Stephen Ricks' MX Blog

My brother took me to a private track in Illinois called "Fred Bud" today.  Initially I wasn't sure what it would be like since I haven't been there before. It turned out to be a great place to practice. It is definately one the roughest and gnarliest sand tracks I have ever ridden. The layout is very old school with no big jumps but the difficulty of this track lies in the roughness not the size of the jumps.  I had a great time and look forward to practicing there in the future. Although I didn't know the people who practice there at first they all turned out to be cool people. The owner is actually a former local pro that has qualified for some outdoor nationals in the past.


Thanks to Jeremy Wilkey for inviting us.

I raced at Earlywine Racing last weekend. I ended up 2nd in 250B and 3rd in the Pro class. The fastest rider at this event was Scott Metz. However, myself and another rider were close to his speed on this track. Unfortunately, I had a couple crashes and my finishes were only 2nd and 3rd. Although these finishes are not too bad, I am disappointed because the track was easy and the competition was not that deep. I will take most of the blame for not riding as well as I would have liked but the track design was not very technical and it was tough to do anything different. 

If I can avoid putting myself in bad situations where crashes occur I am confident that I can stay even closer to Scott Metz. Hopefully, I can race with him in the future. I feel that I could learn a few things about indoor racing from him since he has quite a bit of experience. I'm not sure if I will race at Earlywine again since the track was not too technical; possibly a real arenacross track would be more fun and more challenging.

Since I have began riding I have always rode in the woods for fun. However, this winter and in 2009 I plan to race in a couple harescrambles. This type of race is fun and great training because it is 3 hours long. I have never raced in a woods other than a couple GPs here and there.   I feel that my motocross experience will help my raw speed and intensity because harescramble racing speed is not as high as motocross unless a rider is going through a field. In addition, my technical ability should help me navigate hills, rocks, logs etc with some success. Athough my speed is decent in the woods I will need to focus most on consistency and fitness because of the length of the race.