Observations from Sin City
MAY 8, 2007

Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas featured an 800-foot long start that began outside the building.

 

By Steve Matthes
Photos by James Lissimore

Well, this is it. The final SX round came and went in my hometown of Las Vegas. This is always a cool race, with the teams having special graphics, the gear guys go to town with one-off things and the pits have a unique buzz to them. Although I didn’t see anything official, it was also a see-how-skanky-you-can-dress contest for a lot of the girls. All we were missing were the clear heels and poles. Not that I am complaining or anything….

I want to see which gear company comes up with a bearskin outfit for one of its riders to wear. How cool would that be? The whole bear head flopping around when they jump. I am thinking that it will be some euro company, like Wulfsport.

Makita Suzuki’s Mike Gosselaar came up to me and was a little peeved that everybody was congratulating him on his retirement. People were saying this to him because I wrote it last week. There’s just one problem: it’s not true! He is not retiring and wanted me to correct that. I cannot remember who told me the story, but I figured it was legit. Oops! Sorry, Goose, didn’t mean to ruffle your feathers. The fact-checking department here at MWHQ (Matthes World Headquarters) has been fired.

James Stewart is thankful for all the help and support in winning his first AMA SX championship and his second WSXGP title. Fox's Beeker made sure the rider formerly known as "Bubba" looked purtty in Vegas.

My buddy Corey came down from Winnipeg for this race and I need to bring more random buddies to the races. He reminded me what the fans like; he got very excited at the F-14 fly by in opening ceremonies, the fireworks made him cheer and he started yelling at racers on the track—it was like being at a local pee-wee hockey game! He met Ping and asked me who still wants to hire him to race anything and DV’s nose wheelie got him pumped up. He was bummed out because I told him I might have been able to get him a job flagging at a SX, which is his new goal in his life. He really, really wants to flag one day.

“Rocket” Rob Buydos, the voice of Parts Unlimited, was given the task of hosting a Speed TV talk show in the middle of the pits. It was a cool idea; he would just bring up random people and talk moto with them. Then, with barely anytime to spare, he got asked by Live Nation to fill in for an ill Terry Boyd, announcing on the floor. Add in the six-hour pit show and another three during the night show, and that’s some serious talk time. Rob did an excellent job as well; he’s a great announcer, telling the crowd what to watch for and setting up the different battles in the back of the pack.

James Stewart ended the AMA SX Series the same way he started it: with a win. What can you say about him that hasn’t been said before, Umm … he’s good in the corners? Nah, that’s been said. Umm … he’s good at keeping the bike low off of jumps? Nope, already been said. Here’s a new one: I’ve never seen four hot girls follow him around until the other night (and I’m sure it won’t be the last).

Chad Reed is off for the summer.

Matthes says Reed's new hair style is looking more and more like Captain Caveman.

In a tribute to the 1984 Miller Master’s winner, Broc Glover, Stewie had an all-pink outfit for the race. Not sure if he knew about the Golden Boy’s pink outfit that night, but just like Broc, he proved that pink equals wins! I couldn’t find his gear rep Beeker for a comment, but I did get this from James Stewart Sr: “I'm always happy. This is Big James! This is me. I’m always happy. You guys know that. Everybody knows Big James. I'm always happy.” [Ed note: We apologize for letting Steve run this Big James joke again. It is becoming tiresome and we promise this is the last time... well at least until the next SX season.]

I had a great laugh this week reading the update on Mitchell Cooke and his Euro adventure. It seems that Mitch raced the Belgium National series and he was riding a stock suspended bike. WTF? How is this even something that can happen? I have been around a ton of pros and they wouldn’t even sit on a bike with stock suspension let alone race it! The story goes on to quote Mitch:

 “[Georges] Jobe says this was definitely an eye opener for me and a little blow to my ego.” What kind of “coach” lets a fast pro race with a stock bike?

 He continues: “I can, without any hesitation, say that this was the toughest track I have ever ridden in my career and compared to this, our most difficult tracks on the Canadian circuit look like a highway.” Yes, Mitch, I have no doubt that it was rough—you had stock suspension!!

 “Man, I nearly killed myself in every moto; I was really on the edge and never really felt like myself.” This was probably really scary for Ol’ Mitch—because he had stock suspension! The article gets even better with this quote from the legendary “coach” Georges Jobe:

“Based on what I have seen from him in the past, he is currently riding at 70 percent of his potential.” Ha!  Who is this guy? Raveen? Are you sure he isn’t at 73 percent? Or maybe 67 percent?  Please keep these updates coming, I need to know when he is at 94 percent.

David Vuillemin took home Top Privateer of the Year--and was the unofficial Goon Rider of the Year.

Kevin Windham had his best race of the year, finishing third. He started in sixth and moved past Ivan Tedesco and Tim Ferry and was really catching Chad Reed when he looked like he got tired. His corner speed went down and he settled for third. He is always good at Vegas; the track always demands precision and throttle control, something Windham is one of the best in the world at.

I got my first contract in the mail this week; it was a very exciting moment. Moose Racing has decided that they want to outfit me with gear and casual wear. We had an official signing at my house with my wife, Angie, and dog, Buddy, witnessing it. They are even going to pay me a pretty good bonus. In the contract, it states that all I have to do to get any cash from Moose is finish top three at a SX or Outdoor MX. Shouldn’t be a problem; I will hit the treadmill this week. You will probably notice from now on I will be shamelessly plugging Moose and everything else about this incredible gear company.


RXC’s James Lissimore said that when he was in Manitoba shooting the Blackfoot Yamaha posters, Blair Morgan told him that he has a video of some race in Bumsquat, Saskatchewan where I catch Blair and pass him and then ride off to victory. We need to put this up on the web somehow. Don’t worry, Blair, although I won that 80cc race back in the day, I think it’s safe to say you have won in the race of life. I don’t have any Canadian MX titles, X games Gold (or five), snowmobile titles, and you could probably pull my salary out of your couch cushions. (But I still really, really wanna see that video!)

Live Nation honoured Kyle Lewis' long and accomplished career.

 

The whoops got gnarly; combine hard dirt with 450 power and you get some serious square edges. There were a ton of guys to go down in them; Mike Alessi, Grant Langston and Davi Millsaps all had their night end from a crash in them. Millsaps getting the award for scariest crash of the night when he was out cold for a little while. Thankfully, he got up and walked off the track on his own power.

What is up with Chad Reed’s hair? He has been running the perm for a while and I have never really noticed the sheer mass of hair until the banquet last night. It is really thick and full of body. I can’t believe I just typed that. With him not racing the nationals, the next time we will see him he might just look like Captain Caveman.

Just like I requested, Live Nation brought MotoXXX/Moose Racing’s Kyle Lewis out for opening ceremonies and honoured him for his 643 seasons of SX. That was cool to see and I was pumped to see Kyle go out in style making the main event. He was in tenth in his heat race with two laps to go when something (Baby Jesus in a tuxedo T-shirt?) caused ninth place Paul Carpenter to crash and put KL into the last qualifying spot. A fitting end to an underrated career.

The whoop-dee-doos ate up Grant Langston.

DV12.com won a weekend warrior trailer and when I was over in his pits he was busy trying to sell it anybody and everybody. I guess he’s not a big camper guy. I also noticed his Airwalk shoes and when I asked him about them, he told me that he paid $12.99 for them at Payless Shoe Store. His suit for the banquet was from Kohls department store and was only $134. I played blackjack with him on Sunday night and he has got to be the most unintentionally funny guy I have ever known. Thanks for the good times, DV!

DV also lost out on fifth in the series when Ivan Tedesco got fourth, beating DV by one point. Thanks to Tim Ferry for crashing when he was all alone in fourth, thereby screwing DV and his dream of fifth-place in the points.

Darcy Lange had an okay night in LV. After a brutal start, Lange worked his way up to ninth.

The best race of the night was the Supercross class LCQ. It was between Eric Sorby, Jeff Gibson and Paul Carpenter. First, Sorby and Gibson were going at it, trading aluminum back and forth. They were setting each other up for take-outs and when you do that, it’s hard to beat Eric Sorby. So after Gibby went down, Sorby was caught and passed for the last transfer spot by Gibson’s teammate Carpenter. Tedesco was out front. It was exciting to watch because we all wondered if Paul would get revenge for his buddy Gibson but he kept it clean and passed Sorby for second. When Sorby realized that he wasn’t going to catch up, he did a one-handed, nac-nac over the triple. Exciting stuff….

As usual, the Lites class provided the best drama. Ryan Dungey won the race and was given keys to a brand new Toyota. Ryan Villopoto and Ben Townley each had a bike problem within seconds of each other. BT’s chain derailed and RV with a rear brake line failure. Luckily, this race wasn’t for points and the team can just chalk it up to a bad night.

Josh Hill looked really good; he should have done better but he tried to make an aggressive pass on the second lap and took himself out. He really didn’t have any room in the turn but, because he was a West Coast Lites rider, he couldn’t help himself and proceeded to run it in there. It’s like one of those squirrels who gets shocked grabbing the acorn: he can’t stop his brain from wanting to take people out.

The East or West Lites champ never seems to fare well at the Shootout, and this year the curse was worse than ever. West Coast champ Ryan Villopoto's night ended when he lost his rear brake and his teammate and East Coast champ Ben Townley had his chain fall off.

Josh Hill tried to run Dungey high in the Lites main event, only to go down.

The Alessi Weekly might fill us in some more, but Mike and Jeff Alessi had a rough night. Mike crashed in the heat race and landed hard on the ground. I think the crash was kind of his fault as he got passed by Matt Goerke in the whoops and then he grabbed a handful and when he went back by, his front wheel skipped a whoop and he nosed into the next one. Jeff’s bike broke in the same heat and he made it into the main via the LCQ.

I have been getting some grief from people on the internet and in the pits about this “man-crush” I have on Tim Ferry, even Nick Wey got into the act this weekend. So, I am not going to talk about Timmy Ferry this week, but I will say this to all the people that have been ragging on me: The reason I may talk a lot about him is because he returns my phone calls and makes an effort to be my buddy. I am available to be any pro rider’s buddy and will put in an effort into our relationship. I’m just throwing that out there.

After the race, a whole whack of industry people ended up at Planet Hollywood hotel. This was a lot of fun. It looked like a riders meeting at one point, with almost all the guys there, unwinding after a long season. I had an awkward moment in the loo when I was going #1 and Ben Townley walked in and, even though I have never spoken with him, he yelled out “Matthes, I enjoy your column! Good stuff.” This was neat to me, but what is the etiquette for talking to dudes when you’re taking care of business? I mumbled something and wandered out. But thanks, BT.

Doug DeHaan failed to make the main in Vegas. Here's hoping we see things turn around for Big D in the outdoors.

I got schooled on the new AMA national qualifying system from my buddy AMA Jay. Okay, ready? There’s 100 entries accepted and, on Saturday, there will be two practices. Out of those two they will take the fastest 80 guys for Sunday morning. So if you’re 81st in time, thanks for coming out—how was that 30 minutes of riding?  First thing on Sunday morning, the guys that were 41st to 80th have a 20- minute race and the top two will be alternates for the motos; those guys can jump in either moto if somebody doesn’t make the race. I forget the rest but there are no exemptions for past champions in the Lites class, so start practicing Lammy. The Lites guys “alternate” race is on Saturday.

Man, I haven’t said much about Doug DeHaan in recent weeks because, honestly, there hasn’t been much to write about. This week was more of the same as Dougie D just sort of rode around out there, I am not sure why he has regressed so much from last year, but he just doesn’t look comfy out there. Is he riding injured? Does the burden of him being Canada’s amateur sensation back in the day weigh heavily on his mind? If anyone out there knows him or what’s going on, please let me know.

Ryan Dungey executed his mission perfectly with the Davey Coombs Sr. East/ West Shootout victory.

Josh Summey once again rode to a top ten finish. The Moto XXX/Moose Racing guys have not been telling him anything at all about position, place or who is behind or in front of him. Scott Roegner, his mechanic for this year is now “retiring” from wrenching to concentrate on schooling and his regular day-to-day running of the XXX empire. Hey, Scott, way to come in and get all the glory for the SX season! This from a guy who took off in the middle of the outdoors last season to go on a European vacation. He’s an avid reader of the Observations column, so I had to put that jab in there.

The start was out of the stadium and went a couple hundred feet and then turned left. The guys came flying into the stadium after that. It was a unique idea that, I feel, didn’t work at all. There was sort of a ho-hum feel when the start was happening, and there is only one jumbotron showing that action, and it wasn’t that jumbo. You really had to pay attention to when they were starting the race. The mechanics were situated outside and had no idea what was going on inside. They had to rely on the headsets for the action. As a former mechanic, I think this was unfortunate. Does no one at Live Nation realize what a crucial role us parts-changers play with the vital pit board messages?

James Stewart took the win in the 450 class over Speedy Reedy and Windy Windham.

The SX banquet was held on Sunday night; they had a new venue this year with the Planet Hollywood theatre hosting it. It was okay. They tried some things that worked and some things that didn’t. Somehow, Andew Short got comeback rider of the year—beating Tim Ferry?!?. Some of the guys weren’t there to receive their awards and the truck driver of the year was in the bathroom and didn’t get to accept his reward. J-Bone got another free truck and RC started the banquet off with a speech covering his career. Let’s just say that I don’t need to buy an RC autobiography anytime soon!

For the fourth straight year, Eric Vallejo rushed the stage and admitted that he hasn’t made a main all year; he was tipsy and he wanted to thank his sponsors. He was still rambling on when a Live Nation guy ushered him off the stage. Look for Eric to be chained to his chair next year.

That’s it for Observations from the 2007 Amp’d Mobile AMA SX Series! I would like to thank Dave Prater, Denny Hartwig, Tony Gardea and Tim Dixon for all of their help this year with my passes for guests and all the pressbox help. And of course, anybody who reads this stuff. Ssend your questions and comments in to  letters@racerxcanada.com.