The Blackwater 100 & other good reads

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Kobus Myburgh

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Enjoyed this read and just wanted to share:

The Blackwater 100

America’s Original Extreme Offroad Race
Words by Dale Spangler | Photos courtesy MX Sports

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Many would agree the Blackwater 100 is America’s original extreme offroad race. Before the terms “extreme enduro” or “hard enduro” even existed, before there was an EnduroCross Series, and before there was a Grand National Cross Country (GNCC) series—there was the Blackwater 100. One of the most famous (some would argue most infamous) offroad races in the world, the Blackwater 100, for the most part, has been all but forgotten. What’s the background of this race and why was it so significant? What became of it?

It began as an idea in the mid-1970s, when a preacher from the small town of Davis, West Virginia, located in the northeast part of the state in the heart of coal country, approached a race promoter by the name of Dave “Big Dave” Coombs at one of his motocross races. The preacher, concerned for the economy of his struggling little town, had an idea to hold a motorcycle race on lands surrounding Davis in the hopes of attracting spectators and racers to the area. Big Dave and the preacher watched the movie On Any Sunday, and after seeing the scenes featuring the Lake Elsinore Grand Prix, they decided a similar type of event would be just what was needed to the boost the economy of Davis. Big Dave went down and inspected the land around Davis and saw that the area had immense potential for a motorcycle race, which resulted in the first race being held outside of town in 1974. For 1975 the race was moved into town and became part of Davis’ “Alpine Festival.” The event was named the “Blackwater 100” because of the surrounding Blackwater River that runs through Davis, and the nearby Blackwater Falls. The race’s length was to be 100 miles, therefore “100” was added to the end of the name, and the Blackwater 100 was born.

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Steep hills, tight woods, water crossings, swamps—you name it, the Blackwater had it all. The event was a true test of endurance—for both man and machine—and to simply finish became a sought-after achievement. Due to the difficulty of its varied terrain and four grueling 25-mile laps, the event was eventually dubbed “America’s toughest race.” The winner that first year in 1975 was Kevin Lavoie from Chepachet, Rhode Island riding an Ossa, and he would go on to win the 1976 and 1978 versions of the event also. Other notable names in those early years included Frank Gallo (1977 winner), and Mark Hyde (1979 winner).

“I always looked forward to Blackwater every year as it was one of those must-do events,” remembers 1979 winner Mark Hyde. “After watching the movie On Any Sunday, and seeing how that played out, it was cool to be in a race that had an impact like that. After I won the race for the first time in 1979, I was rewarded with my first factory support ride, and started my career in the motorcycle industry.” [Hyde would go on to win the event three more times].

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Through the support of spectators, racers, and sponsors alike, the Blackwater event continued to grow in popularity. Davey Coombs, son of Big Dave and current Editor-in-Chief at Racer X Illustrated magazine, explains how the event quickly gained the attention of powersports media at the time: “A large part of the popularity of the event came when the staff of California-based Dirt Bike magazine—Rick ‘Super Hunky’ Sieman, Tom Webb, Paul Clipper and Dennis ‘Ketchup’ Cox—came back east for the event at the invite of Big Dave. They had little experience with the thick woods and bottomless swamps, and struggled to even finish the event, yet they wrote very complimentary articles about it (it was Super Hunky who dubbed it ‘America's toughest race’ after he tried to ride it on a big-bore Maico and had a brutal day just trying to get around). They gave the event immediate credibility, and helped bridge the gap that existed between eastern off-road racing and the mostly-California-based motorcycle industry.”

By 1980, due in part to the event’s popularity, the single-day Blackwater event evolved into a three-race 100-mile series with the Blackwater 100 as the premier race. Three-wheelers were added in 1983 (later to become four-wheelers) and then in 1984 Wiseco Piston signed on as title sponsor of the seven-race “Wiseco 100 Miler Series,” which was renamed the Wiseco Grand National Cross Country (GNCC) series in 1986.

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