Observations from Motown
APRIL 24, 2007

By Steve Matthes
Photos by Allison Kennedy

Downtown Detroit might not be the best place for a supercross race.

After two weeks off, the AMA Supercross Series approaches the end with this week’s race in Detroit.  After having races in the Pontiac Silverdome for 20 years, Live Nation went to the brand new, state of the art, Ford Field and it has backfired. I think the promoters were forced out of Pontiac but those races used to draw 50,000 people no problem.  Last year, they had about 20,000 and this year about the same.  After talking to some locals it seems that, despite the city of Detroit’s effort to revitalize downtown, the general population just does not want to travel down there.  The new stadium is also huge, so that doesn’t help for appearances and it was about one-third full.  The higher ticket prices also don’t help the cause.

I had a real sporting weekend in Detroit. On Friday night, Dunlop tire’s Marshall Plumb got a whole whack of tickets from his friend Brandon Inge of the Detroit Tigers. So the Kawasaki guys and I got to go see the baseball game. When “my” guy came to bat, he was hitting .111 (which isn’t very good for you non-sporting guys out there). Then, straight out of the movies, I swear he looked at me, pointed at the fences and belted a home run! Well, maybe not—but he did hit a homer. We had a few beers and a few good laughs that night.

The next day, after practice, Racer X Canada’s Danny Brault and I decided to catch Game 5 of the Detroit Red Wings and Calgary Flames playoff series. It ended before the night show of the race so it worked out pretty good.  We caught a ride there with a couple of dudes that were going to the game also. We managed to get third row seats from a local ticket seller, who had his business all set up on the street corner. It was a great game; too bad the Flames got hammered. We had a fun time, shared a pizza and just hung out like buddies do.

Darcy Lange was happy with his third overall in the Eastern Region Lites series, but he wasn't smiling after finishing tenth in Detroit.

The dark Canuck, Darcy Lange, had an outside shot at the Lites title and won his heat race, setting himself up for the spoiler role. He got a horrible jump out of the gate and was close to dead last on the first lap, thereby knocking himself out of the title hunt and, more importantly, he was unable to provide any help for his teammate, Ben Townley. 

He still had a very successful year and I am sure he will be asked back for next year’s SX series by Pro Circuit.  On another note, on the way to a dealer appearance on Friday night, he convinced Tim Ferry to try out Canada’s version of crack cocaine, otherwise known as Tim Horton’s.  Timmy’s wife Evie had some coffee and reported back that is was “Okay, kind of tasted like Maxwell house”. Red Dog had a “squished up donut” (I think he means a Timbit) and commented that it tasted “too Canadian”.  And you people wonder why I quit working for him.

After the track walk, I was talking to DV, and then Chad Reed came over, followed by Ferry and we had a better reunion than the Smashing Pumpkins could ever dream of!  It was the Yamaha Anaheim ‘05 podium sweep team—Reed, Ferry, Vuillemin and Matthes. Well, okay, one name doesn’t fit in there but we won’t tell DV that.

Chad was telling us about hitting the freestyle ramps at his track and how much fun they are. Jason Thomas wandered up and said that they freak him out; he doesn’t like hitting them. Reed said that it was no problem; just follow him off it. Then JT said that he doesn’t trust Chad’s timing!  Umm, excuse me JT, but he is a pretty good rider—he probably can time the jump excellent. I gave JT the chance to retract his statement but he stood behind it.

Chad Reed was off the pace for much of the night until the final six laps in the 450 main.

The track wasn’t very good for the Lites guys; there was one fast way to do the sections and you had to go outside to get the speed up. What that did was make everyone follow each other to the berm. I saw a bunch of guys pull up along side somebody only to back it down and tuck in behind them to get to the berm. There was a jump onto a table-top that only six or seven Lites guys did, but if there was somebody in front of them, they couldn’t do it.

Well, Ryan Morais was the story of the Lites class and I wanted him to win the title. For one, I groomed him back in the day and could almost claim his title if he won and secondly, Mr. World Champion Ben Townley already has a title and will get a bunch more down the road. Ryan winning it would have been a great comeback for him.  He really can’t blame anyone but himself as he was in second and with Ryan Dungey checking out, just had to stay behind Townley to win. He stalled the bike and by the time he got it started, the title was gone. Don’t cry too hard for him Argentina, he has no deal for next year and will soon sign a big money deal for 2008.

 

Jason Thomas (31) and Davi Millsaps (118) battle.

DV12.com quietly had a good race. He fell in the first turn in the heat, had to go to the LCQ, which he won, and celebrated by doing heel-clickers. (Hey, DV, 1997 called, they want their trick back) He was also pretty far back in the main and worked his way to sixth-place. He passed Voss and Michael Bryne on the last lap, proving that nice guys do finish sixth.

Timmy Ferry had a good night. He won a supercross heat for the first time in his career and ran second for 13 laps before getting passed by Reed. He had some trouble with lappers as well as an almost crashing moment, which caused him to lose some time. Tyler Evans actually raced with him for a bit when he was getting lapped. Not sure if Evans is to blame as he was battling with Kawasaki’s Jacob Marsack and probably saw a green front fender and didn’t realize it was Ferry. I’m just saying that so he doesn’t beat me up.

Speaking of Evans, I think it makes supercross look kind of cornball when he rips off his shirt and shoots a t-shirt into the crowd after qualifying in the heat. It just reminds me of a WWF move—the cheese is practically leaking out of Terry Boyd’s microphone.  This week, he took it one step further by riding the parade lap with no shirt on. I remember only two years ago, that Steve Whitelock was demanding no cuff cut-offs on jerseys and how the name and number have to be correct, etc, etc. There were even some guys that got fined. Then Tyler rides the parade lap with no jersey on whatsoever!  I know it’s a small thing, but this is the type of inconsistency that has the teams just laughing at the AMA.

Justin Brayton didn't make the show in Detroit, but he and Branden Jesseman sure have impressed with the Motoworld.com/ Yamaha team in the East series.

 

I don’t have a photo of the guy and don’t even know what his deal is, but Lites gas card winner Carlos Gonzalez looks just like deposed American Idol Sanjaya. He is a dead ringer for the guy. There was no “pony-hawk” however. Thanks to Racer X’s Billy Ursic for that witty/stupid comment.

Saw all the RXC guys at the race, Dave Stenning, Rick Rundberg, Chris Morgan and a few other Canadians that stopped me to tell me how much they enjoy these columns. I even went back to the motherland on Friday evening for dinner with none other then the classy Todd Kuli in Windsor. To complete the Canadian experience, I ordered poutine.

Ryan Clark went down with Cole Siebler in the LCQ and as Ryan was sitting there on the track, he grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it at him! I’m sure that this is some kind of metaphor for Ryan’s season.

I am really over all the NASCAR coverage that we have to read about in the mainstream MX media. I think it’s great that RC and MC are crossing over into four-wheel racing, but I really don’t care about their races against a bunch of guys that have full-time jobs. They are coming in with big sponsors, big names and they are great athletes. I expect them to do okay against some Billy-Bob who just got off work at Autozone and brought his buddy Cletus to race some round-de-round racing. Wake me up when our guys are actually racing at a level that matters.

Wait. Maybe don’t bother to wake me. I also have a hard time thinking that NASCAR is really ‘all that’ anyways. The technology is mid-80’s and the points leader early in the season was almost fifty years old!  I mean, come on, it’s a fact that the body loses muscle mass, reaction time and other athletic qualities as we age. Have you seen these guys lately? Jimmie Spencer looked like a Jimmy Dean sausage in a racing suit; Tony Stewart looks like the 1976 Elvis in his white jump suit. I do enjoy the road courses as they actually stress braking and turning right.  Good luck to RC and MC in their endeavors.

By the way, did you know that Racer X’s Andy Bowyer’s brother races NASCAR? Yep, he does and in case you forget this fact, Andy will remind you every Thursday after he welcomes you to the Rev-Up.

I am not sure what the deal was with Chad Reed, he was only top five in each practice and didn’t look like himself. In the main, he got a bad start (again, not very Chad-like) and was dicing with Kevin Windham and not really moving up when he suddenly realized that he was Chad Reed. He kicked it into overdrive and had a cool line on this jump-on/jump-off section. Except he wasn’t jumping off, he would cut to the inside and roll the last jump and cut the guy off who just jumped off. He passed Bryne, Tedesco, Andrew Short and Tim Ferry in this same spot. Good move, Skippy!

Davi Millsaps had a ton of trouble in Detroit. He just didn’t look good in practice and the main and crashed out early on. Every guy in the main hadn’t rode much supercross in the last two weeks. It was outdoor testing time.I think Davi just needs to get though the last two races and focus on the outdoors. He has got to be one of the favourites to get second at the races that RC doesn’t do.

I spoke with some people earlier in the year who told me which races RC is going to do: Hangtown, Mt Morris, Budds Creek, Red Bud and Colorado. Then I was talking to a Suzuki mechanic this weekend and he believes that RC is doing the first six. So I am not sure when we’ll know for sure, but I do know not to look for him at Washougal, Unadilla or the Texas race. I really wonder about his sanity for just doing half the season, the outdoors are hard, hard work. Why not just do the whole thing? He has to prepare the same for six as he does for twelve….

Motoworld Racing’s Justin Brayton failed to make the main and lost his chance to move up in the points. He still had a very impressive year, finally rewarding team manager Paul Lindsey’s faith in him. I heard through some good sources that the mechanics on Motoworld have been told that they need new jobs next year as the team is not going to be around. If this is true, at least Paul can hold his head high that he really brought that team back from some tough times. At the end of the year, how many teams can say they won a race this year?

Ryan Dungey won his third Lites main event in Detroit.

Lost in the championship brouhaha was the fact that Ryan Dungey won the race. Look at his series scores 1-18-DNQ-21-1-3-1.   That’s a bizarre stat line for sure. If he had just finished mid-pack or so at his bad races, he would be champion. But then again, if I had bought a bunch of Google stock, I would be a bazillionnaire.

Timmy Ferry and Davey Coombs have a battle going on. Well, I am not sure if DC knows it’s a battle but Ferry says it’s on!  What is the big deal? Well in DC’s Racerhead Friday column a few weeks back, he mentioned that Red Dog needed to work on his parade lap whips. This got Ferry kind of mad as he thinks he can whip it like Stewie. (he can’t BTW) so a few weeks back the Racer X Films crew was at Timmy’s house and Ferry was practicing some whips and rode up to the camera and said “That’s for you Davey.”  

Oooooooo … the gauntlet has been thrown down! This coming from the guy that crashed in practice doing a can-can and missed six weeks in 2000.