By Dan Stenning

The second round of the Royal Distributing CMRC Ontario Provincial Championships Presented by Motovan visited Walton, ON this past weekend.  Although I didn't make it up for Saturday's racing, I heard it was a great day with the sun shining and clear blue skies.  Instead, I opted for the gloomier of the two days to make the trip.  Stupid me.  It was a little chilly with the clouds hiding the sun, but the day turned out to be a good one with the rain holding off until the last couple of motos.  Here is a little of what happened ...
 

Chuck Mesley is back to racing after picking up a CRF450 from Team Honda Powerhouse of Milton last Friday.  "The Mez" rolled into Walton Saturday morning for a warm up in the age classes before lining up for MX1 pro on Sunday. (Somehow, some way, the CMRC rulebook allows Mesley to race Youth (16-24) and Plus 25.) The Honda rider finished fourth behind Kerim Fitzgerald, Jason Burke and Brady Sheren in the Youth final, and finished second overall to Doug DeHaan in Plus 25. Mesley struggled a bit on Sunday, getting tangled up with Trever Hall over the step-down, and finished ... well, on the results page it says 0-0, but he told me he was sixth in the final moto. Oh, and please ignore the "thickness" of Chuck; he is wearing a sweater underneath his Shift jersey.

In  Intermediate action, the battles were on all day between Label It's Brandyn Cowie (554) and the Cobra Shop's Dylan Kaelin (not shown).  These two are clearly the front runners of all the intermediate classes this year.  Brandyn took 2-1 motos in the GP class and 1-1 motos in the MX2 class, and he almost made the intermediate sweep, but Dylan finished with a 2-1 in MX1.   

Brandyn shows one of the tricks he uses to get around the track so fast. 

Albertan John Pauk also rode the Intermediate MX2 and GP classes and was pretty impressive off the step down, as you can see here.  In GP, he finished 12th on the day with 6-0 motos, but redeemed himself by finishing third overall in MX2 with 4-3 moto scores.   

My faithful travel companion, and Mizuno's running rep, Bigwave Billy, accompanied me.  Here he is really taking care of Matthes' new camera while he's out in the rain.  Nice work, Billy.  Look for Bigwave's photos on MXForum.   

Mesley's Honda Powehouse of Milton teammate, Kerim Fitz-Gerald, looked strong on the hard-packed track of Walton.  The South African finished 2-2 in MX2 and led Keast for a good portion of one of the motos.   

Man, there are a lot of Juniors!  I think every Junior class had at least three qualifiers, and the Junior GP class even had to run two LCQs!  Here, one of the squirrely-whirrly LCQs gets off the line, looking not so squirrely I might add.  Eric Jefferies lead from start to finish and ended up sixth in the Junior MX2 Main.
 

Babysitting: one of CMRC race director Brett Lee's many duties. Loving the toque!  

It was Kyle Keast dominating the pro classes once again this weekend.  I'm sure Keast's confidence is up and I think you can look for him to be a contender come the first round of the Monster Energy Motocross Nationals at Ste Julie. Suzuki/OTSFF/Rockstar had only guy in the mix, and that was BC's Brady Sheren. Despite a rough and tough weekend at Gopher Dunes, Sheren looked much more comfortable on the Walton track. In fact, Sheren was this close to Keast at one point during the final MX1 moto.

Orange Motorsports' Trever Hall had a bad day.  Just after snapping this pic I heard the sickening sound of a panic rev.  It seems that Trever hit a kicker on the face of the step down, endoed, and ended up ditching the bike in mid air.  He left to go to the hospital and I heard today that he seems to have not suffered any major injuries and he should be okay.

Sheren went from the lap of luxury last weekend at Gopher, pitting out of the team rig, to pitting out of Chris Pomeroy's pick up.  Brady battled with bike set up but still managed a second in the final MX1 moto.

In Supermini action, Cole Thompson (16) rode to a 1-1 day.  John Pauk rode to a 2-2 and Richard Grey finished with a 3-3.    

Another Orange Motorsports rider , Liam O'Ferrel, was showing his colours this weekend.  Liam finished second in the first Pro MX1 moto but a brake issue kept him from competing in the second moto.  

Other Pro Notables:  Label It's Jay Burke rode strong.  His trainer Rob McCullough has been working him extra hard to make sure he's in tip top shape.  Looks like it's working.  He looks ready. Jay finished second in Pro MX1 and third in Pro MX2.  Doug DeHaan made the trip to Walton. 

Doug has been back on the bike for just over a week now, riding a KTM from Andy White, and he says you may see him on the line at Ste Julie.  Doug finished third in Pro MX1 with 5-3 motos.

Chuck also has a new dog.  This is Diesel.  He wants to see you at the races. 

To view more of Stenning's images from the Walton Provincial, click here.