Racing Intense to kick off Memorial Day weekend! (M4)

Racing Intense to kick off Memorial Day weekend! (M4)

Photos by 451 Photography

Story by Kenzie

It might have rained all day on friday and into friday night, but the soggy conditions made way for sunny skies and windy warm temps.  Megacross is always ready for most all conditions, even if those conditions take a muddy mess in the afternoon and turns it into a little dry conditions.  A spritz of water here and there during the night and the track was set for some intense racing.  Pick any class tonight, it didn't matter if it was 50cc, 65cc, 85cc or any of the C or plus classes.  There was bar to bar racing and good clean racing in which the competitors made some outstanding moves, or had some little mistake to change the out come.  One of the reasons the story headline didn't feature specific riders was there was just to many standouts.  So I hope to try to talk about all the ones I seen.  ( I write my notes while i score.) Tonight was also our first round of the Great River Shootout Series, which has been a well received Series since it has came back, now in it's 4th season......

In the 250C2 class main.  Hailey Norwicki (16) pulls the holeshot, with Max Boltz in a close battle.  She makes a full lap and gets passed on an inside line. Not sure Hailey has rode here much, but she has rode the Megatraxs track.  Max has raced here and done well this year he clearly had some better lines.  Right in front of the scoring table is the zig-zag section where there are inside high lines and outside berms.  The berms feel faster or I guess look faster but in tonights races they weren't.  So many good riders got passed just before the finish line with that one mental error. Hailey was no exception as Lance Wyman (900) took advantage, moving into 2nd place.  Hailey held on to 3rd and the last podium position with an excellent ride.

It was the battle of the "Jakes" in 125cc class tonight.  In the heat race Jake Hasten (14) on the KTM holeshoted and led the heat the start to finish.  Jake Mueller (11) on his ole trusty Yamaha always tries the outside line on the start with a sweeping into the corner idea.  Good starts sometimes but always the bridesmaid as not quite having enough speed to take the lead.  After some coaching Mueller decides to try an inside gate pick for the main event. Just like that he pulls the holeshot and he is known for his very good high bank corner speed.  Checking out on this night worked for him.  Jake Hasten after battleing in the Schoolboy class didn't make the same passes in 125 so he took 2nd this night.  Austin Beaty on his brand new Husky, took a 3rd with a solid battle for that position.  These up and coming riders will be ones to watch this season!

Battle of the 309's, this happened all winter at the indoor and now it pops up here at Megacross as well.  Emmett Baker Ktm (309)  and Cole Johler Hus (309) always seem to be in the "same zip code", so they race hard, and one always has to slash his number, tonight Baker was the slash. So how the day progressed, Baker was at LTM all day practicing, jumped in the van and "flew" up here to Megacross to get in a night of racing.  Johler didn't disappoint and gave some great competition tonight.  Lucas Wood (27) was also on hand and in the mix as well.  65cc Open class was a roller coaster of events.  In the Main Johler went down and had to push hard to catch up.  Baker got out front and cruised, with Wood and Ryder Salas (199) doggin him the whole way.  Consistency was a little lax in some laps but in the end the racing was great.

65 Beginner kicked off the night with a good race, Max Soti was flying out there on the track, I had a hard time keeping my eyes off that kid while he was out there racing. He was out there proving that practice really does pay off, this kid was out at MegaTraxs quite a bit over the winter for open ride days, it is so cool to watch these kids sort of evolve and get better over time. Soti wasn’t the only kid out there putting on a good show, there was a ton of passing going on out on that track during this race. We actually saw a lot of kids in the 65 Beginner class this round, there were 17 of them total.

As 50 Jr left the gate, Ryder Kelly was in first place with Jaxon Donnelly right behind him, Donnelly stayed right with Kelly for almost three full laps and then right at the finish line Donnelly made a move and passed Kelly. Donnelly put himself in first place with Kelly now behind him, yet Kelly didn’t let that go on for very long, shortly after Kelly passed Donnelly back and finished the race. Kelly got his first place with Donnelly finishing in second place. This is two Megacross’ in a row that Jaxon Donnelly has put on some good races. This is another kid who was at MegaTraxs constantly. Actually, I don’t know if this kid missed maybe more than two open ride days at the indoor, I think this kid could live on his bike if you’d let him.

I could almost write some of the same things about many more classes as well.  Honorable mentions would be Open C class with CJ Josephsen winning a well earned main event.  Casey Palka and Nolyn Thompson in Open B class ripping! 

Jake Hasten and Bryce Arnold had an amazing race in Schoolboy, these two pushed each other throughout the whole race. Jake made some adjustments tonight and his mains were more solid when it came to how he managed his laps.  Bryce rocks, he takes and wrings out every ounce of power from that supermini Kx (9) and really rails the corners. Brody Brewer, Grant Robinson, Gage Lane, Jason Coleman, and the regulars like Stever Perkinator Perkins, and Larry "rev" dean bank, all had very solid rides which we all got to watch and enjoy.

2022 has been a good year so far and we are looking forward to M-5 on June 11th.  Tonight's race was part of the Great River Shootout Series, which ads 60+ and Vintage to our class list.  WHo would have thought that 5 - 60+ riders would ride a stadium style track! The thing about tonight was the weather came around and was very pleasant, the racing was good, and the night went well considering we were working with 1/2 our crew tonight, the other half was at FVOR.  Didn't miss a beat, riders expect timely racing and we were done on time and many riders made the long trip back to LTM for thier big race weekend.  Come out and see why so many like racing on Saturday night, you will only be setting on the couch anyway, may as well take the short ride to watch or even race a little.  See ya there!