From the grillmaster...
Smoke Chasing Grand Tour for 2012 is now complete. We want to thank our riders, sponsors and the many organizations that helped promote the Grand Tour.
These fine folks include: the American Motorcyclist Association, Revzilla, Adaptiv Technologies, Morton’s BMW Motorcycles, Ole Time BBQ, The CycleSmiths, Backroads USA, Side Stand Up, the Minnesota 1000, Ryan Peters, Wendy Barclay, and the Mason Dixon 20-20. Each of these businesses and organizations has helped spread awareness of SCGT and/or has donated the prizes we will be giving away shortly.
We would also like to extend a thank you and debt of gratitude to the fine people of Team Strange Airheads, the motorcycle club that started as a bowling team, is headed by a stuffed bear, and still manages to put on some of the best motorcycle events in the country. These events include ButtLite, the Minnesota 1000, a half dozen Teal Lyle rallies, and of course Smoke Chasing Grand Tour.
Last but certainly not least we want to thank our riders. We have had over 500 different riders enter Smoke Chasing during our first two years. This year we are proud to recognize the 50 riders who managed to complete Smoke Chasing Grand Tour. The finishers list is shown below but we would like to call special attention to our Grand Champion, Mr. Richard “Dick” Hautau. SCGT is not a competition but we do declare a Grand Champion based upon the most points scored by an entrant. This year, Dick Hautau (SCGT # 90, MOA # 70, BMW MOA Ambassador #1) of Detroit, Michigan, always riding "two up" with his picture taking wife Sharon, is the SCGT 2012 Grand Champion. Dick is also the new record holder for most BBQ/Smoke restaurants visited in a SCGT season. Dick and Sharon made 624 BBQ/Smoke restaurant stops across 38 states while scoring 906 points. They logged 214 more stops and scored 301 more points than the next closest riders. Dick and Sharon road a K1200 LT 2007 BMW with more than 150,000 on its odometer and according to Dick, added another “22,000 Smiles” in pursuit of SCGT12. Dick and Sharon were brought into the SCGT fold by none other than Morton’s BMW of Fredericksburg, Virginia, and sponsors of the “Team Morton” SCGT12 team. For their accomplishments, Dick and Sharon will receive free t-shirts, free entry into SCGT13, a fancy plaque, the right to name a BBQ/Smoke restaurant as a bonus stop in 2013, and first choice of any two prizes from the riders’ prize pool. None of this will compare to the lifetime of memories a good season of riding brings but as prizes go, this is not too shabby at all.
In addition to Dick and Sharon’s amazing ride we had seven riders finish DJ Morrow’s 15/15/15 challenge visiting 15 BBQ stops in 15 states in 15 days. These riders are Don Stadtler, Andrew Hall, John Beamer, Bill Collins, Garrett Underwood, Greg Turp, and Steve Makela. We had ten riders who visited 20 or more states with William and Diane Dunlap matching Dick and Sharon’s 38 states. We had nine riders who made 100 or more stops and this includes Garrett Underwood, Tim Isaacs, Kurt Brown, Mark Warner, Bill Collins, Brian Harvey, John Beamer, Andrew Hall and Don Stadtler. We found a new SCGT ambassador, comedian, and wildly interesting rider in Luis Diaz Diaz. Luis kicked off the season right by winning a set of Dunlop tires from SCGT, courtesy of the AMA. We had Scott Heinrich score 99 points without leaving his home state and an exercise is efficiency by Robert Stransky who made one BBQ stop in 34 different states. There are of course dozens more names we could name and stories we could share. But we will end by telling you that these great finishers and the hundreds of other riders who have joined them but did not finish, have raised over $12,000 for Eddie’s Road since the inception of Smoke Chasing Grand Tour. For those of you who do not know, Eddie’s Road is staffed by volunteers who donate their time, money, and spirit to the notion that good people can and should help abused kids lead safer, happier and more productive lives. They are efficient, effective, and deeply appreciative of the donations created by our riders.
Team Strange will be hosting SCGT13 and we are adding new challenges, new finishing levels, and a new charity ride element that should keep things very interesting. Plus SCGT13 will give riders a chance to break Dick and Sharon Hautau’s stop record of 624. We will once again use Ride Master as our sign up tool so keep your eyes out for the new GT to post in the next several weeks. We will also post updates on
www.smokechasing.com Ride Safe and Have Fun!
Jon J
SCGT12 Grillmaster
**Note the prize drawing will begin as soon as we have our complete list of prizes in. We expect that to occur in the next week or so.**
SCGT2012 Grand Champion
Richard Hautau (906 points)
King/Queen of Q
Don Stadtler (605 points)
John Beamer (526 points) (Corrected +10 - Grillmaster team missed two states in the count)
Bill Dunlap (309 points)
Diane Dunlap (309 points)
Greg Turp (295 points)
Eric Bray (267 points)
Robert Stransky (256 points)
BBQ Pit Master
Andrew Hall (470 points)
Bill Collins (389 points)
Mark Warner (323 points)
Kurt Brown (257 points)
Garrett Underwood (255 points)
Jack Dannenberg (236 points)
Jeffery Foster (205 points)
Andrew Clark (159 points)
Steve Makela (151 points)
Cy Young (107 Points)
Jerry Harris (104 points)
Spencer Bennett (90 points)
Smoker
Brian Harvey (340 points)
Tim Isaacs (158 points)
Mike Canup (139 points)
Luis Diaz Diaz (138 points)
Paul Slaton (136 points)
Jerry Read (125 points)
Ely Catton (112 points)
Tim Bowman (111 points)
John Sullivan (91 points)
Eric Vaillancourt (83 points)
Charles Hairr (79 points)
Sam Houston (69 points)
Bruce Jansen (65 points)
Griller
Steve Oltman (103 points)
Bill Ouellette (93 points)
William Amerson (86 points)
Ron Personius (80 points)
Cletha Walstrand (57 points)
Marcelo Suárez Salvia (31 points)
Andy Simons (30 points)
Backyard BBQer
Scott Heinrich (99 points)
Mike Sonzini (50 points)
Stefan Kowalewski (47 points)
Lee Hetrick (45 points)
Michael Toler (27 points)
Paul Helm (26 points)
Joe Smith (22 points)
Richard Snyder (21 points)
Joe & Tina Caron (20 points)
Richard Plunkett (20 points)
Honorable Mentions - Riders sidelined for events beyond their control (and stuff).
David Erickson (14 stops and then trouble.