Grab yourself another cup and check out this week’s Monday Morning Coffee column where we talk about what happened in the sport of motocross.
By Billy Rainford
Welcome to the first Monday after we’ve made it through the first round of the 2024 Canadian Triple Crown Series MX Nationals. All the talk and guesswork is done and we now have a better picture of what the season is going to look like. Some things were exactly as expected, but other things came up and will leave us wondering what will happen this coming weekend in Raymond, Alberta, as well as the rest of the summer.
I don’t even know where to start talking about the weekend. Let’s go through the classes to keep this organized.
PreMix
I don’t know why I’m having so much fun laughing along with defending champion Brock Hoyer, but I am. I think it’s because he feels a little sheepish about winning this title as a long-time Pro racer against a lot of kids on Superminis.
The comedy started at the Team Canada MXON Mixer on Friday night (see earlier IG post) and just rolled over to race day.
As they were lining up on the gate for their first moto, I walked up behind Brock, who was lining up next to 16-year-old #15 Dexter Seitz on a Supermini, and said, “What in the world class is this???” I was just playing up the fact that we had these two racing each other.
Brock laughed and we even took a photo of the two of them high-fiving as they lined up.
Fortunately, #477 Joey Parkes showed up and made Brock feel better. Joey is an older ex-travelling Pro rider from Vancouver Island. I saw the number, gave my head a shake, and waited for him to go by me so I could read the back of his jersey. Yep, it was joey! (I chatted with him on my Race Tech ‘Walk and Talk’ that will be up as soon as I can get to it.)
Brock was clearly the fastest and his bike sounded amazing. He had his YZ125 woking perfectly. Dexter took 2nd place and Joey was in a dogfight behind them in 3rd.
I had a chat with someone this morning and they mentioned that maybe we could do something about this class in the future. It seems some people think of it as a fun way for former pro racers to come back and have some fun, while others think it’s an opportunity for young riders to get out in front of big crowds and get some TV time. I’m not sure which way I think the class should go. What are your thoughts on this?
Adding to all this fun, when the three of them were on the podium, Brock had to show Dexter how to open up a bottle of champagne. Of course, as soon as they got theirs open they completely let Dex have it. It was actually pretty funny and I was standing at the side recording with my phone as I always try to:
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Overall
WMX
Well, it looks like we’ve got ourselves a western series on our hands! #50 Viviana Contreras is here from California with her brother to make things interesting. It seems a new hired gun shows up every year to take a run at our legend, Eve Brodeur. Each year they come and each year they fall. This year, however, it looks like we’ve got someone who could potentially do it.
Viviana rides with a style not often seen in the class. As soon as I saw her in practice, I knew she was legit! She throws the bike around like a seasoned pro. She’s fun to watch.
She and Eve split moto wins to share the points lead heading into Raymond this week. Viviana closed on Eve in moto 1 and was going to try to make a move on the final lap when she went down.
In moto 2, she got the holeshot and pulled away early as Eve was stuck in 4th place and took too long to get herself into 2nd place.
Most impressive to me was the speed shown by young #3 Kaylie Kayer. She’s been steadily improving the past couple years and now looks to be the heir to the thrown when Eve steps down. She ran Eve’s pace on Saturday and will just keep getting closer.
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250
Big bummer to start this one. #5 Tyler Medaglia slid out in the slick stuff on lap 1 of moto 1 and was hit by #300 Drew Adams who couldn’t avoid him. Tyler managed to make it back to the mechanics area but as he walked off with the help of Derek Schuster, you could tell he was seeing stars. He wouldn’t line up for moto 2.
#26 Kaven Benoit grabbed both holeshots and went wire-to-wire for the first moto win. He looks to have everyone covered except the young hotshot from Georgia.
Drew crashed with Tyler and had to play catch up. He made it up to 4th place but you could just see his bike was set up perfectly and he rides with an expertise not usually seen here in Canada. It was impressive, you’ll see this week.
#14 Quinn Amyotte looked good and seesm to just keep getting better. He was 4th in moto 1 after a nice battle with #402 Gage Linville. Unfortunately, Quinn made contact with a lapped rider mid-air coming out of Shaw Valley in moto 2 and went down hard, ruining his throttle for a DNF.
#12 Sebastien Racine was very consistent and looks to have found the next gear we knew he had. He will continue to get better this summer.
I’ll do a full report on its own ASAP.
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450
Could anyone put a stop to #1 Dylan Wright was again the question. Dylan chased down the leaders in moto 1 and took a convincing win. It looked like we were in for another one of those summers. #15 Jess Pettis seemed to have the pace needed to run with him but we’d have to wait for moto 2 for things to happen, which they most certainly did!
Jess is a great starter so he got out to the lead again in moto 2 and tried to check out. Dylan’s bike started showing signs of rear suspension failure early and it looked like he may have to let up and limp in for a top 10 finish. Ya right!
He rode the wheels off his Honda with little movement left in the rear end! I stood with Al Dyck, who is a former national champion and a suspension guy, and he was losing his mind at how Dylan was still racing with his bike in that condition. He wanted to make sure we all knew exactly what we were watching.
As the race came to the final couple laps, #8 Mitchell Harriison and #84 Tanner Ward were closing in and the writing appeared to be on the wall, but Dylan just kept pushing and crossed the line in 2nd place. It was nuts.
Jess didn’t know what was going on but saw a pit board that showed “+18” so he was having a blast out front and split moto wins with Dylan to share the red plate heading into round 2.
Dylan’s unbeaten streak has come to an end and it was Jess Pettis who was able to make it happen. Afterward, Jess said to me, “Someone had to do it!“
Harrison looks comfortable on the 450 and said he loves it. He’ll be there all season, you know that.
#23 Josiah Natzke made things tough on himself when he found the ground, Mitchell did too, actually, but looks like he’ll be the rider we expect him to be and will be in this fight too.
I liked what I saw from #808 Preston Kilroy. He looked like he was riding well within himself and I’m sure the team just wanted him to feel things out. He’ll keep getting more comfortable with how we do things up here and be in it too.
#109 Aaron Tanti looked like he was fighting some fitness. He also took a shot from Wright that damaged his rad. I also heard he was told, “Welcome to Canada!” afterward. Shots fired!
Like we keep saying, you don’t win an Australian championship and not be a Canadian title threat, so we’ll wait for him to get things sorted and come out swinging as he gets up to 100%.
There are more stories, but I will cover them in they’re own column upcoming.
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The results are the standings, so no need to post them.
There is a Pro ride day at Temple Hill MX down the highway on Tuesday, so I’ll head there to check it all out. The WCAN gets started on Wednesday. It’s going to be a good week of racing!
I’m currently uploading the Race Tech Walk and Talk where I walk the pits at the end of the day, discuss what happened, and interview people The podcast should already be available, but the 30-minute video will take a while longer to upload to YouTube and process.
I spoke to Dylan Wright, Kaven Benoit, Josiah Natzke, Jess Pettis, Quinn Amyotte, Tanner Ward, Andreas Konrad, Joey Parkes, Julien Perrier, and Tiger Wood in this one.
I also did my first post-race loop of the track. It did not go well. The track was capital G GNARLY! I should have borrowed an electric-assist for this one. However, the ruts were so long and deep that I’m bot even sure that would have saved me! At one point, coming out of Shaw Valley, I simply stopped and almost toppled over backwards! Like I said, it wasn’t a good loop by any stretch of the imagination.
That will get uploaded as soon as I get the time, so you can laugh at me.
OK, I can see that I’m already late and I know a certain Mr Puky who will let me hear it next time I see him, so I hope that was enough to get you through another cup on this Monday Morning.
Be sure to keep checking back as we’ve got a ton of content to get up so we can all get to some serious bench racing heading into Round 2. I didn’t even talk about that incredible ride by Chase Sexton at Hangtown! Where does the time go?!
Have a great week, everyone.
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