The 5-day 2014 NORRA Mexican 1000 was full of ups and downs. It was planned as a 5 day offroad navigational rally from Ensenada to San Jose del Cabo in Baja California. Unfortunately, I didn't make it that far.

I won the stages for the +50 class for the first two days of the event, this despite having a flat front tire on Day 2. The race was going well, and I was very competitive among the leaders of an elite group of motorcycle rally racers, that included multiple Baja and rally champions. On Day 3, starting in San Ignacio, I was riding really well. Although starting about 5th on the day (riders start one at a time, with a 2 minute wait between riders), I had passed the riders starting ahead of me and at one time took the physical lead for the race. That didn't last too long, as I was passed back by a few riders but still had a great lead on the other riders in my class (for riders 50 years of age or older). Then about 20 miles before San Juanico, I had another flat front tire.

I limped the bike into San Juanico, and was able to replace the tube in the front tire. The next section of the race course, between San Juanico and Loreto is a very rough and rocky section of the race. Back on race pace, I began passing many of the riders that had passed me while I was delayed fixing the flat tire. But on one of the very last tough corners of the race about 3 miles before the finish for the day, I lost concentration and had a pretty horrendous crash through a very large cactus. I flipped end over end, resulting in a broken collar bone that finished my race.

I ended up getting my collar bone plated in La Paz two days later. For almost 3 days, it was probably the best racing of my life, but unfortunately, it's a 5 day race that I couldn't finish.