Monday, August 3, 2009

Crossroads MX Blog

Traveled back up to Crossroads MX over this past weekend for some much needed practice for my rider, a little camping, grilling, frosty beverages and a lot of bench racing!

Track was good Saturday through practice and around 4:00 PM it started to sprinkle. It rained pretty steady for a couple of hours and amounted to just over .3" of rain. Ray had cut the track some and it looked like Sunday's racing was going to be top notch.

Spent a good deal of time Saturday night watching movies and grilling with the T-Unit and Butler racing. Chuck Uphoff stopped by with some cool video's of Davis up at Walnut earlier this year. Ray stopped by for a beverage and we all got to talk about the upcoming changes with their schedules. Beginning at their next race the bikes will be first up on race days instead of the quads.

Yesterday's program kicked off with a grand total of 5 quads! They ran 2 quad motos, mixed classes, but still just 1 gate drop, a 20 minute break then another quad moto. The bikes started around 11:00 or so and there was quite a bit of downtime in between. I'm sure they had to pay the workers, ambulance etc... for those hours and I'd venture to say with just 5 quad entries, they started the day off in the hole financially.

I don't have the answer on bikes first/quads first, run 'em all together, etc... it's a touchy subject as to who likes ruts, flat washed out corners, etc... but I can only wonder how much longer they will support the quads if they only have 4 or 5 showing up to participate.

OK, enough of the "soapbox", let's get to some racing action! Like I mentioned before, the rain the got overnight made the track just about perfect for racing yesterday. The track rutted up nicely and was pretty rough. Not as rough as the qualifier, but still plenty rough.

Ben Butler finished off the day with a 2nd overall in 50 7/8, and took the overall in 50 Open with a 1/1. Ben has just started riding his KTM 65 and looked very good on it in Saturday's practice sessions. He is still figuring out the shifting part of the KTM, but look for him soon in the 65 Jr. class.

Also got to spend a little time with Kevin Johnson and his family. Kynon is coming back off a leg injury from a year ago and is quickly getting back up to speed. He ran his Honda CRF150 in the Open C class and did quite well. He also busted out the Kevin Johnson built Modzilla Pit Bike.

I missed the pit bike action due to changing a tire, but heard Kynon was airing the pit bike big time. Kody later rode the little beast and came back smiling ear to ear and said it was insane! Kevin has done almost all of the fabrication on the bike and has some pretty trick hand made custom parts to utilize a KTM 65 front and rear ends. If you're interested in such a project, you might want to get a hold of Kevin for assistance!

Kody raced in the 250 A class and finished 3rd overall on the day, again, missing gettin' paid by a spot! The first moto he raced the last 4 laps of the race with a flat front tire. That made for a few sqirrelly moments in some of the CRMX ruts, but Ol' Dad got the RM 250 ready to go again in moto 2. Kody did get in a lot of good practice time on Saturday and we even did a little testing of pipes and suspension settings. Kody really like the 2-stroke, but unfortunately, with football going strong now it limits the amount of seat time he is getting. We are still planning on hittting races when we can, and I'm looking forward to the Red Bud Fall Classic, if I can just persuade the coach to work with us a little!

Derek Rankin ran 250 B and finished up with a 4th overall. All of the pics I got of Derek yesterday was blurry. Derek must be getting faster if I'm having a hard time keeping him in focus! Good job Derek.

Old man T-Unit made his first trip to CRMX this weekend. Trent ran +25 and finished 2nd overall after getting an early lead.

T-Unit is pretty much a legend on the fair circuit and around Nebo KY, but just recently spread his fame into Meade County KY doing interviews and such. It's amazing how the media can sniff out the true "stars" of the sport. Ryan Sipes was in attendance and was shunned for the T-Unit, go figure!

Trent is a good sport about everything and we all give him a hard time, but for an "old guy" he still get's around pretty quick.

Lastly, I'd like to wish Davis Uphoff a quick recovery. Davis had a pretty nasty get off yesterday, but Dad, Chuck reported just some bruises and strained muscles. If you haven't seen Davis on the big bikes, it's a treat. Not sure when the last time I saw a kid make the transformation from mini's to the bigger machines so smoothly!

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