Monday Gate Drop

Good Morning and welcome to this week’s edition of Monday Gate Drop. My scribing this week comes from beautiful Fort Mill, South Carolina where the Pomeroy Family is staying for the next five days. My wife’s BFF lives here so we loaded up Ayrton’s brand new 2014 KTM50SX and drove down on Friday. We figured that it would be a good opportunity to kill two birds with one stone; we could visit with friends and get a little riding in, plus the weather here is beautiful. If everything goes as planned we’ll be hitting the road on Saturday and making the drive straight to Tillsonburg for the SWO CMRC season opener at Gopher Dunes on April 13th.

We obviously weren’t able to make the practice day at Gopher yesterday but from all the photos I saw on Facebook and Twitter, the conditions looked great. I called Derek Schuster last night and asked him how the day went. Dig was extremely happy with everything. He said there were around 200 riders there (199 probably had arm pump), the track was in surprisingly good condition and best of all there were no big incidents. It almost sounds like everyone read my MXP riding tips from a few weeks ago on how to have a safe start to the riding season. I know I sound like a broken record but it’s been such a long winter out here in the east that it’s great to finally have our riding season get underway. With Gopher Dunes open, Moto Park isn’t far behind as they released this statement this morning:

Motopark will open for the season Friday April 11. It’s been a long cold winter.  Staff have been working for the past week doing the groundwork to prepare the tracks for this year’s opening.

Congratulations to Motopark’s owner Iain Hayden. Iain just wrapped up a record, 7th Pro National title in the CSRA Canadian Snocross Championship riding the OTSFF Rockstar Polaris. He‘s finished with the snocross season, had a little Florida break and will be on the dozers this week along with Motopark’s Nick Hill to work their magic on Motopark’s tracks. Motopark’s Trail system will be closed for the month of April.
Motopark Pro Zeb Dennis will be available all week for those that want to talk about booking a day riding lesson this spring or one of our 5 day summer camps.

The Off Road Café will be open throughout the weekend serving up some great Moto food for riders and their guests. Hotel rooms are still available for booking. Email info@motoparkracing.com should you wish to book a room.

Motopark’s membership are $35 and are good for one year from date of purchase. Day ride fees are $35. Information on annual and family memberships, training, rentals, summer camps and all our other rates are posted  at www.motoparkracing.com

Motopark’s spring hours (April 11 to June 23)
Monday: 9:00am – 7:00pm
Tuesday: Closed
Wednesday: Closed
Thursday: 11:00am – 7:00pm
Friday: 9:00am – 7:00pm
Saturday: 9:00am – 6:00pm
Sunday: 9:00am – 6:00pm

Motopark is located just off Hwy #6 1 km south of Williamsford, Ontario, 2 hours North of Toronto’s Pearson Airport. For further information email info@motoparkracing.com, Website: www.motoparkracing.com
MOTOPARK, 622794 Moto Park Rd., Chatsworth, Ontario, N0H 1G0 519 794-2434

Since we’re Roger’s Cable customers at home, I haven’t be able to watch Monster Energy SX since they took Speed Channel off the air. However, since we’re in South Carolina, I tuned into FoxSports and got to watch the Houston SX on Saturday night. For a track that didn’t look that tough on television, it sure bit a lot of riders throughout the course of the day and evening, most notably Ryan Villopoto. In his heat race we saw the points leader hit the deck pretty hard after the whoops section. Of course this was just after Josh Hill ran it in on RV2 pretty hard in the corner before. I can appreciate Hill and all that he’s been through in his career, but unless you’re actually in the points race and it’s near the end of the main event when anyone is fair game, you don’t attempt a move like that on the Champ. It’s a no no in any sport and Hill should be smart enough to know that. Or maybe he isn’t? Anyway, in the main event, Karma sorted everything out and Villopoto took home a convincing win while Hill finished 12th. Villopoto now has a 45 point lead over James Stewart and can clinch the 2014 Championship this coming weekend in Seattle. Who would’ve predicted this back in January when you had different riders winning each weekend?

Ryan Villopoto had a rough start to the day in Houston, but like all champions do he put it all together when it counted the most. photo by Frank Hoppen

In Houston we also had Cole Thompson to cheer for as he made another cameo appearance in the big bike class. Cole was fast all day on his Rockstar Energy Drink KTM350, but during the start of his semi he went down in the first turn and banged up his knee again. Unfortunately, it was too sore and he was forced to sit out the rest of the evening. He is going to get it looked at today back in California. I called his brother Kyle this morning and he had this to say, “It was the same knee he hurt late in 2013 in AX. Cole said that it feels like the same injury again this time so he’s going to get it looked at today. Last time there wasn’t any structural damage so hopefully it’s the same now. His plan is to finish the supercross series and then come back home and keep training to be ready for Nanaimo”. So far it sounds like Cole will be okay so we wish him the best of luck and we hope he’s feeling better soon.

Speaking of Nanaimo and the beginning of the 2014 Rockstar Energy MX Nationals, one rider who was supposed to be on the starting line but now won’t be is Nico Izzi. He, of course, was one of the big names who was supposed to come north to race in the MX1 class for the Rockstar Energy OTSFF Yamaha Team. However, recently, Nico has picked up some support to race the AMA Nationals so for now he will be a fill in rider on the OTSFF Team. This new situation sounds like a good thing for both sides. With such a long list of names riding the MX1 class in Canada this summer, one rider isn’t going to make or break the series. We wish Nico good luck in the USA and maybe we’ll see him at a race or two up here this summer.

It was a rough night for a lot of riders in Houston. photo by Frank Hoppen

With the 2014 riding season now upon us and thousands of parents loading up their vehicle with bikes and kids to travel to the first of many races this season, the time for sacrificing weekends, money and effort has officially begun in Canadian motocross. As we were driving to SC on Friday, the simplest situation instantly brought back a ton of memories from my childhood and the sacrifices my parents used to make. While driving through West Virginia, our antsy six year-old wanted to listen to music that wasn’t exactly on one of my request lists. Well, since he was being pretty carefree on the long drive, I quickly gave in and he got his wish.

It got me thinking, though, about some of the awful music my parents were forced to sit through on our long trips to the races, and this was in the 1980s so you can imagine my poor mom having to rock out to Guns and Roses as we drove to Michigan or some other far-away place. But other than the odd “Oh not this song again”, there was never any complaining as we were together as a family. These are the types of sacrifices I’m talking about. Yes, what is on the play list is a small thing but it’s part of the bigger picture. Kids, if you’re reading this, please give your parents a big thank you for what they’re about to do this season and reward them by giving your best effort on and off the track to do your best. That’s all us parents can ask for. I hope everyone has a great week and I will see some of you this Sunday at Gopher Dunes. Ride safe everyone and thanks for reading.

Motocross is the best family sport in the world. Thank you to all the parents that make it possible.