A favorite American dirt bike activity is hill climbing. No matter where you ride, there are always some challenging hills that test your skill and your motors capabilities. I started riding dirt bikes in the Tillamook Burn, in the Pacific Coast Mountain Range , Oregon.
My buddies had ridden in these mountains their whole lives, starting off as little kids, following their Dads around on the myriad of trails and fireroads that criss-cross the entire area. They knew it like the back of their hands. It took me forever to get to know the place because I was always just trying to keep up with them and never had enough time to remember where we had been. It would be a full on race from one hill climb to the next. Some of the hills were famous and usually always has other guys there competing for bragging rights and others were hills tucked away that we never had any other competition, just our close knit crew.
These guys loved hill climbing and were amazing at it. He who leaves tire tracks the highest wins,simple rules. One thing I learnt quickly was the old adage, what goes up, must come down and coming down can be way more exciting( but not nearly as pleasurable) as going up! My best hill climber was a 1977 Maico 400 MX, it has incredible low end torque and would tractor when you needed it most. You get out of shape, have to chop the throttle and then get back on it from low RPM and that thing would tractor right through that treacherous zone ,pulling all the way. These old timers are looking good on a Harley and an Ajay.
