, just a 50% grade of loose dirt and rocks with a 6 foot drop off at the bottom. Certain death for a normal rider.









Later in the afternoon we headed down a wide dirt road at high speed. Jimmy took off at lightspeed and was a little speck with a dust plume somewhere off in the distance. I was chasing Jean-Luc and having a tough time seeing through all the dust he was leaving behind. At one point, I could see that the road made a turn to the right but wasn't sure exactly where the turn was. I slowed down in hopes that the dust would clear and then saw that Jean-Luc missed the turn and was wrestling with his bike out in the weeds. Just as I was turning around to see where everbody else was, WHAM!. R-Dubb must've been right on my ass and he clipped my bike with his right cylinder. Fortunately, the passenger footpeg on my KTM took most of the impact as it bent forward 180 degrees, trapping my ankle in the process. Ouch. I was able to wiggle my boot free and the footpeg just broke off. Here R-Dubb looks at the twisted bracket:



After blasting through some two-track out in the hills, we came to a little clearing with a large log where Jimmy demonstrated just how capable the KTM 950 really is.







A self-portrait of sorts:



Here's many of the advrider crew reflected in the polished hubcap of Jimmy and Heather's rig:



On Monday morning I got up to catch the morning light and went for a solo ride out in the mud hills near Tecopah Springs.







After breakfast, we all headed out to the Dumont Dunes for some more sand. How deep? Really deep.



Here Sasha watches as Jimmy demonstrates how to dig out an oilhead:



We rode around these "little" dunes for a while and then headed off to the real thing. The biggest dune at Dumont is something like 1,000 feet tall. Here's a few shots of Jimmy taking a run at it (on a GS!) just to give you a sense of scale:







Here he is just making the top. On a GS. Un-freakin' believable.



In this photo, Sasha gets oh-so-close to the top on a borrowed KTM:



And gets a hero's welcome when he comes back.



Traveltoad being serious again:



In conclusion, many thanks to Jimmy and Heather for putting together an outstanding weekend. The company was first-rate, the riding was perfect and I think we all realized just how much there is to learn in riding a motorcycle well.

Our host and hostess for the weekend:

[Rad]

Thanks for post'n the pis, Andy

It was fun not only meet'n Jimmy and Heather, but Scot Harden who was in the park'n lot the first day with his Dakar bike.

To bad you do not have a shot of Jimmy push'n the KLX with his foot on the back of the bike as he rode the 950....90MPH

[Burren Rider]

Wow, great photo's. Few things impress like a rider who is capable of treating a big bike like a 250 motocrosser (truth be known most of us wouldn't be able to tackle a lot of those obstacles on 250 either). It must be humbling to ride and learn from someone of that calibre. No doubt the course would have been money well spent.

[Mully]

Cool beans, guys!

You rock!

mully

Those are fantastic shots of the 950 jumping the log.
I hope you have those in a much bigger size.

Nice work.

[turkish]

Originally Posted by Surlyguy

Those are fantastic shots of the 950 jumping the log.
I hope you have those in a much bigger size.

Nice work.

I only had my little Sony T1 camera with me for the ride. But you can see the original photos here.

[Rad]

" I did slow down" J-L

[jcolombo]

Amazing stuff, sounds like even riders like J-L can still pick up a tip or two. It also reminds me as many others have pointed out, probably the best money you can spend on a bike is on the rider. Everyone should be required to take a class like this or a track school before they are allowed to weigh in on which Ti footpegs they should get.

When are you guys going back?

JC

[Andrew]

Hall of Fame quality!

[nomiles]

Well done, turkish! nice report and pics!

[Jean-Luc]

Originally Posted by jcolombo

Amazing stuff, sounds like even riders like J-L can still pick up a tip or two.

You bet! I knew I would learn a lot before to go and I did. But I had no idea on how much I still have to learn... Very, very useful

Great report, Turkish, I will add some pics tomorrow...

[turkish]

Originally Posted by Jean-Luc

You bet! I knew I would learn a lot before to go and I did. But I had no idea on how much I still have to learn... Very, very useful

Great report, Turkish, I will add some pics tomorrow...

Heh.

"Oh no. I didn't crash. Not unless you saw me."

[kirkmoon]

Nice pics Andy. Especially the ones of Jimmy doing his amazing feats.

I don't have time to post a full report now, but some of my pics are available for viewing here.

Thanks to everyone. I really enjoyed the experience and the company was great.

[Jean-Luc]

He has a strange hat, but a very nice car

[Jean-Luc]

I'll post the other pics tomorrow but I can't resist to post the ones from Jimmy jumping that log over and over while waiting for the rest of the group.