Atlanta, GA  2-27-10 

Well, I said in the last blog I was hoping to get in some riding at home, but the weather in OK definitely did not cooperate.  It actually didn’t rain or snow anymore, but it wasn’t warm enough to dry up what had already happened.  Actually a pretty funny story, Wednesday I rode my KTM up to my freestyle set up, for 2 reasons.  One I needed a flash light out of my trailer take off ramp, and two to see if it would maybe be dry enough to ride the next day.  As I rode up to the ramp, the 2^nd was a pretty obvious answer…it was MUDDY as ever.  So that was out.  I got my flash light and as I was riding back to the shop, it was actually so muddy, that it caked onto the front wheel enough that it wouldn’t roll through the forks.  That caused the front wheel to lock up, riding with a flash light in my clutch hand, I couldn’t stop, and with a front wheel locked you can’t steer.  So I tried to put my foot out to catch my fall…it slid right out from under me, and down I went.  Rolling in the mud trying to get to my feet, I was thinking, here I am a professional fmx rider and I can’t even ride across the flat ground, I had to laugh at my self! 

Friday was time to fly out for Atlanta as we had our normal practice session Friday afternoon.  If anyone out there works for the airlines, can you answer this question for me?  How is it that my flight from OKC to Atlanta direct was more expensive then my flight from OKC to Toronto Canada, that connects through Atlanta?  I’m taking the exact same flight number from OKC thru Atlanta and then onto Toronoto and that was like $450.  But the direct flight to Atlanta and back was over $800 and both were at a 14 day advance.  Doesn’t make much sense to me, but what do I know.  Refusing to pay $800 for a domestic flight, I searched long & hard and found a similar direct flight out of Wichita for only about $400.  Wichita is about 2 hours away from Stillwater, so I took that one.  They were expecting about 4-6 inches of snow Thursday night/Fri morning, so I left my house at 2am for a 6am flight…and wouldn’t you know, not a drop of precipitation.  Ulwell, I made my flight no problems!  Got into Atlanta and made my way to the stadium and saw the beautiful red Georgia clay track.  Next to Oklahoma dirt, probably the best dirt anywhere in the world!  We had a nice long start straight and no weather elements to deal with (as the Georgia Dome is indoors).  So practice went great!  I think all 4 of us riders were happy with the ramp, the set up, and the way we were riding, so that’s what practice is all about!  I had been hearing about this whole twitter rage, and I finally caved in and signed up for a twitter account Friday night.  So if you’d like to follow me there as well, it’s www.twitter.com/CowboyKenny690.  I’m new at it, so bear with me as I figure it all out, but I should be able to update it more often then once a week like I do on this website. 

Saturday also went according to plan!  Made it to the Chapel service about noon, Jager autograph session at 3-4pm, watched some moto videos in the truck with my team mates and then it was show time!  Man, I know each week I say the racing action is great…but it REALLY is!  This week was no different!  I didn’t get to see the LCQ’s, but the heats were great races, multiple leaders challenging the favorites, passes back and forth, crashes…they were great!  Our half time show went good as well!  I felt like I rode kinda badly, but never crashed, so I guess it wasn’t that bad.  I did a no footed nac nac, then a cliff hanger that were okay.  But then I went to do a double seat grab Indian air and when I had done the double grab part, I was like “what trick am I doing?”  So I just poked out a double grab and didn’t get in the Indian air part.  Then as I’m going for a no handed no footed can, Thomas was in the wrong gear and aborted the ramp in front of me.  I was looking at him as I was going off the ramp and thinking, “don’t worry about him, focus on your trick”. Well I did the no footed can can, and as I was coming down, I thought,”Oh that was supposed to be no handed, lol.”  So after that I buckled down and did a good whip and one of the best whipped out back flips I’ve done in a long time!  Guess next week, I need to drink more Focus flavored Vitamin Water, lol!  After that, I pinned it back, changed clothes and made it just in time for the Lites main event to start (literally the 30 second card was up when I got to my seat)!  The main events were just like the heat races.  In the Lites there were 3 different leaders and a 4^th rider right there battling for the lead.  Up until about lap 12 it was great, then everyone had fallen into their place.  The 450’s were good too!  Fellow Okie Trey Canard in only his 2^nd 450 race ever rode an amazing race and ended up on the podium!  He didn’t let the big dogs rattle him and kept battling the whole race!  So major congrats to Trey!  Great racing by everyone!  Bucky & his twin Brother Rocky Covington showed up too!  They are huge supercross fans and made the drive down to Atlanta to watch, always good times as they are as good of comedians as they are musicians, lol!  I heard about a restaurant in Atlanta called the Varsity (supposedly it’s a world famous tourist place).  I was told it was greasy junk food…I said count me in!  It was actually really good greasy gut bomb food…and you know I loved every bit of it! 

Sunday, I thought was just going to be a flight home.  Normally I’m asleep on the plane before anyone even sits down next to me.  But for some reason this trip I wasn’t quite asleep yet.  A man sat down next to me and struck up a conversation. I hadn’t told this man what I did for a living yet, but he said he was flying into Wichita a day early to go to a motorcycle show.  I kinda chuckled and said what show?  And then told him what I do.  So it turns out a friend of his is just a motorcycle enthusiast & put together a show, kinda like a dealer show, but it’s open to the public.  I think there were over 500 vendors there, with mostly chopper and street bike stuff.  Actually other then one dealership that had a couple mx bikes, there was no off road stuff, but it was still super cool.  They had antique bikes, a bunch of old Indians and Harleys.  Then there was some entertainment, they had a reenactment of a Cowboy and Farmer gun battle from back in the old western times.  There was also a trials riding demo from the Ark Valley Trials Association.  That really caught my attention as I was walking by and saw a car, some telephone poles and a couple of big spools all set up to ride over!  I hung around and watched that demo as well, Dustin Land, Josh Nutsch, Marvin Edgington, and David Black all put on a great show!  They even had a little kid there I think it was Dustin’s son riding an electric trials bike with 10” wheels.  The kid was probably 6 years old, somewhere in there.  He had a little portable ramp he was hitting, but his bike was super trick looking!  I spoke with Richard the organizer of the event and he is planning to make this an annual event, so the last weekend in Feb 2011, if you live near Wichita Coliseum look it up, it’s called “The Big Chill”.  There was an event photographer there, his website is www.landofwinter.smugmug.com.  He said to give him a few days but he should have a ton of pics up there of some of the cool stuff!  So if you’re a motorcycle enthusiast check that out for sure! 

The Jagermeister half time show doesn’t happen at Daytona next weekend, cause it’s put on by a different promoting group.  But you can be sure I’ll be watching the races from home on Speed!  Then we return to the series north of the border in Toronto, Canada! 

Cowboy Kenny #690