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Matthew Stone
Composition
Ms. Emanuel
4 February 2021

Sunup till Sundown

“Riding motorcycles and doing enduros was something I was pretty passionate about. I loved

doing enduros and I didn’t care if I lost points or was in last. I just wanted to enjoy performing

and going over difficult obstacles to the best of my ability”, says my grandpa, Terry Stone. He

was 18 years old when he first bought his 1970 Bridgestone 175cc motorcycle. It was cheap, but

it broke many motorcycle records and the performance was outstanding for only $452. He

bought it down in South Omaha at a little motorcycle shop called Wade’s. He was always a big

motorcycle guy, but after he heard that one of his teachers participated in enduros, he had to give

it a try.

What is an enduro? Well, an enduro is a 100 mile race typically with 25 checkpoints in which

they have to do tricks on rough terrain or get over obstacles such as hills, rocks, and rivers

essentially racing from sunup till sundown. When my grandpa first started he said that 250

people usually participate in the race and the teacher mentioned earlier who was supposedly a

bigshot only placed 245th place. During his first enduro he stated, “I remember getting stuck in

the mud by this little river and I see a huge 300 pound linebacker looking guy coming. I couldn’t

get my bike out of the mud, but this guy comes over and picks it straight up out of the mud and

carries on with the race.”

That wasn’t the only challenge, but he said that when he and his friend were driving around

they began to see some danger warning signs, but it was only some barbed wire on the ground,
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so all they had to do was watch out for their tires. All of the sudden, however, he exclaims, “My

friend and I were keeping our eyes open for any danger, but there was none we could see.”

That’s when they approached another sign and it was too late, they saw a barbed wire coil just

where their heads were and they were riding towards it too fast to react. “Luckily I had my

helmet on and it just scuffed the helmet a bit, but my friend got hit in the forehead and it wasn’t

pretty.”

After completing the obstacles and tricks, he passed the next checkpoint and all of the people

were stopped, some even giving up, at the sight of an incredibly steep hill. However, my

grandpa said he would just roll down the hill backwards instead of just tossing his bike down like

the other racers. When he started rolling backwards on the hill he kicked the engine just to keep

the bike steady and smoothly maneuvered down the sixty foot steep hill that only jutted out about

ten feet. “When I got to the bottom without any damage to my bike the people at the top of the

hill cheered and clapped”, he exclaims proudly. From that enduro race he had no other problems

other than cleaning the mud and rocks out from his wheels from time to time. Afterwards he saw

that he had made 120th place which he said isn’t too bad for your first time racing 100 miles over

rough terrain. He didn’t care about winning, he just wanted to have some fun and race around

with his buddies.

A while after that race my grandpa met the legendary British motorcycle trials performer,

Mick Andrews, who was FIM Trial World Champion and won the Six Days Trial five times. My

grandpa said, “I was a fan of his and I would always practice his tricks, but when I finally met

him we talked for a while and even did tricks together while spinning our bikes one hundred and

eighty degrees while doing wheelies.” “I was inspired to try participating in trials, but I wasn’t
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ever very good at them since they took expert and professional levels of skill to do it”, he

explained.

Eventually after competing in Iowa, Nebraska, and Kansas for his first enduro, he would

compete in his second and last enduro in 1972 which was his best performance. “I was doing

good”, he says, “I had only been deducted 10 points for being late because I hit some mud and it

sent me flying into a tree where I broke my wrist.” He explained that if it weren’t for his messed

up wrist and getting sent to the hospital he would’ve finished in the top place, but he was just

happy to have participated.

After it all, he said that he still looks back with fond memories of him and his friends

competing and even doing tricks near the Henry Doorly Zoo where people would gather, cheer,

and watch my grandpa and his friends perform on bikes. “Oh yeah, I was super passionate about

enduros and just motorcycles in general”, he later stated. “I especially loved going for a ride to

the Lost Hills by myself and just feel the wind and the cool air.” Later, he decided it was about

time to put the cover over his motorcycle and call it quits as he now had two sons to take care of,

my dad and my uncle. Since then he hasn’t rode or worked on any of his motorcycles. I asked

him if he would ever pick up his bike again and he told me this, “I hope so, I have always had a

passion and love for riding motorcycles. Some of my greatest memories were made on my

motorcycles, but as of now I have other things to worry about, someday, I hope I will be able to.”

Word Count: (942)

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