Time to get up and get into the great outdoors!

Well, winter seems to be about over! We got AMA LL qualifiers just around the corner and I, for one am ready to get out and get some photos.

Outdoor racing has started hitting the weekly schedule, although I'm not sure just how many have ran though. I do know they run down at Hidden Valley MX in Burlison, TN last week. I got a report from the Kissinger's.

Angie says it was a little cold and rainy, but Sunday turned out "not too bad"!

They ended up only running one 7 lap moto per class because some sections got worse as the morning went on. Kurt rode in the 85JR class and ended up 4th overall. In the supermini class he wasted a clutch in the mud and had to settle for a DNF!

Here is a photo she sent...







They are planning on making the return trip March 7th & 8th for the qualifier. Good luck Kurt and I hope you have a little better track conditions!

Also have been getting steady reports from Justin Brockman this winter. Justin, by far, has been my most consistent racer as far as getting me results. Thanks Justin.

The Brockman's put a lot into Justin's program and it is paying off. Pretty much every week has finished first in schoolboy and does quite well in Open B. I look for Justin to do quite well this Spring in any qualifiers they run. I'm, also glad to announce I have finally gotten their email straightened out!

I got a message from the head Daviess County Dominator, Shawn Clark the other night.

Most of you probably don't remember the Dominators!

You had Clark, Rob Rollins, Aaron Harbstriet, Kenny "G-Dog" Gross, Kendal Norris, Hayden Matteson and Trey Ramsey. These guys pretty much terrorized the Washington, IN area for years with their off road/pit bike antics!

Anyway, Clark, Harb and G are heading down to Monster Mountain this weekend for some training before heading down to Florida to run The Parts Unlimited River Ranch GNCC.

Good to hear from those crazy kids!

Good luck down there in the sand, and remember if a gator gets after ya, zig-zag when you run! Them big ol' gators handle 'bout like a Hodaka Wombat and have trouble changing direction!

Also wanted to mention some new stickers I have been working on with SIMX's newest site supporter TNT-FX Graphics in Newburg, IN.

Be sure to check out their site. It's changing daily with more MX stuff be added all the time!

Here is a link to the concept for right now, of course it could always change!

http://www.robin1grafix.com/robin1stickers.jpg

Supercross 2009!

Well we got three rounds of Supercross in the books and quite frankly, I'm a little surprised. I really felt Stewart would have a lead by now, and all the regular players would have fallen in tow.

Ol' Reedy looks amazing on the Suzook. Plain and simple, I think he's a contender, right now. Yeah, he just took over the points race and all, but I think he'll beat Stewart soon. To me James just doesn't look like the James of old. Maybe it's the bike, new gear, new team, blah, blah, blah, but I think Reed has just stepped up his program. Plus, he has probably the best wrench in the business and a pretty damn good riding partner in a certain #4 kid from Florida.

I was especially proud of Ol' K-Dub this past weekend. I really felt like the young pups would have ran him down quicker, but he still has plenty of fight in him.

RV has been a little bit of a disappointment. I know, he's a rookie and all, but he had a good start last week and kinda went backwards, ala Mikey Alessi!

Lites racing has been exciting as well. Dungey looks great and I believe he has the confidence to handle whatever J-Law has to throw at him. What about "no main" J-Law the other night. Had to really suck watching all those points go by from the bleacher section.

A quick note on Shawn Clark. Shawn pm'd me a week or so ago, telling me he was making his comeback to arenacross over at DuQuoin. I'd of loved to been there to see his return and it sounded like he hasn't lost much in the last 9-10 months he was off recovering from what, his third shoulder surgery in about three years.

I already had plans that Saturday, and missed a great photo opportunity I'm sure. Look for more info on Shawn in the MXF Racing section of the moto-x-foto.com website.

That's about it for now. I just hate this slow time of the year and can not wait until it gets a little warmer and we can all get back out in to the great outdoors!

2009

Well the New Year has came and gone. It's pretty awesome out right now here in Southern Indiana, sunny and 50 degrees! Supercross kicks off tomorrow live on Speed, Hi-def, even. Stewart's showing off his new gear over at RacerX, and I'm sure everyone is picking their top 3 in SX andSX Lites classes. Personally I'm going with James, RV and Reed on the big bikes. Dungey, Canard and Lawrence on the Lite side of things! I have three more pictures to talk about and then I'll have to get out and get busy with the camera taking in the new 2009 shots.

I'm going to be busy getting the new Moto-X-Foto Racing website going with rider profiles and slide shows. It will take a while but I'll have thing rolling there soon!

You may or may not have noticed the Moto-X-Foto Racing Team yet. What I have done is to take the riders who kept me updated, sent results, come over and say hey every once in a while through out the 2008 year and started the MXF team. I will be devoting more time, effort and coverage to these guys in 2009. The old Team SIMX is still going as well, but these guys put that little "extra" effort into their programs, so I feel, I'll do the same for them!

Final 3 from 2008!


I took this shot at Red Bud during practice day of the Loretta Lynn Amateur Regional held there in June. I have been to red Bud several times over the past few years and have always marveled the Pro's flying through the sand rollers. We've also raced some amateur stuff there, but the "hoops" were always rolled over and not nearly as intimidating as these were at the Regional. I was kind of surprised just how huge they were. My son, Kody, had recently been going through them pretty decently at previous races, but this day was another story, and he wasn't alone!

Granted, there were a few riders wolfing them up; Barcia, Regal, Larsen and those types were almost as good as Ricky and James...almost! But for the most part, everyone struggled with them. In this pick you can tell the depth of them, and they were pretty much kept this way all three days. You can also see on the left, I believe, Kyle Regal doubling in. It was just a stark contrast of how good some riders can actually get!


#413 is Brandon Springer from Evansville. He and Kody have practically grown up together racing since back on 65's. This photo was taken over at SOIL MX near Albion Illinois. The track has been there for a couple of years now and has only been open as a practice facility. There has been talk of them holding some races soon, possibly 2009, but the track itself is an awesome place to ride. This summer they totally redid most of the track and added a couple of sections as well.

I took these photos over by a big downhill tabletop back in August. Kody, Brandon and another friend of the boys, Buck Ritchie, were hitting it pretty hard, throwing "whippertails" and such. I had a few good ones of all three guys, but this one stuck out to me for some reason.


This was taken at Loretta's on Thursday of the Championship week. #95 is Darryn Durham. Durham won the Lites A/Pro Sport title at Loretta's this year and finished 6th in MX A/Pro Sport. This pic was from the second moto when he had bike problems. At the time I believe he was running top 3 when his Suzuki conked out on him. What I admired the most was the kid pushed the bike all the way from the far back corner to the finish line to salvage points. I also forgot to mention it was close to 100 degrees that day. I can't count how many times over the years I've seen kids get mad and throw bikes down, throw gear, etc... just being whiny ass little babies about me, me, me. This kid had heart and was determined not to just lay down and be done. I enjoy seeing that in kids these days!

I think, and don't hold me to this, Durham is riding for Yamaha of Troy. I know last Fall he had some kind of deal worked out with them, but it may have fell through by now also. Either way, he's one from Loretta's I'll be following through his career.

Alright, hope everyone enjoyed my attempt at journalism! Soon, hopefully, we'll all be back in the great outdoors, you guys and girls with the dirt scooters and me with the camera!

Closing in on 2009!

As 2009 gets closer, it's a sunny 52 degrees outside today in Southern Indiana. January 30th and 50's. Global warming? I doubt it, probably have a foot of snow on the ground tomorrow!

Supercross kicks off this weekend, and I'm actually looking forward to it this year. Could be Santa brought me a new 42" Sony TV for being a good boy, but I'm mostly looking forward to some good racing in the 450 class. Yea, I know Stewart's most likely going to win everything, but you never know for sure with Supercross. I think Villopoto, Reed and Windham will all get a win some time this year, but it for sure will be interesting.

...three more of my Top 12!

Matthew Bell, who I like to call "Madman"! This kid is fearless and one of the toughest kids I've ever known. I think he is made of rubber sometimes! One thing about Matthew is, he's a hard charger either in the front, or from the back of the pack.
This picture is in a big powder berm where Matthew came in hard. He hit the dry dirt and let 'er eat! His right front is dragging along kicking up a mini roost, while the rear wheel is throwing another roost, with a dust trailer. I shot this photo in plain old "sports" mode on my camera. All year long I have experimented with different settings, manual mode, etc... and just a lot of different things. This is probably my favorite of the year! Thanks, Matthew!


#4, Ricky Carmichael. Uh, wait, that only looks like the GOAT! Actually it's Kurt Kissinger racing over at Meade County MX late this summer. Mike Wheeler had invited Kody and I over to the new Meade County track several times and we finally got the chance late this year to check them out. I didn't really think we'd know anybody there, but was surprised to see the Kissinger's when we arrived. They had been there before, and said they really enjoyed the track, and we agreed, it's a pretty cool place.
This photo of Kurt is one of my three favorites of the year. I just liked the way the colors worked out, the background kind of blurred like I wanted it to, plus it's just a really sharp picture. Like I've said before, I get lucky sometimes and grab a good shot here and there!


This shot of Kody, was taken at Meade County the same day as Kurt's picture. It kind of clouded up that day rather quickly, and I thought it might even rain at times. In this shot, the skies had turned darker, and I was getting close to putting the camera away for the day. They have a pretty big triple there and it's kind of got a little bend in it. I was actually standing between the double landing and the triple landing just taking random shots when #407 hit it. There is just enough washed out color in the trees in the background to contrast his white gear. I especially was pleased with the focus in his eyes. I can't lie though, I did have to do a "little" Photshop work on this one, not much, but just a little!

Upon finishing, I just noticed these are the three photos I'm currently using on the main moto-X-foto website. I guess these are my Top 3? (Sorry Kody, I still like Matthew's pic as my Best of 2008!)

2008 is almost history!

Well, hope everyone survived the Christmas holidays! Not much to report, at least, moto-related that is. I did pick up a new flash for my camera. Santa bought me a new Speedlite 430EX II unit, and hopefully I can put it to use at a indoor here soon. I did take some family shots around the house and they really turned out nice, but I'd like to see some Arenacross results too!

I'll go ahead and add three more of my Top 12 and add a little 'insight" about the shots.

I got this shot at the Labor Day Race in Petersburg, IN. I miss out on a lot, well, almost all of the quad action here locally, but was fortunate to get to see alot of the quad gang at Petersburg. Corey Heath is from Wadesville and like so many of the area's fast quad racers travels through out the US racing the Nationals. Corey is the 2008 ATVA 50cc Sr. National Champion. I enjoy shooting quads, especially the little riders! He is sponsored by Heath Racing, Elka Suspension, BlingStar Ind., Liquid Performance, OMF Performance products, Moose racing, Smith goggles, Rath Racing, SixSixOne, Wiley Mods and SIMX.

Jalon is another SIMX quad racer! He usually doesn't have much to say, but does all his talking with the thumb throttle! He definately switches gear, when he gets on the track and is an aggressive little rider once the gate drops. In this pic he was waiting in pre-staging for practice at the Labor Day race. I was talking to Jason, Jalon's Dad, when he about ran us over wanting on the track. He has a pretty determined look in his eyes, and we quickly got out of his way!



Danny Rocke #89. The Rocke(t) Racing Team (Dad, Sean) has been around for a long time, and quite frankly, you couldn't ask for better people. Danny has been to Loretta's several times, and done his share of Ponca City as well. At this race, again at Petersburg, Danny had just recently moved to the A class and had traveled down for a share of some of the Labor Day Associations huge purse! In this photo, I like how you have the fairgrounds going on in the background, with a little, well OK, a lot of dust going on in the background as well. Danny is always exciting to watch, and over the years I've gotten several good shots of Ol' #89!

Hope everyone has a safe New Years, see ya in '09!!

MXF blog-a-rooski

Just getting into this blog thinga ma jig! What I plan on doing in 2009 is taking photos at whatever track I'm at and posting a few pics here in the "blog" with a little commentary about the rider, track, results, etc...

But until it thaws out I guess I'm stuck with commenting about 2008.

I recently posted my 12 best photos from 2008. I went back over several thousand pics, looking for twelve tack sharp pics, and found a few I liked. Now I admit, I'm not ready for National Geographic yet, but sometimes I do luck into a good shot here and there. What's that old adage... "even a blind hog finds an acorn every now and then", well that's me! Now many of you have never heard that, I know. I used that one on my daughter's basketball team a long time ago, and they all looked at me, "like, uh, what?" So that's for the "older" folks!

For now I'll just leave a link to the Best of 2008, and add some comments about 3 or 4 photos at a time until I get them all covered in more "blogs"

Here is a direct link to all of the photos

We had gone to Ballance to get Kody a little more track time in preparation for the Youth regional. There were a lot of people there that weekend. I usually try and get shot in corners, and try to zoom in for "eye" shots. I noticed several of the A riders railing this particular corner and set up shop. Cody Miller is #161 and a very talented kid on a bike. I've watched him ride for years, and never really known him, but enjoy watching him ride. This time through, he was on the gas, on the pegs and smokin'! It's really neat to set in a corner and observe how different riders attack different sections through out the day.


This photo was taken at Echo Valley during the FCA MX Camp. Five-time GNCC Champion ('98, '99, '01, '02, '04); 1988 Brazilian Motocross National Champion, ISDE Gold Medalist, Three-time AMA National Reliability Series Champ and five-time AMA National Hare Scrambles Champion Rodney Smith was the instructor. I had never met Rodney, but had heard a lot of good things from his long time friend, Rod Harris. I was really impressed by his passion for the sport and his ability to talk with every participant on their level. In this photo I like the way #810 Duke Martin is attentively listening. Duke, surrounded by beginners and intermediates alike, raced a few years back at several AMA Nationals and still is pretty active in the area motocross scene through his work with FCA Motocross.


This is one of my son, Kody Hamer. We have been doing this together for almost ten years now. I still cherish the countless miles we have put in together chasing this "thang" called motocross! This was also taken at the FCA Camp this summer. Rodney had worked with all the kids for quit a while getting them into the habit of using the ruts. Although "we" had worked on ruts before, it seemed like having someone other than Old Dad explaining it, made it easier to do. It's funny how true that is, ask any of the moto Dads and they'll probably give you the same advice..."go tell my kid to try this, he'll listen to you!"

That's about it for this time. Please feel free to add your comments, etc... I'm not sure how this blog thing is supposed to work, but surely if we can do a four stroke top end, we can figure this out!