Round 9 was not a great weekend for a few reasons, first the weather was wet and crappy both days, and the track was muddy. The promoter of the event had a good few days for the Amateur ECAN event and their turnout was solid once again. Most of the riders I talked to said that they loved the layout of the track. Daniel Thibault and his team have done a great job adding to the track each year to make it a little longer. The parking lot looks like a groomed KOA campground when you pull in. I think it has to be one of the best tracks on the schedule. If this track was clay with the weather we had on the weekend I have no doubt that the motos would have been cancelled. I don’t think you could get up the hills or cross the gullies. If all national tracks were on sand tracks, we would never have to cancel one. Sand riders like Matt Goerke would dominate the series with ease but I guess it wouldn’t be too fair to those riders that don’t have sand tracks near their homes to practice.
The MX1 riders were wide open and charging during the start of their opening moto in Quebec. Photo by James Lissimore
The results from the weekend were a little strange. The 450 class’ points leader Matt Goerke had a 19 point lead and he just needs to finish either ahead or one spot behind Pourcel to win this series. Colton Facciotti had other plans, he needs to lock down 3rd in the points and he showed everyone this past weekend that he can still haul the mail. Colt put the GDR Honda on the top of the box with a 1-1 with a commanding win. No one had anything for the 4-time champion. Finishing second with a 2-2 was Christophe Pourcel. I didn’t find out if he liked or hated the track this weekend but he rode well. I am sure he would have liked to have the overall and scored some well needed points with one round left in the series. Points leader Goerke had a good race with a 3-3 for the day. The last lap in the second moto CP made the pass for second. I heard there were a few words exchanged on the podium and again at the airport after the race. These two riders are going for a championship and with only 15 points separating them, I can see that there might be a little bit of tension. The pass looks clean from the video and there was no real contact that I could see but who likes getting passed with a few corners to go. I hope these two guys can keep it clean for the last round and the best man will be crowned the winner. Both riders have the same energy drink sponsor and they are the title sponsor for the series so I am thinking they will be pretty happy with whoever wins. Fourth for the day was Kyle Chisholm and fifth was Mike Alessi.
The results in the MX2 class might surprise you; Ryan Surratt must like soft wet sand because he was untouchable with a holeshot and two moto wins. It’s so crazy how Ryan has not been even close to the top of the box and he pulls this with a few rounds left. Ryan is now in a solid second in the series. Another surprise was Tanner Ward finishing second with a 2-2 for the day on his KTM. I honestly didn’t expect to see Tanner up on the box until maybe next year but it shows you that with some hard work and a good program, anything is possible. Tanner looked and rode great. At one point I thought he might make the pass late in the moto for the win. If the race had a few more laps I think the results would be different. Third was local rider Jason Benny from Joliette, Quebec. Solid starts, a great ride and being super consistent paid off for the Kawasaki rider. Another Quebec native, Jeremy Pronovost, finished 5th overall with a 5-6. Not far behind him was Yamaha MX101 rider Hayden Halstead with his best overall so far as a pro. Every weekend it seems like Hayden finds some extra speed. What happened to points leader Shawn Maffenbeier? Well, Shawn finished 3rd in the first moto. The second moto Shawn started in the top 10 and looked to just ride smooth and not do anything crazy to jeopardize the championship. As quick as I said that, Shawn was face down in the mud on the second lap on a downhill. The front fender blew off and the bars looked bent. That was it for the 40 plus points lead. Jess Pettis had a terrible first moto where he was stuck in a rut for 4 to 5 laps. It took everything he had to get back in the race but it was for not as he was out of the points running in 30th. Moto 2 was way better, Jess rode smart and steady for a solid 3rd. Jacob Hayes had a good first moto with a 4th but ended up with a blown engine with a few laps to go in the race. Dylan Wright looked fast in practice but unfortunately had some bad luck and had a few tip overs.
The ladies final round is this coming weekend at RJ’s in Barrie, Ontario and it marks the fourth round of the series. Kennedy Lutz and Eve Brodeur have had some great battles so far and I expect the same this weekend. In other news, we will see Mike Brown come up for the final round as well. Mike is no stranger to our Canadian series. I really don’t think he will compete for a podium position but you can bet he will be trying for that Royal Distributing Holeshot. Speaking of Mike, he’s just come off a successful week at the Loretta Lynn’s Amateur National where he took both Junior +25 and the Senior 40+ class wins. There has been plenty of talk about ex-champions racing Loretta Lynn’s. Is it fair for an ex-champ to compete in a vet class? If the AMA only has one level vet class like the +40 then I would say that it’s wide open. If they had it the way it was in the past by having +40A, +40B and +40C the guys like Mike would race the A class. I read some of the comments on a forum site and 98% of the comments were in favour of ex-champs racing those classes. I think one or two keyboard squirrels were pissed that they got beat by a guy that loves racing dirt bikes. See you at the races!