Morgantona SX

Friday night Davey invited us to his house to watch the Daytona SX on the Jumbotron. Good times were had by all. Most of us lost 20 bucks in the betting pool. Then we had a post-race victory celebration at Farber's dad's bar.

Good. We're on the right channel.
Rebecca (who took most of our money), John, Davey, Shannon, Vance (asleep under the blanky), "Billy", Bowyer, and Fleming.

Erin Bates still looks good, even while blurry.
Apparently this is the 450 start. Young Vance and I had lunchbox races before nighty-night time. I got 3rd in the Lights class.
Fubar, Fubro, and bartender joined in the post-race celebration.

That's it from Morgantona. Next: MorganVegas. Later.

Racer X Trivia

We haven't heard anything from the Racer X staff in FLA today. I'm calling out the Sunshine State staffers to a little office trivia. Guess who is gracing us with these brand new, patent-leather Adidas in the Morgantona offices today ...

... a hint ... with all the sunshine flowing through the windows, gleaming off the heels of these beauties, I'm forced to wear my sunglasses at my desk.

Morgantona Karaoka

Karaoke and motorcycles go hand-in-hand. At least in WV. This time of year we tend to lean more toward K than we do the switchbacks of the Appalachians. Daytona definitely doesn't have karaoke like this. Here are some snapshots from Gibbie's Pub in downtown Morgantona. Home of the 2006 High Point party (Write this down, this year's party will be on Friday, May 25. Stay tuned for more details. All are welcome.) The crowd was extra giddy last night since the WVU basketball team putteth the smacketh downeth on Providence. While the Daytonians are resting their clutch-hands, we're going big with extreme karaoke and extremer crane freestyle. Enjoy.

Before karaoke, we stopped off at Chic 'N Bones for Red Bull's presentation of the latest Nitro Circus flick.
Gibbie's...




Yes, "Skaggs" wears his skunk-hat EVERYWHERE.Bowyer points out the elephant in the room.Good news folks, the little 80-ton crane that could was back on all eights by mid-afternoon.

Morgantona Mayhem

I've had a few slips and slides, mostly on purpose, the past few days while on the roads here in Morgantown. But I can't say I had a ride anything like the man who was piloting this 80-ton crane, backwards on ice, over the embankment in front of the Racer X offices here in WV.

Now is a good time to plow the road ...

Madness in Florida

What a wild couple of days! First Tuesday was the opening round of the Can-Am GNNC series. All eyes were on David Knight and long time verteran and former GNCC champ Shane Watts stole the show. I’ve never seen someone so fiery on the podium. He was so adiment about the victory being for everyone who buys their bikes and parts. Unfortunately we didn’t see the insane burnout we were all hoping for.
After the race Weege and I had planned on going back to Tampa to stay with Racer Production IT/score guy/ahhhhh-Tim Boryk. Enroute from St. Louis to Florida Weege had run into Chad Reed in the airport. We started talking about how cool it would be to meet up with him during the week here and get a Racer X Films with him. One thing led to another and it seemed like it was going to happen. A warm trail went cold when we hadn’t heard anything back from “Camp Reed.” At that point we sort of were hoping he hadn’t been hurt for a second year in a row before Daytona. After calling back to check in with the boss we figured out that Chad had been busy with teammate Nathan Ramsey and his wrist accident.
Over dinner at Steak-N-Shake we decided to skip out on Tampa and head north to Daytona. We made a few calls and met up with Road Racer X Senior Editor Laurel Allen. We were bummed on the whole Reed deal but things happen. Our back up plan was to head into downtown Daytona and have a little fun on video. Internet problems in the hotel had us up late and then some Russian (as per LCA) bikers we’re having some fun next door. Needless to say our wake up call came a little too early. We got it together and were off to get credentials and some much needed coffee when DC called and said he had just talked to Jason Thomas. Evidentally JT$ was heading out to Grant Langston’s place to go ride for the day. A few calls later and we were on our way to Orlando. Once we finally found the facility we were absolutely amazed. Grant has a huge chunk of land with an outdoor track and a SX track. It was even cooler that we were there on the same day he was cristening the SX track. Check out Racer X Films later tomorrow to get the scoop on Grant’s SX return!
After everyone had their fun on and behind the camera we had to rush to the Orlando airport to pick up ad man extroidinaire Jason Berry. We had heard rumors of some nasty weather in Morgantown and Jason confirmed the rumors.

Life in the Pressroom

Well, I think we've had better weather than our colleagues back in Morgantown, but I can't be sure because I've barely set foot outside the DIS pressroom all day today. Laurel and I have been proof-reading pages for our next Road Racer X deadline, so apart from one walk by the garages and up and down pit row, I've pretty much just been in front of my confuser all day. We made good progress, though, and I'm hoping to head out to Daytona Municipal Stadium tonight for the dirt track races, which are always a good time.

Morgantona: Weather Check

While it's 72 degrees and sunny in Florida, we're enjoying 27 degrees and a little snow.

Fleming poses for the yesterday/today photo splits.

Hooper measures six inches.

Morgantona (con't.)

I'm late with this post, 'cause "work" got in the way this morning. This is a continuation of our Morgantona diary. Florida doesn't have all the fun this week. Here are some shots from our bowling league night. This is week 7 of 10. Racer X has 3 teams out of the 16. As you can see, actual bowling is secondary during the course of the evening. Enjoy.

Alisa (Weege's GF, but we just call her Weegette) does the victory "waitress" dance.Amanda (Bowyer's GF) does the pistol dance.
Reyna celebrates with the Shake n' Bake.Mrs. Farber to be, Jules, temporarily poses as my Pit Tootsie.

RXI team 1's "A" Game.
Farber and his pre-strike celebration.Farber and his post-strike celebration.
Fleming thought he was at the WVU football game all night.

Hooper guards the man-purses.

Billy and GF Kara take a breather from laughing at Farber.
Bowyer and Amanda swap bowling tips.
Davey finds "Pinky" right where he left her last week. RXI in post-bowling celebration. That's Fleming throwing the "Mountain-Eers."

Chris Carter Radio Show

Ha, ha, very funny, Brozik and Fleming. You guys keep poking fun back there in frigid Morgantown, and we'll just enjoy this Florida sun. Or moon. That's right, the fun in Daytona really gets started at the end of the day, and we'll be trying to capture a little of that scene here on X on the Spot as well. For example, I just got back from the Chris Carter Radio Show, which is an institution here at Bike Week. For those who don't know, Mr. Carter is probably the best road race announcer out there, and every year, he also puts on a radio show in which he interviews racers and industry personalities. On deck tonight were Roger Lee Hayden, Aaron Yates, and Fast by Ferracci MV Agusta's Matt Lynn and Luca Scassa. (Honestly, the guests are really just there to serve as foils for Carter's jokes, but that's part of what makes the show so cool.) Anyway, when the fast guys were finished, Chris--capitalizing on my made-for-radio looks--let me on the show. If you're here in Daytona, be sure to listen to the show every day on WNDB at 1150 on your AM dial. It's on between 8 and 10 p.m. every night. Better yet, show up and watch the nightly recording, which takes place at the Courtyard Marriott near the airport, between 5:30 and 7:10 p.m.

Okay, I'm off to the Ale House, which is conveniently within walking distance of our hotel. We'll try to get some photos up from there later this week. Or not.

CJ

Morgantona: The Beginning

Salutations from Morgantown, West by God Virginia, base camp for Racer X and Road Racer X. This may be an odd addition to the Daytona (Florida - for those of you shivering in the North) blog, but hear me out. Since 3/4 of our office is in Daytona, and we have basically no adult supervision, we decided to add our own additions to the blog. We are going to prove that we can have just as much fun without the sun, sand, surf, babes, beach, bikes, bikinis, and babes. Okay, so we missed a couple of days to post, but hey, we only thought of this today at lunch at Bob Evans.

You too can play along and unless you live in Daytontona, Ohio which just sounds silly.

Again, this is not to make light of the real reporting taking place by Jonnum, Laurel, Weege, Matt, JB, Scott W, the Racer Productions staff, and anyone else with the Blog password. Enjoy.

Here is our web guru, Jason Fleming, taking advantage of our 25-degree weather, our Wi-Fi, and our picturesque view on I-68.

Here's a screen grab of the forecast shootout for the week. See, nearly identical!

That's a short post for now. We have to get ready for league night at Suburban Lanes. Later.

CJ Checks In

Hi guys. I flew into Orlando last night from Gay Paree, and
as we were landing, the plane flew right over Daytona. I don't have much to say, but I thought I'd throw a photo of that up here and tell everyone that Laurel and I will also be posting stuff from the road race side of things. (We'll try, anyway; we've also got a magazine deadline two days after the 200, so we'll be pretty slammed.) Anyway, after a good night's sleep in Orlando, I enjoyed the Sleep Inn's free Continental breakfast with a bunch of families with screaming kids, amped up to be going to Disneyworld, but the drive northeast to Daytona served as a reminder that I was definitely here on the right week, as I was sharing the road with a long train of bikers (made me feel kind of silly to be piloting a Toyota Highlander). Even without GPS, I managed to find the new credential-pick-up location, where Chris Carter hooked me up despite what must have been a bewildering succession of faxes from the Racer X headquarters over the past couple of weeks, as our plans were changing right up until the last minute. Then I checked into the Holiday Inn Express, picked up the many boxes of magazines that we had shipped here, and walked next door for lunch and a brew at the Ale House (just to get the week started off right).

Be sure to keep checking back here for more, and if you're in Daytona this weekend, stop by the Racer X/Road Racer X booth, which is outside the stadium, right next to our friends at Ducati North America.

Triton GNCC Bike Practice

Monday here in Vero Beach was actually pretty relaxing. The GNCC series is on a slightly different schedule than normal because of the weeklong festivities of bike week. Monday was opened up for the bikes to ride practice. The ranch here is massive, something like 5,000 acres, so the riders still haven’t seen the actual race course. When we headed out to the track the skies were a yellowish gray, ash fluttered around in the air and the smell of burning lingered in the distances. Evidentially there were some forest fires within the area. Rain came threw Florida but went north of Vero leaving the area pretty dry. As the afternoon went on the haze blew out of the area the fires have seemingly been extinguished.
Even pro practice for the day was mellow. Riders were turned loose to ride the practice course as they pleased. As the session went on the Florida sand whoops got deeper and deeper. I personally haven’t been to a ton of cross country races but seeing these guys dodge trees and hammer through those sand whoops definitely was impressive. After the session I headed back to the hotel to work on this little preview of what’s to come Tuesday as racing kicks off. We got to sit down and talk to series newcomer and off road mad man David Knight for a minute as well so check that out.
While I was working on the video Weege and the rest of the GNNC crew were diving into the Parts Unlimited spaghetti dinner and then having fun with one of Rob Buydos mini-bike races. Tuesday morning we’re off to catch the final day of this Can-Am GNCC opener. Check back for details later.

Florida is the place to be this week! Warm weather and motorcycles everywhere, what could be better? West Virginia this time of year is still in a dreary state of cold wet weather. Waking up and being able to walk outside to warm temperatures and blaring sunshine is a welcome change to say the least. After a few cups of java and a Florida orange I was off to the airport to pick up Jason Weigandt, who was flying in from a seemingly wild night of Supercross in St. Louis (Check out Andy Bowyer’s race report here). Once I got the terminals sorted out and had Weege packed in we were off for a two-hour drive toward Vero Beach for the first round of the CanAm Grand National Cross Country Race (GNCC). If you know Weege at all you know he’s quite the bargain shopper. We made a quick coffee/water stop and Weege walks out with a hearty breakfast consisting of two chili cheese dogs. Apparently, they had a 2 for $2 deal on the chili cheese dogs as well as a 2 for $2 deal on bottles of water. Weege was happy (and that was lunch, he had already eaten a month-old powerbar on the plane that morning. Yes, he got it on sale at CVS). Eating on the road can be a bit rough for a vegan like me, but after driving through miles of orange grooves and seeing trucks with massive trailers filled to the brim with citrus fruit I’ve challenged myself to see how much citrus I can eat this week. As we kicked off the drive we quickly realized there was a bit of a more direct route to the track. We made a quick turn and were on our way. We made our way into Vero Beach and were stunned to see we actually were at the entrance of the track. Because of the week long festivities in the area it’s a bit of a different schedule for the GNCC crew. Today the quads went off and seven time defending champion Bill Ballance passed his brother who led early to cruise to victory.

After the quads had finished their champagne celebration, Racer Productions set up a “photo opportunity” with the bike teams on the enormous ranch’s practice track. There was a good turn out from Team Gieco/TDI, Parts Unlimited Honda, and Red Bull KTM (although Racer X contributing photographer Jonty Edmunds stole new comer David Knight from us to go shoot some photos.) The day drew to a close after an hour or so of shooting and Tim Boryk jumped in the car with Weege and me for some dinner at local spot. We some how got in just in time 2 for 1 margaritas, which evidentally meant ons drink was mixed and poured into two glasses and then filled with ice. A bit of a bummer but the week is off to a great start. Tomorrow is more practice for the bike guys and Tuesday kicks off the start of the series for those guys. Here are some photos from today’s shoot.