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Preston Tilford (774) took the 450 Pro win with a 2-1. Photo: Dan Alamangos

With ten racetracks within a two-hour drive of Los Angeles, SoCal motocross racers are among the luckiest in the world. Not only can they ride at a wide variety of tracks, they can race all they want—and that includes on Saturday at Glen Helen’s REM races. REM is unique because: (1) REM holds races on 40 weekends out of the year. (2) They attract a large number of motorcycle industry execs and former National riders. (3) REM is the last bastion of the old-school Indian Dunes and Saddleback specialists of the 1970-80s. (4) REM’s down-home vibe makes it very different from many modern motocross scenes.

Justin Jones (3) won the first moto and was leading the second moto when he got a flat front tire. Justin kept going and managed to hang on to second overall. Photo: Dan Alamangos

It’s not just that REM racers know each other, but that they have known each other for years…decades even. Evidenced by the fact that over half of the riders are over the age of 40, the biggest classes are for Over-50 racers and they can almost fill the gate with Over-60 riders (all born before 1954).

MXA’s Dennis Stapleton (184) won the Vet Pro class as he chases 250 Pro winner Swede Kristoffer Palm (227). Dennis is leaving for a Far East tour to Japan, China and the Philippines this week. Photo: Dan Alamangos

The racing is intense—made all the more important because these riders have history with each other—thus they have beaten or been beaten by many of the riders on their starting gate. They all think they can win—because even the oldest and slowest of the bunch won races when they were younger, thinner or hairier. Most of grudge matches are friendly rivalries—a few are true feuds.

Part 1: With two corners left in the Over-50 Elite class, Jon Ortner (10) and Bob Weber (6) came up on Intermediates Jeff Mason (459) and Scott Williams (2). Weber chose to follow the slower riders into the rut, while Ortner went by Weber on the outside. Photo: Dan Alamangos

Part 2: 75 feet later, the final turn before the checkered flag  (which is just around the bend), Jon Ortner ping pongs off Scott Williams (2o), who richochets into Weber (who was trying to make the same outside move on Ortner that Jon made on him the corner before). All three go down. Photo: Dan Alamangos

Part 3: Jon Ortner has already crossed the finish line as Randy Skinner (31) goes by the Williams/Weber entanglement. Photo: Dan Alamangos

This week at REM the good news was that the whole kit-and-kaboodle returned to their own track—after having raced on the Glen Helen National track the week before. Glen Helen is a bee hive of activity every weekend and on this Saturday REM was racing on the upper track, while vintage bikes were on the National track. And several REM regulars tried to double class it—by switching from new bike to old bike and upper track to lower track throughout the day. It doesn’t hurt that from the REM pit, scenic views of both tracks are possible by just walking 75 feet to the edge of the hills.

Dave Eropkin (811) puts a move on Will Harper (7), but by the end of the day, Harper’s 4-3 would best Eropkin’s 3-4 in the Over-50 Expert class. Photo: Dan Alamangos

THE BIG WINNERS AT REM

PRESTON TILFORD: Preston Tilford is beginning to show improvement every week from his previous injuries—and while he was no match for the raw speed of Justin Jones—Jones’ front tube was no match for it either. Tilford inherited the victory after Justin tire went flat—but Tilford holeshot and led both motos to put himself in position to take advanatge of Justin’s misfortune

Greg Matherly (311) swept the Over-50 Intermediates for the second week in a row. Photo: Debbi Tamietti

GREG MATHERLY: It’s always nice to sweep both motos on your way to the podium and that is exactly what Greg Matherly did in the Over-50 Intermediate class—but in a race organization that has Over-50 Novice, Intermediate, Expert and Elite classes, winning the Intermediates too many times make you a candidate to be an Expert the next time out of the box. Chris Cole went 2-2, Terry Varner 3-4, Sam Ramirez 6-5 and Jeff Scott 7-6. Scott Williams had a fifth in the first Over-50 Intermediate moto, but got caught by the Over-50 Elite riders on the last lap and paid the price for being the meat in a faster rider sandwich. Scott’s 13th was the outcome.

Willy Simons, Jr. took the 250 Intermediate win. Photo: Dan Alamangos

WILL JUNIOR: Willy Simon’s Jr. went 1-1 to win the 250 intermediate class over Jake Martineau’s 4-2, Matt Bynum’s 3-3 and Tallon Newman’s 2-4. With a little math skills you can see that the battle for second overall ended up in three riders tied on points—the rubber match went to Martineau, but Newman was the fastest of the three even if he ended up with the worst score.

Tallon Newman was fourth in the 250 Intermediates with a 2-4, but was in contention to win. Photo: Dan Alamangos

CARL GAZAFY: The Over-60 Experts fell to Carl Gazafy’s 1-1 in front of Mike Marion’s 2-2, Ken Ehler’s 3-3,  and Tom Holmes’ 4-4. Jody Weisel and Tom White dueled over fifth place with Jody’s 7-5 besting Tom’s 5-8—a victory aided by the fact that Tom missed the second moto start.

Terry Cook moving some dirt. Photo: Debbi Tamietti

PHIL DOWELL: After a long layoff, Phil Dowell return to racing a couple months ago and has been working his way back up through the Over-50 Expert ranks…and this weekend he took a 2-2 overall victory. It was a good news/bad news day for Luther French, who won the first moto in only his second week in the Over-50 class, but scored no points in moto two. Val Tamietti won the second moto, but a fifth in moto one left him in second overall.

450 NOVICES: Brandon Reid used a 3-1 to win ahead of Noah Hickerson’s 1-4, Brendan Crow’s 2-5, Mark Taylor’s 5-3 and Andrew Shade’s 7-2. At the moment Reid is the leader of the class, but they are all very close.

They don’t all make it through every corner—Chris Arellano (2), Shawn Khacherian (81), Travis Eckstein (52), Glenn Pietronico (262) and Tim Branson (783) in various stages of speed. Photo: Debbi Tamietti

SYD WOODS: In the Over-50 Novice class Syd Woods was perfect with a 1-1 ahead of Mike Hillion’s 2-2. John Caper and Kenny Safford continued their rivalry with a reversal of last week’s placings as Caper’s 5-3 beat Safford’s 4-4 (last weekend Safford’s 4-4 beat Caper’s 3-5).

REM does not race next Saturday, June 21, because of a big offroad race at Glen Helen, but returns to action on June 21. For more info go to www.remsatmx.com

MEANWHILE ON THE VINTAGE SIDE OF THINGS

Doug Dubach on his carbon fiber YZ100. Photo: Dan Alamangos

The Harper brothers had matching T-shirts, matching Triumphs and matching speed. Photo: Debbi Tamietti

Sean Kalos. Photo: Dan Alamangos

Sean Collier was running 16th in the AMA 450 National Championships, but decided to skip Thunder Valley to race at Scott Burnworth’s California Classic. Photo: Dan Alamangos

Jim Gibson. Photo: Dan Alamangos

Jeff Matiasevich. Photo: Dan Alamangos