Troy Dog
It’s no secret that I don’t get to many races. I assumed that after Indianapolis I’d say see you guys at the final round of the Pro Motocross Championship at Ironman. That was maybe. Well, my wife Ginger Dog is like any basic female and loves herself some Nash. So, she wrangled up some help from her mom so that we could head to Supercross and kill two birds with one stone, which was me getting to cover the race, and her to sample just about every drink on each bar’s menu…oh and having a night out for ourselves for the first time in years.
With that we set off around 6:30 a.m. Saturday morning for the other city that never sleeps. I had never been to Nashville, so I was excited to experience something new, as well as watch a Supercross in an open stadium for the first time.
Earlier in the week, Trey Canard told me that he was planning to come out of retirement and race in Nashville. When he retired he had given me a few of his “lucky” jerseys to hold on to, just in case one day he would need them. Well, I had planned to vlog the entire journey of me giving him his jerseys and making it a heartfelt journey to get there. Well, I forgot and we left late, so it was a mad scramble to get to the track. I did vlog this as you’ll see later this week, but Trey was totally not happy with me when I got there and you’ll see why. I don’t think he’ll ever talk to me again, honestly.
On the way to Nashville, Ginger Dog and I had our Dunkin and our snacks. We were living life. Then she made me stop at a rest area so that she could put on her face and made me even later for Trey.
The rest of the drive was uneventful and we made it to our hotel, which was right across the street from the stadium. We walked up expecting to just find the media will call truck and be on our way, but it was pandemonium. There were fences up all over the place and it felt like I had just entered an octagon as people were yelling and cheering outside of the fences for some reason. I looked at my maps and directions that Feld’s Director of Media Sean Brennan had sent me to see if we could figure out where this trailer was, but I had nothing. I started to ask stadium security to find out if they knew. I even called my buddy Darkside, but he was no help. Finally I found someone who knew and it was two blocks down from the stadium in Lot E. Just where I thought it would be. That was the only hard part of the day, so I’m not complaining.
RELATED: READ GINGER DOG’S MUCH BETTER BLOG ABOUT NASH!
When I got into the pits, it was complete chaos. People were everywhere. The weather was heating up and it had such a great vibe! I went over to film with Trey first thing and then set off to find as many riders as I could. Unfortunately I couldn’t bother many of them because it was close to 1 p.m. at this point and opening ceremonies were about to start. I found my athletes Justin Starling and Grant Harlan, who were definitely not in the best of moods until I got there. I tried to find Kevin Moranz, but he was nowhere. I completely missed Josh Cartwright and the rest of the Madd Parts Kawasaki team. So, really I just sat and talked to Mama and Papa Har Dog until it was time to go to the stadium. They are some of the greatest people you’ll ever meet.
The open stadium was perfect for the day we had. It was 70 and sunny. It had just rained right before opening ceremonies, making it a bit hotter, and essentially adding to the wild track conditions that we would see in the main events. Opening ceremonies were awesome as always. Every year Feld adds something new. They had a moment of silence and a memorial for Wills Fedrick , who unexpectedly passed away early in the week. It was heavy and although I had never met him, I still felt the love in the air from the people that did and it’s always sad to lose someone. My thoughts are with his loved ones.
Right after the memorial, DJ KO started hyping up the crowd and started off with Loretta Lynn’s ‘Coal Miner’s Daughter’. It was a fitting start to the day and got me excited thinking about Loretta’s this summer! The crowd was huge and loud throughout the day. I’ve never been to an open stadium before for SX so to see a different version of opening ceremonies was definitely nice. They brought out the Coachella color smoke and more fireworks than usual.
I won’t break down the race in this column. You all watched it by now, I’m assuming? Plus if I type too much, Slaw will try to fight me.
After the race I went down to the press conference and learned some great insight. Like the fact that Ken Roczen hasn’t been thinking too much about what he’s doing. He’s just enjoying riding his dirt bike. Chase Sexton said that he wasn’t impressed with his win record, especially sitting next to Roczen and Tomac, but he did tie Trey Canard with five career wins in Nash. Tomac told me that nothing changes as far as his mindset goes going into the final two races. He’s not going to take any unnecessary risks and he’s going to play it smart. Very DEEP insight here.
I met up with Wes and we ended up getting a ride back to the pits with the Honda HRC team. While on the way to the pit, Jett told me that he remembered that we still had to finish our game of J-E-T-T that we started at RedBud. He said that he was winning, but I quickly corrected him and said that we were tied. He’s ready whenever we can find a basketball and a hoop and so am I. BRING IT ON JETTSON! When we got to the truck, Wes and I jumped off quickly because Hunter was getting doused with gallons of champagne.
Then as I tried to figure out how to get out of the fencing, so that I could get back to my hotel, I ended up running into a few guys and talking shop.
Shoutouts, news, and notes from what I heard over the weekend.
- Kyle Chisholm finished ninth and he was telling me that he was happy with it, but also wasn’t. He knows he can be up further in the field. He said that he was finally on the level that he was last year on his Yamaha. We talked about how his job for the team is basically what Trey Canard does for Honda, but Chiz races on top of all of that. It’s still so cool to me that Chiz still wants to be out there and racing. He had a lot of family there in Nashville including his Grandpa. I don’t think his dad Gary has missed a race this season either. It’s a cool deal.
- I heard some rumblings from two separate parties that I trust that Hunter’s last 250SX race would be in Salt Lake City.
- Jo Shimoda got a podium in his third race back from injury. I know he probably expects to be up there, but this has got to be a breath of fresh air for him and the Pro Circuit team.
- Trey Canard has been to Africa 39 times. He doesn’t like to talk about it, but he does it for the kids.
- Shane McElrath is all in on the Gut’s Racing Vurbmoto Power Rankings. So is his friend Foggy Llama Films. I’ll be in their vlog this week and you need to watch it because these are really well done. They don’t pay me to say all of these nice things about them, I promise. I’m just a really big fan of what they have going on.
- I told Har Dog to wait for me after the race because he was staying in our hotel room. I wanted to help him since he had a dislocated shoulder. Yet, what does he do? He just went ahead and left without me. He started about last in the main and before he crashed he was going after Moranz for 12th.
- Benny Bloss told me that he should be back from his broken collarbone in 3-4 weeks.
- Shoutout to OG Vurbmoto filmer Travis Steward’s son Travis.953 who finished 3rd in the KTM Jr. race. Travis promised his son that if he made the podium that he would get him an Xbox! Although I didn’t get to meet up with Travis, unfortunately. I haven’t seen him in 10+ years, but he’s the reason I had my chance to work with Vurbmoto in the first place. He gave me my start and I’ll forever be thankful for that. I’m still here! I’m CEO!
- We made it into Hunter’s championship party.
To end this (thanks for reading this far if you have) I wanted to say that Nashville should be the series ender for sure, but it should always be on the schedule. The weekend felt like a dream. I met up with just about everyone that I know and got to spend quality time with them. It was one of those weekends in life where the stars all aligned and we all were able to have fun together. We all have busy lives and we were just able to stop and smell the wonderful scents of Broadway street, which is a mixture of throw up, body odor, alcohol, and drugs. It was an all-time weekend and one that I’ll never forget.
