Morning Espresso: Shooting My First National

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I was given an opportunity of a lifetime this past weekend. Joining the chosen ones to secure a sacred vest at the Spring Creek National in Millville. I’m a local videographer for Iowa motocross making a side hustle to replenish money spent racing my dirtbike. Over the last couple years I have grown close with many well known content creators feeding my fire to learning and creating videos. Creators such as Reed Photography, Shillinglaw Studios, 7Wonders Studios, Jeff Simpson, and vurbwes have all impacted me to continue this “hobby” of mine and grow it into something bigger than I ever thought I could be.

Going into the weekend completely dark, I was hanging on Jess Reed’s coat tails to show me the way and make sure I didn’t embarrass myself. She has taken photos of me since I was 14 years old, and has been my main source of media for the last 10 years of my racing. It was without question I was under-geared, walking into the media tent promptly at 7:28 a.m, with only a kid sized backpack, three lenses and a Panasonic LUMIX GH5. During the safety meeting, I was instructed to make eye contact and pay close attention to prevent getting called out by the safety instructor. This is apparently a common occurrence, even for the vets.

With the safety meeting completed, I was a free man. First, I set foot on the starting line, surrounded by the best: not only the best motocross racers, but photographers and videographers from around the world. Out of the entire day I only left the track on two separate occasions, of course to get food. I was finding local friends grabbing as many sips of water as I could traveling around the mile and half long track. Most content creators would go back to the tent to post on their socials for the featured riders, but I stayed out to support my local friends competing for their repective spots in the fast 40.

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I got to witness my friend Collin Hinrichs first ever attempt to qualify for a national, as well as another friend, Izaiah Clark, achieve what most motocross racers dream of: scoring points at a professional level in motocross. He managed to finish 19th in the second moto of the 450 class as a full blown privateer. As I returned to my full-time job Monday, I couldn’t help but feed my desire to continue filming and hope to take on another opportunity like this.

Thank you to Slaw and Wes at Vurb for this opportunity, Reed photography, Joey Shillinglaw, Jeff Simpson for guiding me on that awesome day.