The #338 is planning to race H-Town tomorrow

Let's hope he races despite the injury/pain and goes all ballz out for his first 450 National! One thing is sure with J-Law, when he race he goes for it and has a great style, all wild and wide open.

Time flies and we have 1 more SX to go

Been pretty good at not being good with this blog.

We're 48 hours from the finales of the 2009 AMA Supercross series. Reigning Champ Chad Reed is 6 pts behind James Stewart before the last 20 laps. 6 points that summarize this exciting, unnerving, crazy, shocking season to the best. 6 points to sum up this SX bitter rivalry between Reedy and Bubba. A rivalry that has taken us back to the golden years of Supercross with Bob Hannah versus everyone else, or the great battles of Damon Bradshaw vs. Jeff "Chicken" Matiasevich.

Even if James Stewart has been the fastest all season long, he has not been the most consistent and Chad, until his nightmare night in Seattle, has proven that he could win this championship and win it with pride and merit. 2009 brought a new Chad to the stage and this guy deserves a lot of props because he is much faster than the Chad of 2008, fiter and smarter. Even though I am openly a fan of James Stewart, I have really enjoyed watching Reed race this season and have a renewed respect for the way he handled this season, throughout the battles and brain games with his arch-nemesis. A rivalry that started a few seasons ago at Unadilla when those two were on 250Fs.

James should be able to win on Saturday night at Sam Boyd Stadium, as much as he can throw the title away by crashing under pressure or by pushing it to the limits of grip on the hard-pack Las Vegas dirt. As a fan, I trust that the #7 will take it, but as an observer of SX, I know that things can go the St Louis-way for the L&M rider.

Well, I have more to write about. Here's the Las Vegas SX track.

As we see dusk settle on the 2009 SX season and dawn rise on a new year of Motocross, as the 2009 AMA Outdoors National approaches, rumors are flying as fast as F-22s darting on Taliban positions in the Swat territories. We hear noises about Mike Alessi leaving the Factory Suzuki team, we hear that Chad may ride some Outdoors, that Bubba may ride some, that K-Dub will be at Glen Helen, that Factory Honda may not come back in 2010, that Ryan Dungey would be changing the color of his gear in 2010 and come back in red, or will it be blue, that there is trouble brewing at Monster Energy and that some internal issues are being taken care right now which could have some strong influence on Jason Lawrence's future in motocross, or if these rumors are founded, does this mean that J-Law will start to walk straigth and do what teams and sponsors expect from professional riders? Mate, if you start listening to all these rumors, or start believing in them, you could write a Fantasy novel... or not... political fiction? Reports? ;-)

It snowed in Chicago and we have 4 Supercross races to go

Today March 29th, the Chicagoland woke up with a thick blanket of snow, so thick one of the large bushes in our backyard just collapsed under the weight. Unbelievable, at a time when I was getting exciting that Spring was settling in enough for the mountain-bike trails to dry a bit. An tomorrow the forecast is calling for 49F.... more mud.

Well, talk about being a non-consistent blogger, my production follows Davi Millsaps' Supercross results this season. After traveling to New-Orleans and St Louis for AGV and Dainese business events and witnessing the SX races in the Superdome and the Edward Jones Dome, I stayed home this weekend and followed Jason Lawrence's Canadian misadventures on the webcast (Holley and Weege's excitement level during the SX LCQ had never risen that high before) and through the live blog of one of the best citizen-journalists of the moment, Steve Matthes' Pulp MX.

New Orleans SX (March 14th)

It was my first trip down to Louisiana and, apart from a Friday the 13th flight down to a land of black magic and voodoo, I really enjoyed the trip and town. New-Orleans is full of history and character, has great restaurants, lounges and boutique hotels but still keeps an eerie feeling at time, with testimonies from Katrina's disaster. We were treated with good heavy rains during the weekend which was a bit of a bummer in the pits, although the privateers and some non-factory teams were pitted inside the stadium. The Superdome is a pretty big place but looked empty due to the smallish turn-out of 36,000+ souls. It isn't bad though considering the area, the economy and the fact that many didn't make the trip from TX, AL, FL, KY or Mississippi due to the cost of gas and travel.
Of course the shocker in the 250F was the non-qualification of Martin Davalos and Nico Izzi who didn't make the Main. Martin ended up being hurt when Lemoine landed/rode on his legs in their Heat and Izzi who faced some bad luck and bad starts, even in the LCQ.
Christophe Pourcel had 2 very bad starts but saved it with a good 4th place in the Main while Austin Stroupe did what he had to do and took the 25 points as he is trying to come back on his PC team mate. Jesseman (after a good manly pass on Wharton in the last corner) got a well deserved 2nd and Blake "Purple Rain" Wharton took his 1st podium of the year in 3rd.

In the 450 Main things settled very quickly with Bubba gapping Chad Reed and going for his 8th win of the season. The only exciting things during that Main Event: Broc Hepler's 1st podium of the year and Kevin Windham coming back from 8th to 4th, passing a few good guns on the way and melting the gap with Hepler. of course this is K-Dub's home and the crowd was cheering all the way for him, even when he was passing lappers, LOL! Maybe, with 2 more laps, he could have got by Hepler and make it a race. Not sure.
The Transportation Revolution, the Triumph,Ducati and Vespa dealer in New-Orleans, run by Zach and Max Materne and their parents did an amazing job with the AGV Open House party they organized on the Friday before the race. I was very surprised and happy by the good turn-out and results. If you're traveling to New Orleans, go visit that shop.

St Louis SX (March, 21st)

A Friday evening Parts Unlimited dealer showcase motivated my trip South to St Louis, home of the Cardinals and Budweiser (me likey). I drove down the mostly boring highway to Missouri, stopping on the way at Hall's Cycle, the Ducati and Husqvarna dealer in Springfield, the Illinois State Capital. Hall's is mostly an "off-road" dealer and probably the biggest Husqvarna representation in the Midwest. They told me they had sold about 22 Huskies in the last month which was pretty positive and motivating news in regards to the actually state of the economy.
Friday morning I visited Donelson Cycles, the oldest dealership in St Louis and one that I really suggest because they have a small Dirt Track and MX bikes museum in their St Ann' store. Very cool with some Penton, BSA, Triumph scramblers and more; definitely worth the visit.
I don't think that the Dealer Showcase was very good with a small number of dealers coming, despite the free dinner, the complementary VIP passes for the SX and the presence of motorcycle superman Travis Pastrana. But I would think that it is a correct representation of the St Louis region which looks pretty touched by the economical crisis and poorer than most places where I travel through.

Well, that was the big USP (upper selling point) at the St Louis Supercross, apart from the ongoing very tight race between San Manuel Yamaha James "Bubba" Stewart and Rockstar Makita Suzuki Chad Reed: the guest-star of the night was the guru of the Nitro Circus tribe, the #199, the Master of all Backflips, the fast, charismatic, crazy, ADD, super nice, entertaining, great-for-the-sport and the designer of the very goodly alternatively exciting St louis SX track, Travis "TP199" Pastrana

TP raced St Louis because he had a debt to Feld Motorsports after crashing his 199 Monster truck during a backflip attempt for the Nitro Circus TV show. The debt included TP's participation to 1 SX and to the finals of Feld's Monster Jam series.
Pastrana offered us 2 (two!) backflips during the opeing ceremonies and raced his heart out. It was awesome to see him again on a track and to see that he still has speed, despite his drastic lack of "race training". Travis had the speed need to make the Main but got unlucky, kind of crashed, couldn't restart the bike and ended up destroying his left radiator in the LCQ. His presence was very good for the crowd and the Edward Jones Dome was quasi-full. Rumor has it that TP is frustrated with his STL results and is planning to try again this season, probably in Salt Lke City, home of Ogio and Nitro Circus member Andy Bell.

Back to racing. One week after New Orleans, St Louis gave us another shocker and a good surprise to Factory Connection Honda when Blake Wharton won his first Main event (it is also the first Lites Main event win by a Texan - thanks DC for that info). Austin Stroupe did what he had to do again, trying to eat points away from his French team mate, coming back to second despite a bad start. CP had bad first laps but managed to finish 5th overall, controlling his lead in the series.
Nico Izzi was a very disappointing 3rd of the night. Why disappointing? Because I believe that he has the speed to win a Main but does not have the level of fitness necessary for that. In the first half of this race he wasn't able to charge on Wharton, never really threathening him for 1st and in the second half he just faded, giving Stroupe the opportunity to come back on him like an Exocet missile locked on his target and ended up throwing away the 2nd spot when AS past him with half a lap to go. At this level, you don't fade half a lap from the end of a Main: you crash trying, you resist until the end, you block your opponent, you ghost ride your bike of the finish line, you go find that last rush of adrenaline deep inside you for an extra 30 seconds.
Noticeable riders in this Lite main were Matt Goerke, Steven Clarke, Matt Lemoine.

We had a very exciting night in the 450 class (you can check my other log for some of the live comments during the race) but I know that you have already watched the race on TV, read the various race reports on Racer X and others.
Travis definitely designed a challenging track but I didn't think that Stewart would be the main victim of that very cool track layout. James went down twice in his heat, just making it into the main. He then went to pass Chad Reed for the lead in the Main and had established a nice 5 or 6 seconds gap when he missed a shift and crashed. Shocker! Chad got by and controlled the remaining laps taking a deserved win in Missouri and taking his lead back to 11 points with 5 races to go. Wow, is that a tight series or what!?
5 races to go, 25 pts for a win, 22 pts for a 2nd... Skippy needs to win 2 more races to seal the title; James Stewart needs to win them all. Anything can happen.

Jason Lawrence raced in St Louis (after missing Indy and New Orleans) and rode well and smart. he moved away for Reed and Stewart, not wanting to interfere with their race and rode behind Short in 5th for most of the Main, not trying anything stupid but after having parked Mike Alessi in the first laps. Lawrence has the speed to be a major factor in the 450 class and has proven that he knows how to race with his head too, when needed. I hope this gave him a boost of motivation for the last 2 rounds of the West Lites series when they roll into Seattle and Salt Lake City. Could he be a factor in the race between Weimer and Dungey? Maybe...

Toronto SX (March 9th)

Well, I didn't travel across the border in Canada but I wish I had because it is one of my favorite town in Northern America (with New York, San Francisco, Quebec, New Orleans) and I have good memories from time spent there with my bud Lorne White.
So I listened on the webcast and will be watching the CBS broadcast after I'm done blogging :-)
#377 Christophe Pourcel wins the Lites Main event and wins his first US title with the East Coast Lites 2009 Championship.
"Felicitations" to the Frenchy who is coming back from hell after being paralyzed for 8 months due to his dramatic crash in 2007. An example of determination, of work and believing in it. I have tremendous respect for Mitch Payton who believed in the kid and stood by him during the last year and a half, when Christophe was in recovery, trying to walk and ride again.
Stroupe finished second, first podium for Tickle in third and Izzi, once again had an inconsistent night.

James Stewart win in Toronto, Chad goes 2ndand Josh Hill rides awesome to 3rd overall! Great work for the #75.
So James eats 3 points back and we've got Skippy with an 8 pts lead with 4 to go. Gnarly!

Motocross star system. It's still cold outside.

First of all, what the heck is happening with SX track designs?! It looks (or at least the riders make it look) very one-lined with little passing options. It makes for good block-passes once in a while so I guess it's better for the show.
Looking at the A3 track design (oh yes, Anaheim 3! Finally the last opus of angel Stadium for the season, time to move on, away!) I am wondering whether we should bring our dirt jump mountain-bikes? This looks more like a "pump track" than MX. I guess the more jumps, the more rhythm sections, the more show, the more happy and returning Monster indulged spectators. Those guys are going to spend more time in the air than on the ground.


Here's an exemple of an MTB pump track. Not too different eh!


Gosh it's still very cold in this part of the country. it didn't stop a good number of gizzers and their misses to make it to the great Ducati Open House we had last night at Corse Superbike in Wisconsin. But yeah, still way too cold for me. I can't believe my buddies Brad Jerominski, Fred and the others have been riding motos on the snowed up Club 57 tracks. And, oh yeah, I still remember saying that I wanted to go ice-riding this season. No way Jose! Way not my kind of fun. The only cold thing I like are usually beers and ice-cream.

So what happened at the San Francisco SX? Well, Bubba cleaned the house and scored his 4th victory of the season. If only he hadn't made that small gear mistake at A1, I would be starting to wonder if this would turn into a perfect season or not. This time, he had didn't have to pass anyone and just went into after-burner after corner 1.
Chad is fast still, no doubt. Chad rides smooth but he gets caught behind riders and he looses time passing them. His teammate Alessi really insisted on that, I was surprised to see Reed not trying something harder but he did try to pass him clean. I guess my next wish is to see CR and JS out of the gate and entering the first corner side by side. I'm sure we'll have that before the end of the year. The other guys in form were there and confirmed, like RV, Josh Grant and Andrew Short.
In the West Coast Lites class, things turned out more exciting for the rest of the season with a nice win by Jake Weimer. He faught Dungey both in their heat race and in the main and both time stayed cool and held it strong, not letting the #10 Suzuki by. I wanted to make a note on the TV boradcast, I think that it was Shaheen who said that Weimer cracked under pressure from Dungey in Phoenix and I wanted ot openly disagree with this. Listening to Weimer, seeing hm ride and behave on and off the track, I think that he is one very cool, very calm guy and I don't think he cracked in Phoenix, it was just a small normal mistake due to the difficulty of that sand pit. Weimer stayed cool till the finish line in SF and scored a great win. The championship is wide open.
What's up with my man Kyle Cunningham? He's fast and has been fast at all races this season but something out of his control always happens to him. In pthe previous races he fell victim to a Lawrence-Canard crash, then someone slammed his shifter, then he got taken out by Lawrence again in PHX. watching SF, he was on the gas, he looked like he was pushing a bit more than he should, but here comes Morais, wide on the triple and Kyle lands out of the track, almost crashing badly. I hope he didn't crossed a black cat, or walked under a ladder in the recent past. Here's to Kyle having better luck and showing his potential in the last races.

So, let's go back to drama, MX goss and the star system. So you take 16 year-old kids, the majority with an already big ego and a strong taste for success, you turn them into pro riders, give them lots of attention, give them lots of goodies, provide them with all the practice tracks they need, provide them with 1 or 2 mechanics, 1 or 2 suspension guys, 1 or 2 engine guys and pay them very very very uber very good money (I think that the average income for a person working 45 hours/week is averaging $42,000 in the State of Illinois).
Then turn them into stars of our sport: pimp them up in the press, get lots of videos of them, lots of photos and interviews, posters in magazines where plenty bikini girls pose, have all the cool clothing and skate shoe brands drop tons of stuff for them, let them have all their friends around, let them go out of control on all the hunting girls roaming the pits. Make sure they know that they are the center of attention and spend a lot of money doing so. And if they don't perform very well, if the results don't come, just be patient and pay more. Make them... "special".

But don't come back all surprised and worried and all shocked and scandalized that little Johnny turned into a car-rolling, splif-rolling, out of control, misbehaving person. And yes Jason Lawrence is surrounded by gossips and crazy Internet rumors and all but J-Law's entourage, family and agent, have let this happen. I think that Lawrence is focusing too much attention due to his past hantics and his punkish behaviour but I don't think he's the only one that needs a reminder of what the job is about and what is expected from a highly-paid employee.
The history of Motocross is landmarked by misbehaviour and punk attitudes, from Weimer to Hannah to Lechien, to Micky Dymond to Mattiasevitch to Jeff Emig to Jason Lawrence and I would remember that at some points MC and his group of buddies were the kings of Rock n' Roll too.
Jason Lawrence is definitely the focus of a lot of Internet specialists (look who's talking!) who are very good at expressing their opinion and are looking for every pro rider out there to behave like Ricky Carmichael, James Stewart, Ryan Dungey or David Bailey and Johnny O'Mara. I think that as much as unlawful behaviour is forbidden, as much as "punk attitude" is not welcomed, we are dealing with humans that grew up too fast and outside of the "normal" world and obviously are getting a lot of different character.
Is it a generation issue? is it this generation that is not liked by the Internet forums? Until he won his first Supercross and showed speed, Josh Grant was carrying a bad image too, alike Josh Hansen and Jason Lawrence. Others are behaving like that but have been good at not attracting the spot light on their off-track lives. I don't think I have any replies to this.

Well, Jason Lawrence and Josh Hansen (guys, you need to stop hanging out with each other at the tracks) got into it again after the race at SF. Looking for trouble with my buddy Steve Boniface and starting a fight that definitely didn't help their image and the dislike from many. That's where I think Josh Hansen isn't smart? Has he seen how Bonifast is built? Dude!? The rumor talks of a good, well placed, fast like lightnig head-butt that Steve administred to Hansen and I smile with pride when I hear about it. Go Stevo!
Joking aside, fights have always happened post-races, in the pits. Even on tracks, it is not like we've never seen any bitch-slap going on. So I don't really care about the fight but I have find it unacceptable that J-Law got involved, a day when he had not raced due to supposedly medical conditions. If you don't race, for whatever reason, just stay quite and don't give your sponsors anymore reasons to call and shout at your agent on Monday morning. Who's in charge here. Scott, come on, it's time to hold on the reins tighter or let go.
The bad thing is that I enjoy watching Jason Lawrence racing, I like having wild characters with attitude in racing, I think it's good that a fight happens once in a while, they are humans after all, but Lawrence needs to really avoid stupid incidents like that one, getting involved in a fight that is not his.

Anyway, it gets the Internet going, it gets more impressions to all those web pages and help the sales of ads for many.

I hope Lawrence gets back on the bike and goes racing the 450 for fun, showing what he is capable off. The Outdoor Nationals will bring "Redemption Time" for him, or just... "Hit the road Jack, and don't come back no more..."

SX 2009: D -3 and Red Bull No Limits

As the teams are converging onto Anaheim's Angel Stadium, Racer X reported a small rumor that if coming out to be true, would be another amazing marketing move.

According to Racer X, Jason Lawrence's party (no pun intended) didn't come to terms with Fox Racing and J-Law would be moving to One Industries for the 2009 season. OMG! If this is really happening, One Industries would end up with two of the bitter rivals of our sports in the USA. Both Jason Lawrence and Minnesota wonder Ryan Dungey dislike each other openly. I think that the rivalry even developped into "hatin'" for RD10 and the recent Supercross Preview show that aired on CBS really made sure that his would come out loud and clear during Ryan's interview. Those 2 guys had stormy battles, on and off the track, in 2008 and 2009 can only promise to be better, stronger, and Kathrina-esque!

If it's true, I am very surprisd that a pro athlete like Lawrence who has one of the most famous and experienced agent in the industry used and rode Fox Racing gear during the off-season, if no deals had been finalized. That was definitely extra exposure for the Morgan Hill crew as J-Law is constantly on the radar of the mx-paparazi scene, a bit like the othe J-Lo ;-)

If this is confirmed though, I can only be in admiration for another amazing marketing move by the guys at One Industries who will have both rivals under their flag. What a fun year it is going to be for the One Ind. advertizers, man, I am jealous! :-)
In doing so, One tells people that they cover the full spectrum of the MX scene, from the very well behaved, clean cut, kids to the bad boyz.
In an industry where paying athletes is really worth it as long as they bring you big media coverage, what better move than this, knowing that these 2 guys, thanks to their bitter rivalry and racing skills, should be all over the press for the years to come.


Robbie Maddison is nuts and that's really cool for us!

My friend Ron Joynt of DeCal Works is very excited about this because Maddo will wear DeCal Works graphics/decals on his YZ250 tonight in Las Vegas:

After attempting the long distance jump on a motorcycle on December 31st 2007, reaching 322 feet (or 98.14 meters), Maddo will go at it again tonight in Las Vegas and attempt another crazy jump, during the Red Bull New Year's No Limit, live on ESPN. I don't want to go into the description of what this is really - a crazy but very well prepared jump by a crazy but very pro and cool Australian rider - basically Robbie will jump 98ft high onto the top of the Las Vegas' Arc de Triomphe, then drop 100ft down on the other side.

Steve Matthes did a quick interview of Maddo for Racer X.

To give you an idea, check this photo of the ramp (thanks to Racer X for the steal):


Things can go wrong. Check this vid' of Maddo close-call practicing.



HAPPY NEW YEAR 2009

BONNE ANNEE 2009 A TOUS

KHERI YA MWAKA MPIA 2009

FELIZ ANO NUEVO A TODOS

TATRA N'TOANA 2009