Article Contributed on: 6/9/2009 7:44:50 PM
The 20th annual TOP GUN Police Motor Officer Competition organized by the Blue Knight Law Enforcement Motorcycle Club, Colorado Chapter 1 was held on June 7, 2009 at the Jeffco Stadium. The spirit of the event is to bring together motor officers from different law enforcement agencies to participate in a friendly competition and skill demonstration. The competition is also a major fund raising event for charitable organizations such as Colorado Special Olympics.
This was the third year I had attended this event. Over the years I have befriended some contestants, and even learned their riding styles a little. Although I am not a motorcycle enthusiast, I found myself enjoying the friendly competition. The event also gave me the opportunity to show support to the law enforcement officers who serve and protect us daily.
This year's event started off with the solemn opening ceremony that honored fallen officers, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem. Everyone spent a moment to reflect on the ultimate sacrifice that some law enforcement officers made in performing their duties.
Then the competition began.
Each competitor rode in on their Harley Davidson, BMW or Kawasaki motorcycles twice, one in each of the two courses patterned with traffic cones. These two courses were a mirror image of each other. The contestants were to be judged not only by time, but also the skill demonstrated for precision. They were to drive within the boundaries set by the cones without knocking over or even touching them. The course was designed strategically to push to the limit of the capability of the motorcycles; hence, some of the turns were as tight as possible. To a layman like me the difficulties were not unlike driving inside your home garage without crashing.
After every competitor had completed the two courses, the top 5 contestants of the Harley Class, and 3 from the BMW Class proceeded to the next round of competition. At about this time, Mother Nature made the competition more interesting in the form of rain shortly followed by heavy hail. As a result the competition was postponed until the weather improved. By then, the chalk markings on the courses were largely washed away, and the courses were sprinkled with standing pools. The competition yet continued notwithstanding the courses had to be re-marked and water pushed away.
This year the top 5 contestants of the Harley Class were Mark Miller and Tyler Hammond from Jefferson County Sheriff's Office, Tim Lambert from the Longmont PD, Steve Kunst from the Englewood PD, and Dave Snelling from the Arvada PD. The 3 BMW finalists were Steve Keliiholokai from Littleton PD, Edward Nolte and Jason Pray from Aurora PD. One of the top placing officers, Tim Lambert from the Longmont PD, was "adopted" in the Adopt-A-Cop program. This meant that someone had made a donation vouching for this officer to win. As a result, Officer Tim Lambert was allowed to pick a charitable organization to designate the donation. What an honor! Congratulations to Officer Tim Lambert for a job well done.
In the second round of the competition, the rides were even more exciting because the contestants were now more motivated to push for speed, as precision by itself was obviously not enough to win.
In the end Deputy Mark Miller from Jeffco, and Officer Steve Kunst from the Englewood PD were the two finalists to contend for the Top Gun title. Once again Mother Nature decided to add another level of difficulty to the competition by starting another round of rain. Both officers had to finish the competition in the rain and on the slippery course for the final round.
In the final round Deputy Mark Miller, to the joy of both colleagues and friends from other agencies, claimed the 2009 Top Gun title over Officer Steve Kunst by less than a quarter of a second! Congratulations to the excellent performance by both finalists, and hat off to all the contestants and helpers that made the event possible and enjoyable. See you all next year.