Work is either fun or drudgery; it depends on your attitude. I like fun. Colleen C. Barrett. This lady seems to have it right and lately FUN has been a high priority for me. Since putting my Yamaha Canada YZF450 together on Thursday it’s been a whirlwind of fun for the past four days. Moto on Friday, moto on Saturday at Motopark, big family dinner for Easter, banger of a night at the local watering hole called “The Ranch” then ended it all with a sick leftover dinner from the previous Easter family gathering. It looked as if fun was had by all in this country as Gopher Dunes, Motopark, and Popkum MX tracks were open for the first rides of the season. For me, the fun got a little swallowed up with the amount of food I ate this weekend. YIKES is all I have to say, (LOL) but fun was a big part of it. How nicely my summer is starting to form; FUN will be easy to find.
Kyle Keast was back riding this weekend at Gopher Dunes and having FUN after a long stay off the bike since last June when he broke his femur. Great to see the “Dozer” pushing some sand. Photo by Randy Wiebe
Last week I did a podcast with PulpMX’s own Steve Matthes. We talked about lots of stuff but the one that seemed to make my phone blow up was the chatter we had about Canadians racing in the Supercross series. The one thing that kept coming up from texts or twitter was the high cost and how hard it is. I can’t stress enough that it is not as hard as some may think. I truly believe that Canadians put the Supercross series on the list of “unreachable” unless there are the perfect scenarios. Whether it is the bike, the parts, the gear, the bed they sleep in, the proper cereal to have on race day, if the sun has set just in the right spot, or if their hair looks good enough on that day, I just don’t understand why we look at that series as the end all to be all. Yes, it is the very tops of the sport but we all ride bikes just like the guys do that race that series. Doing the obstacles is just as simple as stuff our racers do each weekend at any track. It’s like we put this series up so high that the very thought of it scares us.
The other topic was money. It doesn’t cost that much to do this; 1000 bucks will get you your license and signed up for one race. Today’s racer can make that in a week either getting a good job or saving that Christmas/Birthday money from Grandma and Grandpa. Instead of buying an RC car, maybe invest that money in yourself or go without poser rims or that hopping stereo to have Justin Beiber blaring. To achieve the dream, sacrifices have to be made. In our next issue I am destined and determined to prove to all of you racers that doing the Supercross series, whether it’s 1 race or 5, is not out of reach. Nicky Beatty did it. He’s now my guy to get all the info to show how to go about getting the tools to make a 2014 SX series run for any Canadian. Then it’s time to get off the pot for all the negative Nellys out there.
Our first issue online. HERE
I’m pretty jacked about our very first issue that was launched online last Thursday and was distributed at the Toronto SX. The mag is bigger in size, which gives all of our amazing photographers their just do with huge pages for beautiful views of amazing photos. Our advertisers will have bigger ads, and there’s more in the face of the reader. Lastly, it gives all the stories a bigger view for the passion of that story to explode off the page. Once again MXP has stepped it up, spent some dough and made the best even better as far as magazines go in this country. There is no arguing that. Thanks for all the nice comments for those that have seen it.
Did you visit our site last week? We absolutely killed it. With the help of Ami Houde, Jamie Routely, Kyle Sheppard, Mike Williams, Marc Landry, Rand Weibe, Brett Lee, the Tricco family, Mitch Goheen, and Jim Muir that sent us some content, the site was overloaded with lots of news. If you missed it hit these links for a recap:
Fast Times Inc – Toronto SX Photo Report
2013 KTM Photo Shoot – James Lissimore
MXP top 20 – #10 Spencer Knowles
I almost feel like we are doing bad thing for all our readers out there. With all this amazing information you’re never going to leave the house!! We’ll be back to normal this week with nothing happening on mxpmag.com Hahhaah April Fools!!!
The Supercross series picks up again this weekend in Houston after taking the Easter weekend off. That’s a long haul so far for these guys. There were 12 straight weeks of racing with no breaks whatsoever. There will be five in a row then a week off before the outdoors starts. I just took a look at their schedule and they get five weeks off the whole time between SX and MX from Jan 5th till August 24th. That’s unreal. That’s one of the craziest schedules for any sport in the world, especially how physically and mentally demanding motocross is. I applaud those guys that make it through the grueling months trying to be a top racer. It’s a path many are afraid to do. You guys deserve more for your efforts. Now if only some of our Canadians could look at that and realize how good we have it up here for the amount of races we actually have.
4. These racers deserve so much more than they get for the amount of time and effort is put in racing a dirt bike for a living. Photo by Rich Shepherd
I am truly pleased to announce that starting this Thursday April 4th, MXP and CMRC will be playing the 2012 Monster Energy Motocross Nationals through our websites and YouTube channels. I have finally found a way to convert the DVDs I have so we can make this happen. This coming Saturday marks exactly nine weeks till Nanaimo, the opening round for 2013 on June 2nd, so we figured we should run last year’s series. Once that’s done I will be loading random old races each Thursday after that. I have been watching so many old races and man they are really good. There are so many memories from the past that people need to see, especially the youth and future of our sport. It’s important for these kids to know how we got to where we are today. It’s a sign of respect to understand how the sport has come so far in Canada by watching those who helped bring it to the level it is at today. I’m excited, for sure. So plan this Thursday to sit back and see the sights and sounds from the 2012 Monster Energy Motocross Nationals as we start from Nanaimo, BC in the mud, all the way down the final round at the Trans Can in Walton, Ontario.
The Monster Energy MX National poster from 2012. We will be airing these races starting Thursday this week as we head into the 2013 series starting in June. Just nine weeks till round 1.
Hope everyone had a very special Easter weekend with their loved ones.