Motocross Performance Magazine Canadian Motocross news leader
I’ve only had the chance to go to Daytona once. Steve Matthes is not a big fan of the Daytona round, and I understand his points, but I still think it’s a worthy pilgrimage for any diehard Motocross fan. It’s so unique compared to the other sixteen rounds, everything about it is so different than the usual races inside a football or baseball stadium, and the venue itself is so iconic. I agree with Steve about being quite far from the track and how for media, there’s a lot of different hoops to jump through, compared to the usual Feld-run rounds, but there’s also so much history there and I’m glad to say I’ve at least made it once to the Daytona round.
I had the chance to attend the 2014 round of the series, and around those years I often got to spend a week with Matthes down in Florida in conjunction with whatever southern SX races were going on. We would spend the week hitting up spots like Ryan Villopoto’s, Chad Reed’s, and Tim Ferry’s to shoot photos and videos of the riders at their training compounds, and those trips will always be some of the most fun I ever went on.
After looking through my photos from the 2014 round, I settled on this shot of Ken Roczen and Dean Wilson battling for second during the 450 main event. I love whenever you can get a shot of riders racing in tight with each other, and the grandstands of the Speedway really sell that this shot is Daytona and not any other SX round. It was great to see Deano battling in this spot, as he was still a full-time 250 rider at this point but had got a chance to fill in for Chad Reed on his Two-Two Motorsports team at this race. He crushed it too, winning his heat race and then hanging on to second for over half the race before eventually dropping back to seventh at the finish line.
This shot was taken with my 70-200mm lens set at 92mm, with a shutter of 1/1000, an aperture of F4, and an iso of 6400.
