Monday Morning Coffee

By Billy Rainford

OMG it’s SNOWMAGEDDON! OK, not really. It looks like we missed the brunt of it for a change here in London, ON. If you looked at the news reports, you’ll see Toronto actually got hit much harder than we did, which is pretty rare.

I just got in from clearing a few driveways on our crescent here. Truthfully, it wouldn’t have been the worst shovel I’ve ever had to do but it was just past the cutoff for firing up the machine. It’s also -15 Celsius here this morning, so I figured I’d give myself a break and use the snowblower with the hand warmers. Not too shabby.

Does anyone else reading this have a dog? Is anyone else getting pretty sick and tired of having to towel them off every time they go out into the back yard for any amount of time? Maybe it’s the breed we have, but she paws at the back door after doing her business and she goes from blue merle (that black and grey mix you see on some Australian Shepherds) to almost pure white. It’s actually a pain in the a**.

Did you watch Anaheim 2? I went over the racing in another post Sunday. If you like to do a bit of reading (why else would you have clicked on MMC, I guess) and haven’t checked it out, you can do so HERE.

However, I didn’t talk about our 4 Canadians we had lining up for A2. Let’s do that now.

The big news was that #66 Cole Thompson was going to line up on his Heartbeat Hot Sauce Team Solitaire Yamaha but in the 450 class. He was on teammate Robbie Wageman‘s bike for this one. There were only 47 450 riders trying to make the show this week.

Let’s go over his stats from Saturday at Angel Stadium:

Q: 24th 1:03.988 (behind Noren and ahead of Miller)
Heat 1: 15th (behind Lane and ahead of Pape)
LCQ: 5th He started around 11th and moved his way up to 5th but couldn’t close in and pass Mitchell Harrison who grabbed the final transfer spot (and then had to deal with Vince Friese in the Main…

#214 Tyler Gibbs crashed in practice on Wednesday and messed up his left elbow pretty badly. He was still determined to give it a go and went out for Q1, but it was immediately obvious he just wasn’t going to be able to ride and he pulled off after a couple laps.

Here’s how he summed it up on Instagram:

“Well, A2 didn’t go how I wanted. A mid-week practice crash put me out with an injured elbow. I tried to ride, but it just wasn’t safe and I couldn’t hold onto the bars. Bummed, but that’s how it goes sometimes.

“Time to heal up and get ready for AZ in a couple weeks. Thanks to @foxracing for the all-black kit and blue goggles, and @cassidy.mccafferty for the custom-painted lid. Turned out so good.”

Q: 24th 1:05.911 (behind Meyers and ahead of Gordon)
Heat 2: 15th (behind Copp and ahead of Aeillo)
LCQ: 14th (behind Cozad and ahead of Bloy)

Here’s how he summed it up on his Instagram page:

“A2 ✅ Happy with my qualifying. Just wasn’t quite there in the night show. Taking it all on and enjoying the ride. We are going to get there one of these days.

“Big thanks to all the people behind me”

Q: 31st (behind Jorgensen and ahead of Freehill)
Heat 2: 11th (behind Bourdon and ahead of Meyers)
LCQ: 5th (he was leading for a short period but ended up .5 seconds behind Jorgensen to miss the Main in 5th place)

Here’s how he summed it up on his Instagram page:

“Would be lying if I said I didn’t shed a few tears after that lcq 😭 bit of a rougher Saturday for me, had a small bike issue in my first qualifying session and wasn’t really able to get a good time on the board. Regardless I’m happy with my bounce back in the heat, and then to come so close in the lcq after being off the pace all day isn’t so bad. If that’s a bad day for me I’ll take it. Beyond stoked on this path God has me on right now

“Thank you @byrdog151 spinning the wrenches again for me

“So many people go into my program and I can’t thank them enough
@teamnextlevelracing#teamnextlevelracing “

Round 4 this coming weekend in Houston is a Triple Crown event, so it may not be one that all of our riders plan on hitting. Good luck to those who do. It’s even more difficult to qualify for these ones. Not to mention it’s a 1500 mile drive!

Trystan Hart Wins 2026 King of the Motos…Again

You can actually watch Trystan Hart‘s full POV video:

Partzilla Arenacross Final Round this Weekend in South Carolina

The final 2 rounds (17 and 18) of the 2025/26 Partzilla Arenacross Series take place this weekend at the Florence Center in Florence, SC.

Here’s a look at the Pro points:

Rounds 13-14 of GT Arenacross Championship Feb 6,7

With so many Arenacrosses happening these days, you can find something just about anywhere you look! The GT Arenacross Championship has 3 stops left. Next up for these riders are Rounds 11, 12 this weekend at Gomez Western Wear Arena in Mesquite, Texas.

Here’s a look at the Pro points:

GTArena Motocross 2025-26

Open Pro

Place – Name Number – Hometown GTAmX Round 01 – PRO 11/14/2025 Points GTAmX Round 02 – Amateur 11/15/2025 Points GTAmX Round 02 – PRO 11/15/2025 Points GTAmX Round 03 – PRO 12/12/2025 Points GTAmX Round 04 – PRO 12/13/2025 Points GTAmX – Round 05 – Pro 1/9/2026 Points GTAmX – Round 06 – Pro 1/10/2026 Points GTAmX Round 07 – Amateur 1/16/2026 Points GTAmX Round 07 – PRO 1/16/2026 Points GTAmX Round 08 – PRO 1/17/2026 Points Total Points 1st – IZIAH CLARK #91  – FORT DODGE, IA 19 0 22 25 25 23 25 0 25 24 188 2nd – BEN NELKO #2  – ALIQUIPPA, PA 25 0 24 18 23 25 22 0 22 16 175 (-13) 3rd – CHEYENNE HARMON #1  – FORT WORTH, TX 23 0 18 22 24 21 20 0 24 13 165 (-23) 4th – CARTER GORDON #151  – LOUISVILLE, IL 24 0 20 14 21 20 21 0 23 14 157 (-31) 5th – CAIN LARSON #983  – ASHLAND, WI 21 0 23 20 22 24 24 0 13 0 147 (-41) 6th – PRESTON TAYLOR #996  – HASTINGS, NE 15 0 13 19 16 16 19 0 17 20 135 (-53) 7th – CARTER STEPHENSON #824  – GROVELAND, FL 0 0 21 23 18 12 11 0 18 22 125 (-63) 8th – EDDIE NORRED #188  – ROCKFORD, IL 0 0 15 0 15 18 18 0 19 19 104 (-84) 9th – CADEN BRASWELL #22  – SHALIMAR, FL 18 0 16 17 17 15 16       99 (-89) 10th – WYATT REIMER #66  – CLAREMORE, OK 0 0 14 15   19 17 0 14 18 97 (-91)

Ryder Malinoski Dislocated Hip in that SMX Next Crash

The good news is that Ryder Malinoski is relatively OK after that scary crash off the start of the SMX Next Main at A2. Milt Reimer posted a video of them all walking together (Ryder with a cane), so that’s great to see. Here’s the video of the crash as caught by someone in the stands:

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A post shared by Nathan Dean (@natedean15)

It may be time to rethink having these types of rhythm sections right after the first turn?

Have a great week, everyone. It’s started snowing heavily again here, so if you need me you’ll likely find me out in the driveways of our street…