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Organizers gearing up for biker rally

Volunteer helpers always needed
A 2014 Harley Davidson Road King is the top prize for this year’s Four Corners Motorcycle Rally at Sky Ute Casino Resort on Aug. 31. Another Harley will be given away at the casino’s event center later that evening.

Organizers of the Four Corners Motorcycle Rally, which will begin Aug. 29, are looking for volunteers to help during the event.

“Maybe two times as many as last year,” said volunteer coordinator Tuggy Dunton.

They are looking for people who can work four-hour shifts beginning Aug. 25 and through the Labor Day weekend.

Most of the planning, organizing and work during Rally Week is done by local volunteers. Rally Central is at the Sky Ute Casino Resort Event Center. The organizing committee is an independent entity spun off from the Ignacio Chamber of Commerce.

“You are the reason this thing works,” Johnny Valdez, organizing committee chairman, told volunteers at a recent meeting. If helpers are being paid anything, “it’s peanuts.”

This will be the third year back at the event center. There will be vendors, concerts and other activities for bikers and other spectators from when gates open at 9 a.m. to late night.

The Ignacio Chamber of Commerce took over the rally on short notice in 2006 after a dispute between the private, for-profit organizer at the time and the Southern Ute Indian Tribe. All the vendors and events were in downtown Ignacio that year until 2012, when free activities downtown competed with paid admission to the event center. The Ignacio rally lost $80,000 to $90,000 that year “because we were giving it away for free,” Valdez said.

Last year, all Ignacio vendors and events were at the event center with paid admission, as they were in the 1990s.

“Last year, we gained $120,000” with 5,000 paid admissions and 7,000 through the gate, Valdez said. “Last year on Saturday, we brought in over $95,000.”

So far this year, four times as many online tickets have been sold compared with this time last year, he said.

“There’s a couple hundred thousand dollars that goes into putting on this event,” said organizing committee member Mel Silva. “That’s what it costs.”

He compared the $10-a-day admission charge (advance sales) for a full day of activities and concerts to the cost of going to a movie. Tickets at the gate will be $15 per day.

“People said the music last year was the best ever. We’re spending around $8,000 more this year,” Silva said.

Rally signature events will include biker bull riding and the Million Dollar Highway Poker Run to Silverton. Sponsorships from the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad and Durango Mountain Resort help legitimize the rally, Silva said.

“We want to be in the Big Three (among rallies) with Daytona and Sturgis,” he said. “Nobody can duplicate what we have for rides.”

Poker run proceeds will go to Operation Second Chance to help military veterans, the Powerhouse Science Center in Durango and the Pink Ribbon (breast cancer) Coalition.

“We’re all about giving money away,” Silva said.

New this year will be a zipline challenge and midget wrestling on Sunday to draw people back from the motorcycle parade in Durango.

“Yes, it’s un-PC,” Silva said. “We had a huge response online.”

There are fewer events crammed into the schedule at the event center this year, he said.

“We’ve pulled our horns back a bit and focused on the best things. But there will never be a dull moment,” he said.

If you go

For information and a schedule of events to be held at the Four Corners Motorcycle Rally, visit http://fourcornersmotorcyclerally.com.



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