Max BMWs Wheels in the Field Event - 2021
/I haven’t been to many organized events in my life. Most of my off road riding or weekends away have been self organized. This year, i’ve been to two organized events and have really enjoyed them. I figure there are others out there who were in my position, wanting to know more about them before committing. So this is less of a review, and more of a “whats this all about” kind of post. The easiest way to do this is to tell our story from that weekend.
Riding the power lines was probably the most fun, and the most scenic!
Wheels in the Field is a BMW only event that is hosted by MAX BMW, and takes place in Chester Vermont. Its technically a 1 day event, but you should really make a weekend out of it. You can sign up for the A ride or the B ride. They are very similar rides, but the A ride diverts in to “hero” sections occasionally. That takes about half of the day, and then there is Lunch, and another ride called the Enduro ride. They send the GPX tracks out about a week before the event. I of course, being the nerd I am, color coded the tracks and re-named all the waypoints. Doing this helps me follow them while riding, but also helps familiarize me with whats to come.
Our trip started out on Thursday. Its a far ride to Chester, so our plan was to spend Thursday night at our buddy Pete’s Cabin. Pete is a character, and its known that whatever happens at Petes cabin, stays at Petes cabin. I rode up with my buddy Moses and got there around 8PM. Most of the rest of our group got there a few hours earlier. Petes cabin is about 3 hours from where we live, so it was a good mid point.
Friday, we decided to take the back roads up to Chester. A lot of beautiful pavement, and some fun easy dirt roads as well. We ended up meeting a few other friends at the lunch break, and our crew was now a total of 8 riders, and this is also where we had our first mishap of the trip!
The mishap
We were on our way up, just about 30 minutes from Chester when it happened. Riding up through a twisty dirt road, all on our Cardo intercoms chatting away. Pete was in the lead since he knew the area, and on the comms casually told us to look at that cool little bridge on the side of the road. It was a small home made bridge over a creak leading to someones house. Moses was 2nd in the line up right behind Pete. He glanced to the side, and then back to the road. The problem was, the road was no longer in front of him! It curved to the right while he was still going straight! I’ll note that Moses is actually a great rider, with a good amount of experience. This type of thing can happen to anyone if you lose focus for even just a few seconds. It’s the nature of the sport.
So the road curved right, and Moses was still going straight. He went in to action trying to save himself, and we are hearing all of his reactions over the Comms. “Woh!”. On the left of the road was a ditch, and then a dirt wall of sorts. He ended up riding the ditch, with the thought that he would compose the bike and pull back out in to the road. Solid plan, except for the unexpected small boulder hiding in the brush. His left cylinder/crash bar hit the boulder and immediately flipped his bike around and to a full stop. He was still on the bike, but the bike fell over to the side and kind of pinned him between it and that dirt wall. No one saw this happen, but we all heard it. “ooooohh, someone get this bike off me”.
I was 5th in the lineup and pulled up quickly at the scene. It felt like forever to get my kick stand down and run over. Luckily riders 3 and 4 got to him first and started pulling the bike off of him. He was fine, but a little banged up. No broken bones, and nothing else serious. Just bruising. Lucky guy. The bike on the other hand, was done. The front wheel was bent, with spokes missing. The front forks were bent and would not compress anymore. The rear sub frame was twisted to the side (sounds familiar, but thats another story for another day). The crash bars ripped out of the screw holes in the engine.
So now Moses was a bit bruised up, the bike wasn’t going anywhere, and we were still about 30 minutes away from Chester. We made it work. A nice local man let us put the bike in his driveway. Moses hopped on the back of Victors bike (one of the best riders I know) and we rode on to Chester.
Arriving at Chester
Once at the event, we were some of the first ones there. Our first goal was finding a good area to set up camp. Some of us were in Hammocks, and so we needed to find good Trees. The event is held in a field so it wasn't an easy task. Still, we found some trees and all started setting up camp. Meanwhile, Victor took Moses to the emergency room just to get checked out. I was in charge of getting the bike back. I found a local rider that had a trailer and he was more than willing to help. His name was Zam, and Zam was the man. Thats one of the great things about the riding community, is that when someone needs help, no one questions jumping in and saving the day. Zam drove with me 30 minutes south, loaded up the bike, and we brought it back to the field.
Friday night we were on our own for dinner. A few guys went and got us subway as we were dealing with all the other Drama. Then Pete and I helped build some of the other crews tents since they were out helping Moses. Moe came back from the hospital with a thumbs up. All was ok, but his shoulder was sore. Now for the best part of events like this, the camping. I set up my favorite hammock system, and my new Big Agnes high back chair. For the rest of the trip, the chair was a hit, and found a new name of the Big Anus chair. Everyone was shocked to hear that it cost $150, but soon agreed it was well worth it. It’s the kind of chair you can fall asleep in, and replaced my 7 year old REI small camp chair. It packs to about 5” longer than the REI, but is totally worth it. We drank and hung out around the giant bon fire, just the boys being boys.
Saturday morning, kickstands up at 9AM. Rider meeting at 845AM. Petes buddy Mark (and now our buddy) insisted that Moses take out Marks bike, and Moses took him up on that. I think Moe needed to get back on the horse, so that he would be mentally OK for the next time he would ride. It made sense, and he did well. He rode for about an hour, and then we got to a muddy water crossing. He asked me to ride Marks bike across, as he didn't want to strain his shoulder getting it through. Made sense to me, but I didn't want to do it! I was already a little nervous getting my bike across. Remember this is the first hour of technical riding. It takes most riders some time to warm up, and it likely takes me a little longer than most. Add in that Marks bike was the bigger Adventure model. Still, I did it. I rode my bike across first, then walked back across the mud, and rode Marks bike through. No issues doing it, and to my luck, there was a professional photographer there taking shots as I rode through. These are some epic photos, so worth it!
Moses decided to call it a day soon after. He proved to himself that he was still good to go, and went back to the camp site to chill with Mark. My buddy Rich and I paired up for the rest of the day as we were riding a little slower than the rest of the group. Vic, Leo, and Pete rode out on their own further up in the group. We reached some decent mud, nice fun rocky hill climbs, and most importantly the Power Lines. The Power Lines were the highlight of the trip. Much of the weekends riding is the type of riding i’ve done many times before, but the power lines were great. It was such a beautiful ride and felt really unique. This weekend is worth it alone, just for that portion of the ride. And while being a beautiful portion of the ride, it was also fairly technical and fun!
During the group A ride, we met many people. Some people needed help while riding, picking up bikes, getting unstuck, etc. It was a great feeling, helping and meeting all these people. Its part of the ride. Unfortunately, helping others lift their bikes, or helping them ride their bike through tricky parts (which I did twice that morning) drains a lot of personal energy. I like to look at energy level when riding kind of like a video game. That little bar in the top right corner showing you your energy left. If its gets too low, you’re out! I saw my bar getting smaller and smaller as we kept stopping to help others.
Lunch comes around, and Rich and I ate a little too much at the camp site (provided by a local snow mobile club). Between our energy bars being depleted, and the large lunch, we made the questionable decision to just hang back at the campsite, keeping Moses company while he removed all the accessories off of his bike. Rich and I would spend the rest of the day half regretting we didn't do the Enduro afternoon ride. Personally, I was happy. I had a great ride in the morning, and I was fairly exhausted. I didn’t need to push myself, and I ended my riding on a good note for the day. That, and I didn’t want to leave Moe alone for the rest of the day. Vic, Leo and Pete would go on to the Enduro ride while Rich, Alex, Chris, Mark and I hung back with Moses. Mark ended up ducking out of the event early that afternoon due to stomach issues. Something about the Chili the day before.
MAX BMW agreed to take Moe’s bike back to one of their locations, and said we could call the insurance company to come to their shop directly. We pretty much knew the bike was totaled, so we spent the afternoon removing the accessories. Or rather Moses did, with my tool kit, while I sat in my comfy chair and relaxed. Moe had one of his employees drive up that night to drive him back home. Before that though, we all went to the trials competition. Vic decided to compete and did really well. After that Teach Mcneal came and did a stunt show for us. First he took someones 850GS and ran it through the trials course, jumping that bike fairly high in to the air, and doing Endo’s down the grass hill. Then he took his BMW sport bike and tore up the pavement for a bit, doing stunts that made me nervous, but was so thrilling to watch. It was a great show.
We then had a dinner sponsored by MAX BMW in a giant tent at the camp site. It was really nice, they fed us well. Alex and I snuck off before dinner to buy Leo a birthday cake, and we broke it out shortly after the meal while still in the big dinner tent. We camped again, drank, hung out by the fire, and had another great night.
Sunday morning we were on the road by roughly 9am. Alex, Leo and Chris rode home on their own. Rich, Vic, Pete and I rode down south together for a few hours before Vic and Pete split off on their own. I was supposed to ride home with Moses originally, but he got a ride home in a cozy car the night before. Rich had his bike trailer stowed at Petes cabin, and I hitched a ride back with him since he lives near me in New Jersey.
Rich’s trailer. i had to remove some parts from my bike to make it fit!
Overall, a great event! I will 100% be there again next year. MAX BMW were great hosts, we met lot of great people, the terrain was great, and the location was beautiful.
