Decal Works Presents the Monday Gate Drop

To kick off the March break of 2016, we again welcome DeCal Works as the proud sponsor of this Monday’s Gate Drop. DeCal is getting ready to begin their very busy spring season as the most trusted graphic company in North America. If you’re in need of a set of your own set of custom graphics then all you have to do is log onto www.decalmx.com and within minutes you can design and order a set.

Let me think here, what do I want to talk about first? Well, in case you didn’t already know there was a pretty big event this past weekend in Toronto, Ontario. After a year’s absence, the Monster Energy Supercross returned to the Rogers Centre in grand fashion. With what appeared to be the largest crowd to date, the world’s best Supercross racers came to Toronto for Round 10 of 2016 to put on a show for all of their Canadian fans. I’m sure by now that everyone knows the results from Saturday, but unless you were in attendance, there might a few things that you missed.

My Toronto SX weekend began on Friday afternoon as I arrived in the city which is currently home to the last place team in the NHL. The last two times that SX was here we stayed at the Sheraton Centre, which is located about 15 minutes (by foot) from the stadium. This hotel is very nice so I saw no reason to change things up for this year. After checking into the hotel I made my way down to the Rogers Centre to meet Andy White and to leave a bunch of tickets at Will Call. From there I made my way into the jam packed pit area where all of the teams parked their big semi-trucks. This area is very small and the trucks are literally feet apart, maybe even inches apart in some cases. After wedging myself between a few semis, I ran smack dab into Chad Reed’s mechanic pushing Chad’s factory Yamaha. I’m not sure if there’s a better looking bike in the pits than Reed’s YZ 450F, and after even closer inspection, it really is a piece of art. I also ran into former top Canadian pro rider and now one of Reed’s most trusted staff members, Shane Drew. When I turned pro back in 1990, Shane was national #6 and one of the nicest guys on the circuit. Being ten years my senior, Shane was one of the riders back then that helped me with getting used the pro class and we’ve been friends ever since. On Friday we spoke about everything from family to how Reed’s season is going in 2016. He also sent me a text on Sunday confirming that Reed is sore after his crash on Saturday night, but that he’s okay and he will be in Detroit this weekend.

After walking around on Friday afternoon, it was time to head over to the Red Bull HQ on Queen St. for the 2016 launch of the Honda Canada GDR Fox Team. Both Colton Facciotti and Jeremy Medaglia were in attendance. It was great to sit and chat about how their off-season went and how their first two weeks of riding have gone. Both said they felt great and were looking forward to getting back down to GPF and doing the serious work that’s involved in getting ready for the opening round of the Rockstar Energy Drink MX Nationals in Kamloops. Even though the series doesn’t begin until June 5th, all of the top riders are in full preparation mode. After meeting everyone that’s involved with the GDR Team this season, and checking out their brand new Fox gear, it was time to call it a night. However, before I left I got the chance to catch up with the new Team Manager for Team Canada and the 2016 MXON, Miss Kourtney Lloyd. While we were talking, she showed me photos of the house that she’s rented for the team in Italy for the week that they’re there. The house is really nice and Team Canada will have everything there that they need to be prepared for this massive event. All in all, it was a great time at the Red Bull HQ and a perfect way to kick off the Toronto SX weekend.

For the first time in a while, the weather for this event was finally spring-like, and the temperature was already up to 10c as I made my way back down to the Rogers Centre on Saturday morning for the Pirelli media breakfast. During this breakfast, Pirelli introduce the all-new MX32 Pro Series tire to Canada. This tire is an updated version of the MX32 with a slightly different knob pattern to help the MX32 Pro become more of multi-use tire. It still keeps its unmatched performance on the softer, loamy type soil, but now a rider can use it when the conditions become a little harder packed. As Josh Whitmire from Pirelli explained, now with the MX32 Pro, a rider can use this tire when the conditions are soft in the morning and when they get harder packed in the afternoon. It really is the ultimate multi-use tire and one that should be very popular this season with all levels of riders.

After breakfast it was time for one of my favourite parts of any SX day, and that’s the track walk. As everyone knows, the track walk is the time to slowly walk around and get a close look at what these incredible SX riders will be facing later in the day. One of the sections that stood out on the Toronto track was obviously the whoops. Both sections of whoops were extremely deep and challenging, and that was good news for both the riders and for the fans. The dirt was also in pretty good shape as it was dry and packed well, although I always seem to forget just how many rocks there are in Toronto. Anyway, all the riders seemed excited about the track and were looking forward to practice – I know I certainly was.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBRr1hz3S1w

Everything went smooth in practice and all of the top riders were riding at their usual speed. It was unfortunate that the only Canadian riding on Saturday, Dave Blanchet, got landed on during his second practice session and was done for the evening. Having not one Canadian rider on the line when the heat races began was a shame and no doubt will deepen the debate about why no Canadian riders chose to race this very high profile event. My feeling is that it’s a complicated question and one with really no definitive answer. Like everyone, I think it would be cool to see a few of our fast kids out there mixing it up, especially in Toronto where the lack of entries almost guarantees you a spot in the night show. However, I totally can understand why most don’t; it’s definitely not an easy task. Also, since all of our top riders are in some way contracted to race this summer in the nationals, risking an injury in SX is a very tough thing to do. Like I said, this debate could go on forever and perhaps this is not the time for it. I do think, though, that we’ll see at least a few Canadians lining up in Toronto in 2017, without a doubt. Something tells me I’ve said this before but it still hasn’t happened.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=808Sv8z_n8g

So with the night show approaching I made my way up to the Parts Canada private box for the introduction of the all new Alpinestar MX gear to Canada. This gear is awesome and will be worn in 2016 by Mike Alessi, Vince Friese and Jacob Hayes of the Monster Energy Kawasaki Team. As you can imagine, everyone involved is very excited about this gear coming to Canada and it will no doubt be very successful. As I made my way back down to watch the opening ceremonies, I ran into a few people who will remain nameless. However, they confirmed to me that it appears that Jimmy Decotis will not be returning to Canada this summer for the MX101 Yamaha team. This is sad news as both parties were looking forward to working together again. The reason is that Jimmy has re-signed for 2017 with the Geico Honda Team and they weren’t big on the idea of him racing a Yamaha this summer in Canada. Maybe we’ll still get to see him race a few east coast rounds this summer on a Honda? I was also told that there is big possibility that we’re going to see Davi Millsaps in Canada this summer racing on a KTM. If this happens then I’m sure he will be pitted out of the KTM Canada truck, but we’ll have to wait and see what goes on. It doesn’t help matters that Davi was injured last weekend in Daytona, and with his collapsed lung, he was forced to rent a car and drive back to California. But, he should be healed in the next month or so; wouldn’t it be awesome to see him on the starting line in Kamloops? This will see names like Goerke, Facciotti, Metcalfe, Medaglia, Alessi, Friese, Benoit, Clason and now Millsaps in the MX1 class. That is quite the lineup of talent!

I don’t think I need to go into the results from Saturday night as I’m sure all of you witnessed those. I will say that when Dungey finally did get into second place, I thought he had a decent chance of catching Roczen for the lead. However, I saw two spots that Roczen was just a little faster, and that made the difference (I’ll save my analysis for this week’s Style Check). If they keep finishing in this order for the next few rounds, this 2016 championship is going to get exciting and it’s definitely not over! I hope everyone had a great time on Saturday night in Toronto. I left there feeling very excited to go riding and with the announcement that Gopher Dunes will be opening this week, it looks as though we all will all be riding soon enough. I also hope that everyone has a great March break and please ride safe and travel safe. I can’t wait for the Toronto SX next year and I know I’m not alone on that feeling!