Jun 29, 2010
Early on Monday June 28th at 4:20am local time, two riders (Frank Kelly from South Carolina and Will Barclay from Highland Beach, Florida) crossed the finish line (together) for the Hoka Hey Challenge in Homer Alaska. It’s reported that these guys didn’t know each other until meeting at the last checkpoint on Sunday. So as not to be disqualified (speeding tickets) or have an accident, they opted to ride together across the finish line at the same time. Hmmm, now is that even possible? The next batch of riders scheduled to cross the finish line are at least one day behind these two finalist. Both riders will need to still pass a drug test, a motorcycle inspection, polygraph and verification of gas receipts and road logs to be declared the winners of the $500k bounty.
The question(s) facing the organizers (Big Jim) now is 1-can these guys split the prize monies? 2-is it possible that riders could log more than 8250 miles in 6 1/2 days on back roads (no interstate riding allowed) and not exceed the 60 mph posted speed limit? Another twist to the story is that Homer Alaska has no drug testing lab and no official polygraph equipment. So the drama continues. On a sad note there was apparently one fatality during the event in Casper Wyoming on Saturday June 26 and others have been injured in various accidents during the ride. Just part of the experience we guess.
We do hope the cloud of confusion and misguided information floating around will be cleared up shortly by the organizers and this challenge can be put to rest for this year. As has been noted by some participants and observers, the original intent of this event was to challenge the riders AND give them an experience of a lifetime. As noted by Chris Callen, editor of Cycle Source Magazine, “this Challenge has nothing to do with open-road, or even back-road rallying from checkpoint to checkpoint. This would be a test of a motorcyclists physical endurance or a rider’s ability to make runs without sleep, or sustenance. The crux of the Challenge of the Hoka Hey is the challenge of not succumbing to the spirit of self-doubt“.
(photo Michael Amstrong)
Too much $$ to be safe. One rider friend from Alaska asked, “when and what route so I can avoid it.”