But the oldest form of competition in American is still plugging away on the sidelines and still enjoyed by many. It's just that hillclimbing hasn't yet captured the interest of the general public the way, say, supercross has. And that's a shame because hillclimbing has lots to offer, especially from a spectator standpoint. It's easily viewed from one location, there's plenty of action, and it's something that lots of people can relate to. After all, who hasn't taken a dirt bike, pointed it up the side of any size hill and had a go?

Life is a climb. For Dusty Beer and other hillclimbing enthusiasts, the challenge of attacking hills that appear to be unclimbable and making it over feeds their souls, though they never get enough of that feeling.

Dusty Beer (yes, that's really his name, not his preference of beverage) from Montana has been climbing hills in competition for 19 years and is one of the sport's best. In fact, he's won the North American Hillclimbers Association Championship Hillclimb Series the past two years, as well as what is probably the crown jewel of the sport, the Great American Hillclimb Championship in Billings, Montana.

We caught up with him not long after his second Open Exhibition victory of the NAHA/FMF Championship Hillclimb Series, which gave him a perfect two-for-two so far in the five-round series. Talking to him, there's no missing his love for the sport, and you can't help but believe him when he says it's poised to take its place with other popular extreme sports."[I did] a little bit of motocross when I first started out," Beer begins. "A little bit of cross-country-not too much.

"When I was in high school [in the late '70s], my older brother [Doug] worked on a ranch in the summertime, and he got me a job out there. The guy that had the ranch had some irrigating bikes (dirt bikes used to check irrigation spots around the ranch), and they'd go out after they got done [with work] and beat on hills with the irrigating bikes. When I got out there, it was right in the middle of it. Then we went down and watched the Billings hillclimb, and we were hooked!"

Beer worked his way up through the ranks of the sport until he was one of the top riders. However, few people outside the sport knew of his accomplishments or abilities because, for various reasons, hillclimbing in the western U.S. wasn't as organized as the eastern-based AMA series. "We've been keeping track of points, it seems like, for a long time, but [we] never really organized officially until about the last three years," Beer admits.

That's given the western 'climbers less exposure and, to some, less credibility than the AMA competitors enjoyed-and that certainly chafed the western riders, who tackle hills that are notably more technical than the ones back east, which are often not much more difficult than uphill drag races with a jump or two included. There are no undercut ledges, road jumps, rock faces or turns on eastern hills. In addition, the AMA classes are limited displacement, with pros running in 800 and 540cc classes. In the west, pros have a genuine Open class, as well as 700 and 250cc Exhibition divisions. It brings out innovative, fire-breathing machinery, plus demands excellent riding skills.

The top rider in the NAHA Championship Hillclimb Series for two years running, Beer gets to unload a trailer full of bikes adorned with number one plates at each event. Though the KTMs he uses for the 250 and 700cc Exhibition classes aren't too far from stock, his 1428cc Kawasaki used in the Open classes is insane. He built it, based on what works for him.

But the AMA series is what comes to mind for many when you mention the word "hillclimb," and that causes Beer to grimace. "We kind of get affiliated with [the eastern riders]; they just kind of lump us in with them.

"For a while, I seriously wondered where we stood in the riding world. It was good when Ty Davis and Larry Roeseler came up [to ride Billings]. It wasn't real fair to them when they came to Billings because they just got thrown in the middle of it. I know they're both very talented riders. We kind of wondered, Would they come up and destroy us? And it wasn't even close.

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"So I think in our realm that even somebody like [motocrossers Ricky] Carmichael or [Jeremy] McGrath would be pretty hard-pressed to beat us. I think they'd do very well, but I don't think they'd win."

And that's due to the very specialized nature of rough hillclimbing as it's practiced in the west. "The more riding experience you have, just in general-a lot of it's decision-making-that's why it seems like in our sport right now, 30-year-olds are pretty much at the top of the sport," Beer, 36, observes. "There's some good young kids coming up and riding, but they just don't have that experience and that time they can fall back on.

"Then the other hard part about it is it's a pressure sport. It's not like getting a bad start at a motocross and being a really good rider and passing your way through the pack. In our sport, if you make even one, tiny little mistake, 10 guys go right by you with a faster time or higher footage. So a lot of it's a mental thing too that you kind of have to acquire [over time].

"That's the hardest part of it, is putting your best effort forward when you have to. If there was no pressure and you got as many runs as you wanted, it'd be a different game. (Riders get two runs at a hill in each class.) A lot of times you have to do it in one ride [because of how radically the hill changes between runs]. That's the hard part about it; that'd be the hardest part about it for anybody coming in-it's the decision-making and the pressure and how far do you hang it out? How conservative are you? When do you hang it out?"

A common sight at hillclimbs is Beer scaling monster hills faster or farther than anyone else.

Saddle time is the only way to get that experience, of course, and that's a major factor behind practically all riders entering multiple classes at each event. "Our NAHA keeps points in each class," Beer points out, "and they crown an overall champion from all the classes combined. You're riding for points in every class, plus you're riding for money in every class. Plus, it's more riding. Some of the hillclimbs are bad enough as they are, especially Billings; there's so many riders. If you only rode one class, you'd sit there for two days and ride two times.

"Each class is fun in its own way. I like the tire classes. Sometimes they're the funnest class just because you're limited to a knobby tire."

And Beer sees that fun extending to spectators as well as competitors-which is why he believes hillclimbing is just waiting for the right promoter to take off as The Next Big Thing in extreme sports. "Our sport is such a good spectator sport, and that's why I say, if a promoter does it right, you can offer a big purse, and you can come out making a lot of money. It's like we have this really good sport that nobody knows about. That's what we're trying to establish with the NAHA; we're trying to get credibility.

"I remember when I first started, in Billings I think it was a $3000 purse. That was almost 20 years ago, and they're up to $30,000 now. But they have some corporate sponsorship. Miller beer pretty much writes them a $20,000 check every year, and they're well organized. Plus they draw 20,000 spectators at $8 or $9 a pop.

"We need a big shove from something like [McGrath entering Billings]. It's like we have this dying sport, [but] in Billings there's so many riders that next year they're probably going to limit the number of riders [allowed]. It's kind of [ironic] that there's so many riders you can't run 'em all and yet there's not that many hillclimbs really."

Hillclimbers tend to be a friendly, supportive group. Here, Beer gives rival Travis Whitlock some pointers, which Whitlock then used to grab second in the Open Exhibition class behind Beer.

While Beer doesn't like many aspects of the rival AMA series, he admires some aspects of their program, namely running the featured Exhibition classes on one day. "So your whole show is like a four-hour show, and really that's where we need to head," he says. "Take the cream of the crop and don't make it an all-day event and wipe the spectators out. Make it something that they want to come for three or four hours."

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The Great American Hillclimb at Billings is the sport's biggest event, having taken the place of the old Widowmaker, and Beer insists attending it at least once in your life should be mandatory for any motorcyclist: "That's something you need to do at some time because it's pretty incredible. There are people that it's like a ritual for. There are spectators that have been doing it longer than I have! For a population of 100,000, basically, in Billings to draw 20,000 people to one event is huge. Think what California could do.

"What we really need is the right kind of promoter to take it to the next level."

And though that would probably come about too late to benefit the miner and family man from Montana, you get the feeling he wouldn't mind as long as more people come to enjoy his sport. "I think we definitely have a legitimate sport, and it's definitely a very good spectator sport. Hopefully it'll go somewhere."