Let me just chime in for a quick second, first and very last thing I will say about this topic.... It just doesn't matter, the whole intent of this site was to create a place for Hayabusa Riders to get together, share stories, meet new people and have fun, nothing more, nothing less. This site grew well beyond anything that was ever planned or honestly anything that I believe anyone could have ever orchestrated. The success of the site was two fold, 1. We provided a place using the principles posted above from RacerV, 2. Great people interested in the bike and the desire to get out and ride... that's it, that is the recipe...
For anyone that might think that I have been involved in discussions or conversations behind the scenes, make no mistake I have been MIA from the site / admin side of things for quite some time and have several of the mods / admins seemingly frustrated I think in my lack of involvement over this whole thing, honestly it's just garbage all of it. Let's just boil it down to the real fine print...
RacerV --- John, I've ridden with you in groups, I've ridden with you alone in Robbinsville, The Dragon, Cherahola Skyway, Hallet Racetrack and our friendship goes deeper than this.. I'm just not going to argue over something that might come between that, while hindsight is 20 / 20 I would hope that in the future you guys would include the site in some decisions, maybe we could offer some information on how we got to the decisions we did. I never wanted to be in charge of anything at the bash, I just wanted to ride, but I seemed to always get called to the principals office (Mrs. Reba) every time something went wrong, every time someone wanted something they came to a mod and admin, to me so in some way while we didn't want to be over anything we had to be. The bash started out just as you have it now, several folks getting together to have a good time so that's awesome your working towards that, no foul there...
Loomis, love ya dude.... I put a picture of you and your brother up the other day as a couple of the original group from 2007 when we rode to Hooters on that Friday, one of the best memories of me on two wheels going across the skyway... I don't give up on friends, let me know what you need I'm always here for you...
The problem with being the owner of this site is that I just can't please everyone, over the years we had emails and face to face discussions from members telling us what they wanted out of the Bash (an event that wasn't ours) and we tried to help get some things moving or help others like with Dave and the food, the org always covered any cost that needed to be made up, we always tried to give stuff away and we always tried to stay out of the way but yet people kept coming to us with needs / demands, in the end I just stopped coming.... So while I never wanted any of it, I just wanted to go ride and play I was getting complaints that "The Captain" should be more friendly and do more things with the new people... I just thought we were there to ride, right.. no one told me I was in charge of entertainment, the Bash for me turned into a job... Cap where is the food, Cap where are the pics, Cap, what time are we leaving, who's doing this when is that blah blah... Annnnnd when we did get involved people got upset that we were trying to take over so we back out and stayed to ourselves and then people said the mods / admins were just a big clique, so the man trip to Glacier National Park I headed with my best bud Uncle Steve! So while the oRg may not have ever been directly responsible for the bash it was all organized here, the members were from here and discussions were from here which meant the brand was here too... I think that is why there was so much confusion with the membership!
You folks remember this, anything that get's in between you and the people that helped you make some of the best riding memories of your life is probably just garbage and pride, lose it because one day you will look back and regret it. Of course there are always those folks that don't always hang out on the site anymore and I won't go into it in detail but know that SCAR and I spoke on the phone for about an hour the other night.
Man I miss spending time with Scar, Tom is a great dude mentally positive, loves the hayabusa, loves people and loves business and there isn't anything wrong with any single piece of that. Scar has been to my home, ate from my table, slept in my home, even been in my hot tub and we rode all over the Sierra Nevada's together as well as central Oklahoma, so don't think that I hate him, I miss his friendship. When Scar left he was building the Stampede (which I attended the first one in Reno) and loved it, Scar always wanted to be and as far as I know still wants to be an event promoter and that is AWESOME, but at the time several years ago a Hayabusa Promoter as a mod on this site went directly against our core and fundamental values which was that everyone was welcome. While I know that Scar would never turn anyone away, his events were paid events just like other paid events and to participate you had to pay a fee for food, clothes, group rides or whatever was included in the event... There is absolutely nothing wrong with what he has built at all but the oRg could not have someone on staff that managed that type of paid group ride and still be a leader of our get togethers in my opinion so we parted. Scar is a good guy, people have tried to make more out of this situation than it ever was and over time as we recently spoke about even we forgot a lot of the details.
For every story that you think you might know, I assure you there is as Paul Harvey would say "The Rest of the Story" and we try to keep people's private lives just that, private.. I have no secrets but I do try to keep who slept with who or who stole who's bike or who got caught with his wife all hush hush.... It happens more often than you think!
Let me just close with this... It isn't worth it, there isn't enough time in the day to do all the things I want to do much less argue on the Internet over who is right, when I'm going on vacation and who is going to win... Lose the pride, remember why we are here and never lose sight of that and made sure you let the other guy know you have his back...
Some of my closest friends I have to this day are from right here on this site, I will not lose those friendships because of pride. If people want to go to Robbinsville on another date awesome, let us know how things go, tell us if the Troopers are out and how Pappy's doing. John don't turn the music up too loud cause Mrs. Reba always calls me and most importantly, make some great memories...
Cap, over and out!