“Time heals all wounds,” the old saying insists.
While that may be true, the scar of losing a loved one remains forever, the emotionally cutting pain growing duller with the march of time but never disappearing completely for most people.
Kurt Caselli’s family, friends and many fans know this well. However, instead of letting grief bog them down, they turned around and created the Kurt Caselli Memorial Ride Day at Glen Helen Raceway Park in San Bernardino, California, and, soon after, the Kurt Caselli Foundation (KCF). Both have turned out to be wonderful tributes to a young man known to most around the world as a top-level racer but—more importantly—a great person.
The Fourth Annual KC Memorial Ride Day was a perfect example of replacing the pain of loss with the joy of friendship, the fun of riding dirt bikes and furthering the goals of the Foundation.
“The first year [of the ride day] was a huge outpouring of support,” Caselli’s former teammate and KCF board member Quinn Cody remembered. “Everybody just jumped in, and it was literally planned over a couple days. Everybody kind of threw it together and we got a huge turnout the first year; it was amazing. The last couple years, we kept it on a Friday and kind of kept our core group of people out here. A lot of industry people would come.
“This year, we wanted to make the effort to move it to Saturday so that we could get everyone here—all of Kurt’s fans and friends and family—because a lot of people have a hard time taking off [work] on Friday this close to the holidays and everything,l” Cody continued. “So we moved it to a Saturday [this year] and I think it was hugely successful. We got a bigger group of people. It wasn’t as much of an industry event. We wanted everyone, all the [non-industry] people who support the Foundation to come out and enjoy the event.”
And there was plenty to enjoy. From the moment one turned the corner to park, a large vendor’s row dominated the area behind the Glen Helen MX starting gate. The track itself was prepped (plus there was the regularly scheduled every-Saturday races going on at the REM track). Erek Kudla flew out from AMA headquarters in Ohio to bring the FIM World Trophy that the U.S. team won for the first time for its first visit to the West Coast as well as lay out a fun off-road loop with Jacob Michna.
Following the awards presentation (where EnduroCross and GNCC racer Rachel Gutish received the $2500 scholarship from the Foundation) and raffle, the day drew to a close with the traditional tribute lap to Kurt.
From a vendor standpoint, first-time attendee Joe Boisvert of Rekluse said, “We’ve been aware of the Kurt Caselli Ride Day as long as it’s been happening, but we were able to develop a partnership, a relationship with the KC66 Foundation this year and we wanted to come up with a creative way to give back to what the Foundation stands for so we worked with the Foundation to come up to come up with a custom clutch cover with the KC66 emblem and come down here [from Idaho] and show it to folks and give them the opportunity to purchase one if they wanted to support the Foundation. We sell the covers for $189—$125 goes directly to the Foundation—so we were selling and installing covers on people’s bikes here for the day and just giving back to the sport and people and what it all stands for.”
Boisvert stunned many when he took his Harley cruiser around most of the MX track for the tribute lap, bypassing just one hill!
Cody summed up the evolution of the Ride Day by observing, “I feel like if anything it’s gotten more organized; we have a lot more vendors, a lot more people who want to support the Foundation. The first year [of course] there was no Foundation; it was just a memorial ride for Kurt. People were still mourning and it was kind of, I guess, a farewell to Kurt. It was a little bit different event. Now we start to see people that want to support the Foundation and work we’re doing and also remember Kurt at the same time.”
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