Decal Works Presents Monday Gate Drop

As always, this week’s Monday Gate Drop is brought to by fine people at DeCal Works. With the hockey season now underway, everyone at DeCal Works is very excited about their hometown team, the Chicago Black Hawks. This makes it a perfect time to go to www.decalmx.com; within minutes you can design and order your very own set of custom graphics. Thank you to Decal Works for their continuing support of MXP Magazine and Canadian motocross.

Before I dive into the news from this past weekend, let me start off by warning you that this version of the Decal Works Monday Gate Drop may be on the short side. You see, not only am I a little fatigued from two days of intense arenacross racing in Sarnia, but it’s also Thanksgiving and I want to spend some time with my family. Having said that, I suppose now is a great time to wish everyone out there a very Happy Thanksgiving!. I hope everyone has as many things as I do to be thankful for. Life is always challenging and sometimes not always a barrel of fun. However, as we witnessed this past weekend in Sarnia, our lives and our health can change in an instant, so let’s all take full advantage of our talents and be thankful for what we do have.

I was going to wait until the end of this column to talk about what happened on Friday night to Bobby Kiniry, but since I just mentioned his situation, I might as well get into it now. As most of you know by now, during the Open main event on Friday night, Bobby got one of the two rhythm sections very wrong and ended up hitting the ground very hard. Perched in the press box about 100 feet above the Hiawatha Park track, I only caught the final part of Kiniry’s crash, so I didn’t see it how it began. What I saw was the horrifying sight of him flying through the air, hitting the ground hard and then sliding to the edge of the track. The crash, the impact and the fact that the dirt in Sarnia was rock hard all helped make Bobby’s situation very serious. Also add in the fact that Bobby didn’t immediately jump to his feet the way we’re so accustomed to seeing him do. Everyone knows that Kiniry is one of the toughest riders in the world, and usually when he crashes the track needs repairing, not Bobby the invincible. However, this time he didn’t move and neither did most of the 2000 people that were in attendance. Soon the red flags came out and the race was halted while the medics got Bobby ready for transportation to the hospital.

This process took almost 30 minutes as every precaution was taken to expedite Bobby’s departure, but to also do it in a fashion where his comfort was taken into consideration. While Bobby was in an extreme amount of pain, his situation didn’t appear to be life threatening so there wasn’t a need to move quicker than necessary. Over the years, like almost every rider out there, I’ve been in Bobby’s position of lying severely injured on a track while everyone waits impatiently for an ambulance to arrive. Obviously, no one ever wants to be in that tough spot, however this is motocross and we all accept the inherent risks when we throw our leg over a bike each time. But, I’ve also been in the position of sitting on the starting gate waiting for my moto while the paramedics tend to a fallen rider. As we all know, this is a very unsettling feeling and it always amazes me how as riders we knowingly or maybe unknowingly block the fear out of our minds. Think about it for a second? How many times have we seen this type of situation unfold, and then once the rider has been attended to and taken to the hospital, the next gate drops and everyone goes for it as if nothing has happened. Whether it’s a lack of fear, an abundance of courage, blind ignorance, or maybe a combination of all three, athletes have a unique way of performing under some very intense pressure.

Anyway, Bobby was taken care of and he will be out for a while as he suffered a dislocated hip, a broken upper femur and multiple cuts and scrapes. I texted him yesterday and he actually responded right away to say that he was back in New York already and resting at home. He had surgery in Sarnia on Saturday morning and then checked out of the hospital. He and his family made the long and obviously very uncomfortable trek home. I can’t even imagine how painful that drive was for him, I cringed just thinking about it. He told me to tell everyone that although he’s in pretty bad shape right now, the surgery went well and he’ll make a full recovery. He also wants to thank everyone for the outpouring of get well wishes. I’m not sure what the recovery time is for this type of injury, but I’m assuming we won’t see Bobby on a race track again until the spring of 2016.

So as Bobby heals up from his injuries, my sources tell me that his Rockstar Energy OTSFF Yamaha Team has gone out and secured the services of Brett Metcalfe for 2016. This is a huge deal for the OTSFF Team as well as for Canadian motocross. This gives them Matt Goerke (hopefully Bobby K) and now Metcalfe under their tent next season, and it also keeps our favourite Aussie racing on Canadian soil for at least one more year. Also, from what I hear, this Rockstar Energy deal is a complicated one that will extend into Metty’s post racing days. While this definitely is unfortunate for the Monster Energy Thor Kawasaki Team, I think Metcalfe has earned the right to look out for himself and take care of his future.

Obviously, this leaves a big gap on the Kawasaki Team as right now they only have Vince Friese signed for 2016. While filling the boots left by Metty’s departure might be impossible, there still are a few big names out there who might be looking for work next summer. Names like Mike Alessi, Jake Weimer and Josh Grant might be a few to consider for the MX1 class. I think all three are capable of winning races (as is Vince Friese), but can any of them go ten rounds with very few mistakes and win a championship against Goerke, Metcalfe and Facciotti? Well, if you can win one moto, you theoretically should be able to win twenty right? We know it doesn’t work that way, as we’ve seen during the last few years, it’s not how you do on your good days, but it’s more about how you deal with your bad days. To be honest, the name I like most of the ones I mentioned is Jake Weimer. I think he is at the perfect point in his career and in the right mindset to come to Canada and be a championship contender. Of course, these are just my thoughts! Whatever happens, we all know that the action is going to be incredible when the gate drops next year on the 2016 Rockstar Energy Drink Motocross Nationals.

In talking about the Bobby Kiniry incident from this past weekend’s arenacross, trust me when I say that although his situation was bad, it didn’t detract from some of the awesome racing we saw on both Friday and Saturday. On the amateur side of things, we saw a big jump in entries as more riders came out to try their hand at AX racing. Again, it was incredible to see the progression of the riders at all levels as they each got better and better as the weekend went on. The track in Sarnia was a little bigger than London, so it gave the Jet Works crew a few different options as far as jump combos and the length of the whoop section. The dirt was also a lot different so the surface was much harder packed than London was. However, like London, the racing at Rounds 3 and 4 was entertaining in every class.

In the Pro class, it was the Jacob Hayes and Cole Thompson show as these two riders are proving to be the best of the best. They also have very little time for each other and they seem to come together on the track quite a bit. Their feud began in London and it carried over to this past weekend. Hayes felt that Thompson took him out during the opening weekend and on Friday night it was payback time. When Cole left the inside open during the Lites main event, Hayes not only went for the pass, but he pushed Cole right off the track and onto the ground. Then during practice on Saturday, Cole retaliated with an elbow to Hayes in the same corner. Finally, in hopes of halting this escalation of the tit for tat aggressive riding, the officials called the two of them into a meeting and were told to cease the BS before someone got hurt. However, in a great move and taking into account that these two riders are both going for an AX title in very tight confines, they were told that if they were going to be super aggressive with each other then they should be smart about it and at least wait until the final few laps. I love this type of progressive thinking by Justin Thompson and his crew, to tell them to not to run into each other is ridiculous as sometimes that’s the only way to pass in AX. Instead, they were told to at least wait until late in the race so it doesn’t have a chance to escalate throughout the main event and ruin the race.

Well, the racing was great all night with the exception of a few block passes, everything remained relatively clean and the crowd was treated to some great racing. Now the series takes a week off before resuming in Penticton, BC on October 23rd and 24th. With Kiniry out now, it will be interesting to see which pro riders show up in Penticton and also at the final round in Calgary. I hope as many as possible show up as I think they will really like racing in this series. The tough draw will be Calgary as it conflicts with the next two rounds of the Future West Moto AX Series in Cloverdale, BC. Most of the pro riders in the west are situated much closer to Cloverdale than they are to Calgary. We shall see what happens. Regardless of who shows up where, we know the racing will be great in both series.

Here some highlights from Jimmy Decotis’s big SX win in Australia this past weekend.

Well, that’s it for me this week. You see, every time I say that this might be a shorter Gate Drop, I end up rambling on for what seems like an eternity. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and a terrific holiday Monday. It’s hard to believe that the racing season in Ontario is now over! What the heck are we going to do with our weekends now? Finally, the Nitro Circus tour hits Canada beginning this Wednesday night in Toronto and we hope to see everyone there. I think it’s going to be an awesome show and we can’t wait to see what the Nitro crew has in store for us this time around. Please have a safe week and all the best to you and your family!