I can remember sitting on my BMX bike at the top of a massive dirt hill at a construction site. There was a worn, single-track trail with a small jump halfway down, and the route led into a massive pit, creating a high-speed, frame-rattling descent that would only be executed on a dare, and then with much coaxing from buddies. We were 10 or 11 years old.
Most of us have such memories, wrenching on our bikes, riding them to otherwise forbidden locations and testing our young courage in an arena both dangerous and innocent, where only our youthful oblivion kept us from punking out of situations that actually could have, and sometimes did, land us in the hospital.
Only a special few turn the childlike obsession to go fast, possibly break bones, and earn glory and legendary status, into a life’s work, or at least a lucrative pastime.
That’s what happens to the likes of Cody Webb and Taylor Robert, two EnduroCross rockstars who recently took top honors at the 2015 Geico EnduroCross season finale at Citizen’s Bank Arena in Ontario, California Nov 21.
Taylor and Webb, both of Team RPM/KTM, took first and second respectively in the grueling race, but in the end it was Webb who took the season championship. Taylor, however, was just happy to have secured a second win.
“It feels good to get another win and I feel like I should have a lot more of them by now but there are a lot of tough rider,” Robert said about his second career win. “I knew those guys were going to be fighting for the championship and that I could probably steal a win.”
Webb, who battled Husqvarna’s Colton Haaker throughout the race, was humble in his triumph.
“As far as the championship, I definitely felt a lot of pressure but I knew I have been riding solid all year and made good decisions,” Webb said. “It word out in my favor tonight. I felt like I wasn’t the fastest rider tonight but settling for second was OK because I won the championship.”
There it is: EnduroCross is the culmination of all dirt road daydreams of our reckless childhoods. Jumping ramps, bombing down impossible hills, and catching air on jumps, to the thrills, imagined or otherwise, or the girls watching us, all conjured images of one day making a speech, having won the top award in an insane contest involving dirt, speed, axle grease and wrenched bones. And these guys managed to do it for real.
Photo credit: Dirt Bike Magazine
