Monday Morning Coffee
By Billy Rainford
And we’re off! We’ve made it through the Holiday Season and we’re on the board with the first 0f 17 rounds of Monster Energy AMA Supercross in the books. We’re headed straight into Motorcycle Show season, too. Calgary and Toronto held their first shows over the weekend, but Jeff McConkey wasn’t able to get to the Toronto Supershow because of the crazy weather we had here in Ontario. It actually shut down the 401 Highway right by his house east of Toronto. There were over 120 vehicles piled up and it was complete chaos. This means I don’t have any Dog the Bounty Hunter (and Beth) photos to post here. You’re welcome.
Jeff has already sent in his ‘McThoughts‘ columns for A1, and I’ll get to those as soon as we’re done here.
My plan to watch Anaheim 1 went out the window when I was informed that my so called buddy was going to leave us all hanging because he had to be up early Sunday morning for a 14k JOG. A training JOG! (I think you just run…)
You see, he’s the only one with Rogers that I know in the area and he also got a shiny, massive TV last year so it’s the perfect place for a Supercross viewing party. It’s also usually the only time I plow through more than my fair share of potato chips, Doritos, and whatever other bags of nastiness he supplies. It’s awesome!
Let me just say that I ran competitively for over 20 years and I don’t think I EVER would have left my Supercross buddies in a lurch like this. One of the other guys who usually heads over just had his own mansion built here in town. He made a massive ‘man cave’ and everything, but he’s yet to hook the palace up with the right amount of cable. Get on it, he who shall remain nameless!
Anyway, what this did is left me scrambling to remember what I did when I stayed home last season and watched the races. These ‘secret’ places you find online that show sporting events rarely last more than a season, so I wasn’t very confident in my chances of seeing A1 this year. I was worried.
I’ll have to let him off the hook because the online method worked like a charm this past weekend – in hi def an everything! We won’t have to worry about the possibility of him having to be up early to go ‘antiqu-ing’ this coming weekend because I’ll be in San Diego myself!
Brock Leitner tried to qualify for A1 Saturday night | Bigwave photo
Canadian journeyman racer, #497 Brock Leitner, was in Anaheim for round 1. He came up short in his bid to make the night show, but gained valuable experience that will see him get there one Saturday night soon.
He was 55th fastest in combined 250 qualifying and 3 1/2 seconds away from making the top 40 who transfer to the night program. Yes, that’s quite a gap, but with a solid week of working on specific things with Sean Hamblin, that amount of improvement is possible.
Have a great week of training and we’ll see you in person this Saturday at Petco Field.
Here’s how Brock summed it up on his social media:
Amsoil Arenacross | Cincinnati Pro Results
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Saturday Cincinnati Arenacross – 1/7/2017
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Full results at: http://www.arenacross.com/event-results
Florida Winter Ams
We’ve had a few Canadians down in Florida ripping up the Winter Ams series lately – not to mention Moon Gerrits and Cruz Rainwater are also lining up and I just wanted to type those two names…
This is from a couple weeks ago, but here are a few Canadians’ results from round 1 at Diamondback (the new track at Gatorback) from Dec 31st:
Tanner Ward and Eve Brodeur went head to head in 250 B:
This past weekend they raced round 2 in Dade City, Florida, but the results page hadn’t been updated at the time of this column.
You can check their site later today for results at: http://www.unlimitedsportsmx.com/raceresults/
Noah and Bjorn Viney Sign Amateur Deals with BTO Sports
Ulf Viney took his Ottawa family down to northern California a few years ago to give their young motocross racers, Noah Viney and Bjorn Viney, every opportunity they can to succeed in the sport. I got to know them a little better this past November at the Mini O’s at Gatorback and the two young riders have a ton of talent.
Now they’ve taken the next step in their advancement and caught the attention of the gang at the BTO Sports amateur program.
Read younger brother Noah Viney’s BTO bio HERE | Bigwave photo
And Bjorn Viney’s BTO bio HERE | Bigwave photo
Best of luck, guys. And yes, if you’re in San Diego this weekend I’ll look you up!
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You can also find the entire night’s racing on Youtube…but you didn’t hear that from me!
The only future excuse we’ll accept for not hosting the weekly Supercross Viewing Party is if he has to travel to be at the next ‘Gelande Quaff‘ competition…
Have a great week, everyone. Watch for stories from along the road this coming week as I meander my way across the continent on my way to cover Sand Diego, Anaheim 2, and then the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colorado!
Twitter: @DirectMX
Instagram: @DirectMotocross
Facebook: @Direct Motocross
It’s going to be a crazy couple weeks, but this is why I got into this in the first place. #MotoGypsy
