Summer
Convention 2003Summer
Convention 2003Report by Stefan Roth
Our second quarter meeting coincides with Summer Convention, where the members get together to have a grand time 4-wheeling, eating, 4-wheeling, camping, 4-wheeling, and talking with old and new friends! The event took place June 20-22, 2003 and is put on by our members just for our members so we can relax, mingle, renew old friendships and make new ones.
The
5th annual Summer Convention was hosted by Atomic City 4 Wheelers in Oak Ridge,
Tennessee, at the Windrock ORV Area. Atomic City ably handled the event registration
and club members lead the trail rides with help from members of Plum Crazzed
Jeep Club, Rattle Rock 4WD Club, and East Tennessee 4WD Club.
Windrock is over 70,000 acres with dozens of trails, ranging from very easy to extremely difficult. The 4-wheeling experience varies from large rock crawling trails to steep hill climbs to occasional mud holes. Windrock is private land owned by Coal Creek Mining and Mineral Corp.
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Trail rides started off early Friday morning with more stragglers arriving throughout the day and to join the early birds on the trails. The full complement of 100 attending vehicles had arrived by Friday night and Saturday morning. Atomic City 4 Wheelers lead organized rides for the eager participants. Various flavors of easy, medium and hard rides left at staggered times during the morning. The "easy" trails were designed to provide a good challenge for stock or mildly modified vehicles or inexperienced drivers. Most of the medium rides were full and the hard core rides were filled by drivers knowing the upcoming difficulty of trails such as Rattle Rock, Little Rattle Rock, and Atomic Ridge.
We lucked out with the weather. It had been raining as late as Thursday, but the three days of the event were sunny with highs in the 70's and low 80's and night time temperatures cooled down to the 50's. Unseasonably cool, but very welcome!
Saturday night dinner was catered right in the headquarters campground by perennial favorite Buddy's BBQ. There was enough food for seconds for those that wanted it.
The campground is a new development, owned by Gary Hoskins. Members of Southern 4WD Association built most of the campground and we want to thank Scott Campbell, D.A. Young and crew for all their work over the last months.
After dinner, the second quarter business meeting was chaired by President Bob Yarbrough. The officers and volunteers reported on the association's on-going activities and accomplishments. Most of the issues centered on land access issues and trail maintenance activities. One of our member clubs is responsible for coordinating association activities at every ORV area in the southeast. In this manner, the work is spread around and the results are there for everyone to enjoy.
After the meeting, the door prize raffle and "Real World Rig Awards" were held. Roy Stroud ran the proceedings with humor and fun. Due to the generosity of our 4WD clubs, vendors and individuals, over half the attendees received a door prize. Plum Crazzed Jeep Club, in association with AutoZone in Harriman, TN, stood out with their many donated raffle prizes. Heart of Dixie Off-Road Club and Cumberland Off-Road club also donated door prizes. Impromptu auctions were held for unclaimed prizes, with the $240.00 proceeds going to the Windrock trail maintenance. Rattle Rock 4WD Club, who handles the fund, would like to thank all those who donated. Among businesses, Bestop and Tellico4x4.com stood out as being very generous with donated prizes, with Tellico4x4.com donating a SuperWinch 3000 for ATVs. Big Daddy's Off-Road, WindrockOffRoad.com, Ramsey Winch, and Tilley-Lane Chrysler/Dodge/Plymouth/Jeep in Lenoir City also donated merchandise for the door prizes.
We held a contest to see who could pick up the most discarded trash (by weight) from the ORV area and bring it to the campground for proper disposal. Well over 1,000 pounds of trash were picked up. First place went to Clay Shiver, a member of the Carolina Off-Road Extremists (CORE), who brought 436 pounds of trash in his pickup truck. As the oddest item, they noticed an old console television set on the side of an access road and brought it along. Second place went to Taylor Robbins and Brenna Henry of CORE with 171 lbs of trash. Brent Galloway garnered 3rd place with 145 lbs and Jeremy Taylor collected 138lbs for 4th place, both of East Tennessee 4WD Club. Georgia Bounty Runner's Jay Bird collected 119 lbs for 5th place.
The "Real World Rig Awards" are a tradition started by the Georgia Bounty Runners 4WD Club when they hosted the very first Summer Convention. The light-hearted awards change every year and are presented to the most rusted rig, most pricey rig, "can't remember when I last drove my rig" member, best rattle can paint job, best shade tree mechanic, etc.
People with long trips home left on Sunday morning, while a bunch of diehards and local members stayed for Sunday trail rides.
A big "thank you" goes to Atomic City 4 Wheelers for putting on two successful Summer Conventions in a row. Everyone was very appreciative of the efforts of this hard-working club.
Next year's summer event will be in northeast Tennessee hosted by the Carolina Trail Blazers 4WD Club.
