2009 Iron Butt Rally - Official Daily Reports

[lkoncor]

Gratz to all the FJR riders! and big gratz to Jim Owens!!!

 

[Rogue]

Congrats Matt, Iggy and all the other finishers and congrats to T-Dave for a great first attempt!

 

[Jimmy]

How many of the top 20 are new riders in the IBR? Anyone know?

Significant difference in points for the top 2 to the others while everyone else is relatively close.

 

[wheatonFJR]

WOW. Congrats to ALL the riders!! :clapping: Congrats to the winner Jim Owen...and to SkooterG for his Top Ten finish...with 2 minutes to spare even. Congrats to all the other FJR riders who have endured and have done well.

Happy for all those intrepid riders -no matter the brand- on one hand, who've shown their metal...and who forever will have my respect for what they have endured physically and mentally these last ELEVEN days...

...tremendous sadness on the other hand for a wounded rider - Davo. Please...a miracle please...

 

[Bungie]

Congrats to everybody and special thoughts 'n prayers for those in need.

A special thanks to the event organizers, for doing a good job balancing their requirements with those of us who wanted to follow along. Does anybody have a pic of George Barnes? Thats my uncle's name!

 

[Warchild]

How many of the top 20 are new riders in the IBR? Anyone know?

Rookies include 8th place Bob Lilley, 9th place was Ken Meese, 10th place was Peter Behm.

...tremendous sadness on the other hand for a wounded rider - Davo. Please...a miracle please...

The other riders were not aware of just how critical Davo's condition is.... they will when they read this thread. A lot of the IBA staff is grieving tonight.

I recall in Spartanburg giving Davo a blast of **** for running those POS Continental Road Attack tires. I tried to tell him they will not last on our roads, but he said they lasted a good long while on the roads Down Under. He said he would put on a fresh set in St Charles, and it would last him the rest of the event. "No, it won't", I said, "you will need tires again before the end of Leg 3".

Sure enough, in Santa Ana, while waiting to be scored, Davo comes up to me and says, "Warchild, I should have listened to you, mate, I have maybe 1500 miles left on the Road Attacks before they are done". He then said he's not too concerned; he'll get on the Concours Owners Group and someone will hook him up with a rear tire.

Davo, we're pulling for you, mate.....

 

[Cal24Master]

How many of the top 20 are new riders in the IBR? Anyone know?
Significant difference in points for the top 2 to the others while everyone else is relatively close.

There are at least 4 that I know of.

I feel really bad for the riders that made the checkpoints, rode the miles and ended up being DNF because of lack of points. In the first IBR's when you only had to make the checkpoints to be a finisher, Turbo Dave's mileage would have qualified him as a finisher. He really did a hell of a ride. It is a shame that he did not obtain finisher status. I am happy that Maura Gatensby, who rode over 9,000 miles in 2007 and was not a finisher, did finish this year.

I'm sure I'm pointing out the obvious here, but in the last 3 Iron Butt Rallies it has been the case that in order to be a finisher it takes a combination expert routing abilities, and riding ability to even obtain a finisher plaque, let alone a high finishing position. My hat is off to all the riders. Particularily Jim and Jeff who have shown once again that they possess super human skills in both respects.

 

[trimmantom]

Congrats to all riders in the worlds toughest ride. Special thoughts for Turbo Dave and all our FJR riders.

Prayers for Davo and his complete recovery. Another great event by the IBR.

 

[tcfjr]

Some statistically meaningless but potentially interesting data, using only the results from the 70 riders in the 'finisher' class:

Average points, by manufacturer (excluding those with only one representative):

• Yamaha - 97,356
• BMW - 96,580
• Kawasaki - 94,792
• Honda - 94,195

Average place, by manufacturer (again, excluding those with only one representative):

• Yamaha - 30.71
• BMW = 36.38
• Kawasaki - 37.00
• Honda - 37.16

 

[Allan B]

Congratulations to the winner, well deserved I'm sure but congratulations to ALL of the participants, finisher or not, for taking on this monumental rally and giving it everything they had. They should feel like winners, too. :clapping:

Thoughts and prayers to Davo and his family. I am really hoping against hope that he will, somehow, pull through. Go Davo.

Allan

 

[Jimmy]

How many of the top 20 are new riders in the IBR? Anyone know?

Rookies include 8th place Bob Lilley, 9th place was Ken Meese, 10th place was Peter Behm.

Cool. Give me hope!

 

[doctorJ]

Jim deserves this win not only because of his strategy, stamina and riding but for what happened to him in the last one. Good for you Jim. Good for all the riders whether #1 or DNF and kudos to the staff. What happened to Davo hurts us but probably hurts the staff and riders more. Nothing will be done about the deer, IMO (sure hope I'm wrong), but don't see how that risk can affect planning for the next IBR or other LD rides. I guess it just falls into the category of a risk we take. I know I'm getting wary of riding at night due to deer, and have limited it to only (well almost only) 4 lane interstate type roads. The risk is still there but I feel it is less than country 2 lane ones.

doctorj

 

[Jimmy]

Agreed on the Road Attacks. I put a set on my bud Kev's FJR before we went to Laguna in 07. He was replacing them yesterday (he rarely rides) and I apologized for suggesting them. They didn't hold up too well.

(Damn shame to see a guy go down under those circumstances. Damn shame. And crazy odds on top of all that. I just don't get it. But when does stuff like that ever make sense. Uhhg....)

I was particularly impressed with the tire Iggy was running. It was down there but had life left in it! Not much left but it did VERY well. Correct me if I'm wrong but it did the whole rally right?

Well done Iggy and Greg and Turbo Dave - who I seriously enjoyed checking out his bike today!

 

[vectervp1]

I was particularly impressed with the tire Iggy was running. It was down there but had life left in it! Not much left but it did VERY well. Correct me if I'm wrong but it did the whole rally right?

Nope like a lot of riders, Iggi did a rear tire change in Santa Ana. His front did make it through the entire rally though.

 

[vectervp1]

How many of the top 20 are new riders in the IBR? Anyone know?

Rookies include 8th place Bob Lilley, 9th place was Ken Meese, 10th place was Peter Behm.

Cool. Give me hope!

I wouldn't get your hopes up too high. While these are rookies to the IBR, they are not rookies to LD rallies. If you recall Ken Meese won EVERY rally he entered this year. He's a hell of a rallyist and I wouldn't put him in the 'rookie' ranks.

 

[Jimmy]

My hopes are just fine thank you...

 

[dcarver]

I have a fearless prediction, based upon 1 whiskey n 7, that SkooterG will place 5th overall. I have no inside info, just a wild assed, non-scientific guess.Any other fearless predictors out there willing to be subjected to enduring shame when proved wrong?

Thoughts and prayers to Davo, friends, and family.

Final results are now available on the IBR website:https://www.ironbuttrally.com/IBR/2009/2009IBRepilog.pdfFrom Tom Austin's report:
Top 10:

In one of the most dramatic finishes in history, Jim Owen has won the 2009 Iron Butt Rally. Riding a BMW R1200RT, Jim scored 139,833 points. In 2nd place, with 136,090 points, was Jeff Earls, riding a BMW K1200GT. Owen and Earls ran neck and neck for the entire 11 days, during which Earls maintained a slim lead for the first two legs.

Rounding out the top ten were the following riders:

3rd place was Eric Jewell, riding a Honda ST1300, with 130,338 points.

4th place was Chris Sakala, riding a BMW R1200RT, with 126,481 points.

5th place was Greg Marbach, riding a Yamaha FJR1300, with 122,021 points.

6th place was Mike Hutsal, riding a Honda ST1300, with 117,843 points.

7th place was Rick Miller, riding a Honda GL1800, with 114,326 points.

8th place was Bob Lilley, riding a BMW K1200LT, with 111,836 points.

9th place was Ken Meese, riding a BMW K1200GT, with 111,129 points.

10th place was Peter Behm, riding a Yamaha FJR1300, with 109,350 points.

Other FJR riders, who posted 5 of the top 15 places:

11 Michael Evans Yamaha FJR1300 11,535 miles 109,020 points

13 Matt Watkins Yamaha FJR1300 12,502 miles 108,653 points

15 Dick Peek Yamaha FJR1300 11,401 miles 107,138 points

27 Wendy Crockett Yamaha FJR1300 10,500 miles 96,033 points

29 Buford Neely Yamaha FJR1300 9,939 miles 95,073 points

33 Bob St. George Yamaha FJR1300 9,613 miles 94,266 points

35 Chris McGaffin Yamaha FJR1300 10,088 miles 93,007 points

45 Terry Neale Yamaha FJR1300 9,861 miles 88,412 points

48 Jerry White Yamaha FJR1300 8,836 miles 87,978 points

52 David Porter Yamaha FJR1300 9,400 miles 84,429 points

53 Jim Mulcahy Yamaha FJR1300 9,546 miles 83,969 points

54 Chris Whitmore Yamaha FJR1300 9,228 miles 83,633 points

DNF Alan Barbic Yamaha FJR1300 10,702 miles 73,369 points

DNF Tom Bisagni Yamaha FJR1300 8,278 miles 71,303 points

DNF Derek Dickson Yamaha FJR1300 7,836 miles 49,634 points

DNF David Hicks Yamaha FJR1300 7,980 miles 48,930 points

DNF Mark Dieck Yamaha FJR1300 6,610 miles 36,883 points

76,000 points were needed to reach 'finisher' status.

Woot! Do i win a prize? What freaking good guess! With this, I'm immediatly putting SkooterG's FJR up as collateral on a 1.2 billion to 1 Las Vegas bet! Wish me luck!

 

[Rogue]

So Alex Harper went through 3 bikes and still DNFed, is that an IBR record?

 

[kaitsdad]

I was particularly impressed with the tire Iggy was running. It was down there but had life left in it! Not much left but it did VERY well. Correct me if I'm wrong but it did the whole rally right?

Nope. That tire was new at Checkpoint #2.

 

[dcarver]

Is Greg Marbach's 200k+ mile *original motor and drive train* bike the highest mileage ever to complete the rally?