Rough Riders

But Neugebaur, a truck driver, doesn't lack persistence. He rides a beat-up white-and-yellow Honda with no plastic covering up front -- it looks like half a bike. He's been working on his twelve o'clocks for months. On his tank he's scrawled the words "Scrape it Bitch" -- a challenge to himself to bring the rear bar of his bike down to the ground and scrape the asphalt. By January he was starting to get them down. But he doesn't have them licked.

Neugebaur pops his bike until it's nearly vertical when it veers to his left, then lurches back to the right. Neugebaur's right foot comes off the peg and hits the ground -- he's trying to find some balance, trying to save it. But the foot is a sitting duck when the bike slams down on it, breaking it and lacerating it in three places.

At the hospital, a nurse tries to stem the bleeding -- all this is on tape -- and blood pours from his foot like dark syrup. Doctors insert two screws into Neugebaur's foot and staple up his cuts. He'll be off his feet for three months. His truck-driving job demands footwork.

A day after the wreck, Seales thinks Neugebaur will face the same gut check he and Sunday have passed: Do you continue to pour your money into these bikes and tear up your body for an outside chance at glory? "Somebody's going to need to let him ride a 50," Seales muses. (The small 50 cc bikes are the motorcycle equivalent of a BB gun. You can do tricks on them, but you're only 2 feet off the ground.) "It'll give him confidence. It'll give him something to do."

Two days later, Neugebaur is out of the hospital, his foot wrapped up. He watches the video of his crash. His teammates and friends pass around his sliced-up, bloody shoe. "I know I'm going to get back on the bike," he says. "Absolutely."

The promise of a new sport keeps Neugebaur enthusiastic. His foot will heal.

"It's the possibility of being famous, people knowing us," he says.

Later in the evening, Neugebaur grows more contemplative. He's trying to reach competition level. This is already going to set him back. And competitors pull this move all the time. "It's fun to do this," he says, "but you can lose your life."

"We're retarded how much we're into this," Sunday says.