Southeast MA – Martinsburg WV
Fri April 24, 2019
(~503 miles)

For the past couple of years, Memorial Day weekend has found me riding around the mid-Atlantic region for 32 hours in the Mason Dixon 20-20 endurance rally. This year is the penultimate running of the event, with 2020 being the 20th and final rally, bringing numeric harmony to the universe. The event sold out for the first time in its history this year, which means folks are eager to have dibs on getting in to next year’s rally, which will be offered first to participants of the 2018/2019 rallies. Plus the Iron Butt Rally is coming up next month and the MD2020 makes a good final shakedown trip for many IBR riders.

The theme of this year’s event was “Cold Leftovers”, whereas Rallymaster Rick Miller is cleaning house and using a bunch of bonus locations from former rallies that either weren’t visited enough to his satisfaction, or that caused particular problems for riders in past years. When we received the electronic GPS files and rally cover sheet a week prior, there was no elaborate puzzle or other tomfoolery immediately apparent. It looked like a pretty straightforward rally, which in itself caused angst and sleeplessness amongst us riders, who are a suspicious lot with absolutely no trust of anything ‘simple’ coming from a Rallymaster. 🙂

After several hours last week routing through the 70-odd bonus locations in Basecamp, I eventually gravitated toward my very first route (which is unusual). There was one 5-location combination bonus worth enough points to make it mandatory if one was trying to be competitive in the rally. We had to collect the combo bonuses in uninterrupted sequential order, which I estimated to take about 9 hours of riding. Due to the positioning of the start/finish of the combo loop and other nearby bonuses, I had a feeling that competitive routing patterns would be similar, leading to some closely contested finishing results.

After some recent work to fix small coolant and oil seepages, the bike was ready to go at 0500 Friday morning for the 8-9 hour trip down to West Virginia. I came across another LD rider, whom I didn’t recognize, on I-84 southbound just before Hartford. We waved and paced each other for a bit, each recognizing the gear and license plate backers sported on our bikes, but then chose different paths around the city. He made it through first, and I ended up catching up to him close to the NY border. We rode in tandem, while I tried to make out the license plate state.

I had planned a stop at the Red Line Diner in Fishkill NY to grab a meal with Ken Aman, and this other rider followed me off the exit to a red light. Here I learned it was part-time Canadian Marc Beaulac, also on his way down to the MD2020. I invited him to breakfast, but he was only stopping for fuel and had plans to meet other riders further up the road. Ken rode up to the Red Line about the same time I did. He was taking a work break and we had a good meal catching up before heading our separate ways.

It was a beautiful spring day and I took it pretty easy speed-wise on the trip down, setting my cruise control (!) to 75-78 for most of the way. I was determined to see if I could manage a 400 mile range using my new-ish aux tank, and was gratified to see I had that capability when I finally stopped for fuel. Now I know that my range will basically lie somewhere between about 360 miles (i.e. when I ran out of gas on the RnR) and 410ish (cruising).

I arrived at the Comfort Inn in Martinsburg in the early afternoon, with plenty of time to check in and socialize a bit before registration began around 15:00. Check-in was quick as always with this rally and the odometer check ride was the same nice 16 mile loop including the curvy WV-901. The heat and humidity were bearing down a bit by late afternoon and it was nice to enjoy the AC inside while catching up with other riders.

I ran into my fellow I-84 traveler from this morning, Marc, in the lobby along with some other familiar characters.

The pre-rally dinner was scheduled for 18:00 and we gathered in the downstairs function room for some fried chicken and potato salad. Walmart had apparently screwed up our chicken order, so the staff resorted to KFC to salvage our dinner plans. The food and companionship was most welcome after a day on the road.

After the meal, Rick welcomed us all and went over some history for the newer riders as well as the usual ground rules. No major changes were announced to the rally layout…still no puzzles or twists. Some of us were still worried about a bombshell to be dropped in the morning rider’s meeting, but Rick hadn’t done that before in my experience. Very likely what you see is what you’re gonna get at this point.

With routes already chosen, we spent a relaxing hour or two kicking tires out in the pleasant evening air by the bikes, with none of the annoying mosquitoes or biting flies we have back home right now. I turned in at a reasonable hour in order to be ready for an early wake-up and staging the bikes for the start the next morning.

Nobody seems worried here