On June 26th-27th Hoagy's Heroes hosted the HILLBILLY 1000, a 1,000 mile Iron Butt Ride (IBR) through West Virginia. This was an in-state IBA SaddleSore 1000 World Record Attempt in West Virginia. The ride took place totally in West Virginia and started at Triple S Motorcycle Co. in Morgantown, WV. First Bike out was at midnight and the last bikes left by 2AM. Jim was the only WORM that rode in the Hillbilly 1000, but he had a support crew consisting of Rose, Stuart, Kayla, Rebecca, Mary and Jonathan too. Jim has described the experience for us:

Hello everyone, I just completed my second IBA sponsored Iron Butt 1000 miles in 24 hours ride on June 27th, 2009. I completed this ride in 17 hours and 1 minute flat. The ride was organized by Hoagy's Heroes Organization and took place entirely in the State of West Virginia. I would like to share some of my favorite experiences with other riders who may be thinking about doing a IBA ride and say thanks to the outstanding organizers, Hoagy's Heroes.

I first met up with Hoagy at the Holiday Inn Express in Morgantown located almost across the street from Triple S Harley Davidson, where the ride started. Let me say from the first hello, it was all hugs, handshakes and smiles. I was quite impressed with Hoagy's concern to meet and know all the participants by name. His appreciation for the riders was obvious because of his ability to address the riders by name throughout the ride. It was apparent all of Hoagy's staff, mostly family volunteers, had a true dedication to the cause they were helping out with. The entire staff was so very friendly and went out of their way to answer all questions. Everyone associated with Hoagy's staff including Hoagy himself, definitely has earned the Hero in Hoagy's Heroes.

This Iron Butt ride group was smaller than the last ride I participated in (April 2009). I think that is why I enjoyed it so much more. I met a great bunch of riders from the experienced IBA riders to the first timers. Everyone I met tried to welcome each other and shared interesting stories. West Virginia is where I was born and raised and it will always be home in my heart. Besides contributions and profits from this ride being donated to Children of Fallen Soldiers Relief Fund, I wanted to complete an IBA ride in my home state.

Other than some road spray due to an earlier rain shower close to Summersville, WV on US RT19, the weather was exceptional. It was nothing but sunshine and clear sky's throughout the entire ride. One thing about riding your motorcycle in West Virginia, the scenery is breathtaking and the curves in the roads were made for riding.

My favorite time on this ride was a 30 mile stretch out of Charleston, WV towards Beckley, known as the West Virginia Turnpike, on a section of Interstate shared by both I 64 and I 77. I'm happy to say I crossed this section of highway three times because Charleston, WV was an intersecting point to all the Interstates and the intersecting point to the different legs traveled on the course. This section of highway had the hills and curves that definitely challenged the rider at Interstate speeds without being too difficult. Being centrally located, this stretch of road put the excitement back into the run just at the time you needed it. The only thing that would have made it better would be if the ride was scheduled for the Fall color change in the leaves.

I was not the only rider that was a first timer to ride in an event organized by Hoagy's Heroes. I met a fellow rider named Marvin from Ohio. Not only was it his first time riding with Hoagy, it was his first IBA ride. We both hit it off right away and teamed up for the ride. Though Marvin and I spent the first leg of the ride trailing along with Hoagy's group, it was nice to break away from the pack and still know you had another rider with you, should something go wrong. In fact, a bunch of the riders became stuck up in Bluefield, WV because the gas stations that advertised to be open 24 hours were in fact not open 24 hours. I only bring this up because in my travels to find a gas station that was open, I thought it was ironic I passed a store front called the Hillbilly Trading Post while participating in the Hillbilly 1000.

Hoagy gave the riders a tip in advance of the ride. He knew the West Virginia Turnpike was a toll road. He suggested the riders use plastic sandwich bags to hold the proper amount of change in a bag for each toll booth. The bags made it easier to control the change and quickly pass it along to the toll booth operator. Most of the riders took Hoagy up on his suggestion. There were three toll booths along one pass of the West Virginia Turnpike. Each of the riders made four passes past each toll booth. If you can imagine, twelve times each rider gave a toll booth attendant a $1.25 bag of change. At first the operators seemed a little annoyed and confused as to why they were receiving so many bags of pre-counted change. As the day went on and all the bikers kept handing out bags of change, the toll operators started asking questions. By the last pass, the word had spread between the toll operators of our ride. It actually seemed as if they were enjoying the little bags of change and were passing along well wishes to all the riders.

I hope to participate in future rides with this great organization. What more can you ask for, you get to ride your motorcycle with a great group of people and contribute to a worthy Hoagy's Heroes cause to benefit children.

This past Monday several WORMS members participated in the call to support the Harley Owners Group Million Mile Monday event. The goal this year was significantly higher than last year - it was set at 5 million miles! Holy cow - the only way to achieve that level of riding is to get our Iron Butt Boys (IBB) into action, and that means Jim, Mike and Jimmy. I'm sure each of them did their fair share, if not more. Woody rode to work and took the long way there. Rose rode to work too. Allen took the day off (partly for a dentist appointment but it was a good excuse for a full day of playing hookie) and rode over to National Harbor in Maryland. The achievement was just under 5 million miles - almost 4 million 400 thousand. Check out the pictures taken on a lazy Monday afternoon while most everyone else was working! Hahahahahhahahahahhhah....er.....uh......hahahahahaahhahahahhahahha...ahh. That felt pretty good!

While Jim was over in West Virginia doing the HillBilly 1000 ride, and Woody was busy at home climbing up and down ladders, Allen was busy getting a demo ride on the new Harley-Davidson V-Rod Muscle on this fine Saturday morning. What inspired Allen to go ride a V-Rod? It was this little e-mail received a few days ago:

How often have you walked by the V-rod and thought "wow what a cool bike, I wonder what it rides like?" Has anyone ever offered to let you ride a brand spankin' new one for free? Well now's your chance! Come to Patriot from 10 am to 4 pm this upcoming Saturday June 27th and we'll let you take one out for a spin - no pressure, no bull. Bikes go out every half hour, and the workshop will be every hour on the hour!

What are 3 COOL THINGS about the V-rod? It's got a hydroformed frame - in layman's terms, that means when the frame is bent, no stress fractures are formed, meaning you've got a stronger frame. The cool styling was inspired by the VR1000 dragster racing heritage. And it's got a wicked 125 horsepower! So please, drop by the store on Saturday and take one out for a spin. All you'll need is a helmet and your motorcycle license!

Just the boys made the ride down to the 17th Annual Big Damn Bike Show on Saturday, the day before Father's Day. The weather prediction was not good - severe thunderstorms and rain. So Allen rode his chopper anyway - this was a chance to get it into Waugh Harley-Davidson's bike show and no stinking rain was going to stop him. Woody, Mike and Allen met at the usual Starbucks in Chantilly at 0730 (early birds, WORMS, you get the picture). Mike and Allen put the rain suits on but Woody elected to take a chance. Woody's luck ran out a few miles down Route 28 when it started to sprinkle. The rain became more intense further down Route 28 but it wasn't too bad.

Once we arrived at the show you knew some work was coming - Allen needed to get the chopper cleaned up. Of course it started to rain again about 30 minutes later and this rain was pretty heavy. We took the opportunity to look at the new bikes inside the main building at Waugh Harley-Davidson. They sure have some nice bikes in there! The rain finally stopped so it was cleaning time again - would this ever end? Even Woody offered to help clean those "M's" in the exhaust pipes, since he thought it would look pretty cool. It did look cool too - much better than the green bike next to Allen's - he had the same pipes on a similar bike but Allen's pipes were just a tad nicer.

Woody had to leave around 1PM to get home for family stuff, but Mike and Allen were there until the bike show awards were announced. Around 3PM the time came and would you believe that Allen won 1st place in the "American Custom" category? Would you believe that shortly after receiving that award that he was presented with the "Best in Show" award? Holy smokes! This was truly an event to remember. Anyway the ride back home was beautiful weather and Allen was simply exhausted after putting about 150 miles on the chopper. But you know what? It was a heck of a way to start off the WORMS summer activities and this laid the ground work for a super Father's Day.
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A few dedicated WORMS members (Mike and Allen) got their chores done early Saturday so they could ride down to see the Hooters Swimsuit Contest, at the Fredericksburg Hooters. This was another chance to see girls in swimsuits if you had missed the Blue Ridge Bike Festival in April, but of course both of these fine gentlemen did attend that April WORMS ride so this was a bonus event. The boys got there 30 minutes early and ate their fill of chicken wings before coaxing a few Hooter girls to pose on Allen's chopper. Then it was time for the swimsuit contest but wait a minute - the price was $25!!!! That's too much for these old boys, especially since they planned to stop by the hospital to see Mike's daughter for a brief visit before it was dark. So in the spirit of saving some money, the boys took off and didn't even see one swimsuit girl. We did see Mikes daughter (doing well) and then we rode the back roads to Catlett in Manassas. It was a beautiful ride and the boys arrived home just before sunset.
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