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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2007-08-23, Page 7THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, AUGUST 23, 2007. PAGE 7. The big news of Walton, of course, was the motocross. The Lee farm was packed with motorhomes, campers, tent trailers, tents and bike trailers in every corner from the Tuesday on through the weekend. Monday saw the arrival of vendors and trailers for the workers. A steady stream of participants lined Walton Road from both the east and west and into the village on Tuesday morning. The great work of the gate volunteers for the Walton Area Sports Club had the roads cleared by nearly 10 a.m. after starting shortly after 6 a.m. All the information gathered, vehicle stickers, wristbands issued and fees gathered all takes a bit of time. The three parking attendants were kept busy trying to find spaces for the ever bigger and bigger motorhomes and trailers. All the amateur riders have to be there on Tuesday and registered to ride, starting on Wednesday for practise and some races in the later afternoon. The amateurs race Thursday, Friday and Saturday with trophy presentations on Saturday evening.The pro-sponsored big rigs beginarriving usually on Thursday for setup in the pro pit area and they arequite the rigs. Most other riders thatrace pro arrive on Friday or Saturdayby noon for sign-in and practice runsSaturday afternoon. The TransCan isfor the amateurs from Thursday toSaturday with Sunday being the Monster Energy CMRC Final Grand National race of the season. This is a nine-race series for Pros that travels across Canada starting in May in Ste. Julie, Quebec, then Gopher Dunes, Courtland, Ontario; Shadow Valley Raceway, Morden, Manitoba; Regina; Moto Valley Raceway, Regina; Wild Rose MX Park, Calgary, Alberta; The Wastelands, Nanaimo, B.C.; River Glad MX Park, Moncton, New Brunswick; Sand Del Lee Motocross Park, Richmond, Ontario to the final race at the Walton Transcan, Walton, Ontario. It’s a big but great week in Walton with so many people around. It’s a lot of hard work, long hours, dirty work and it takes a lot of people. Kudos especially to the 48 volunteers for the Walton Area Sports Club for working the gates and to the Brussels Minor Hockey families who did a fantastic job of keeping the garbage cleaned up. Driving by on Monday, you wouldn’t know by the looks of the fields, that nearly 3,000 people had been there camping. Congrats to the Lee family for another successfulevent of Motocross.Sunday was the McCall reunionheld at the Walton Hall. They had anice get together with many McCallrelations gathering for a potluck meal.Joan Perrie attended thesouthwestern Ontario regional seniorgames in St. Marys on the weekend.Joan participated in the 200m. prediction swim and finished in first place with a time of 16 min. and two seconds. They saw the eight lengths of 26 metres at the St. Marys Quarry. Joan reports the water was beautiful, clean, fresh and deep. Prizes of a travelling alarm clock in case, engraved with Senior Games 2007 was received by the winners. Joan and David Perrie attended the Saturday evening banquet at the St. Marys auditorium. Other locals competing in other events were Ken Scott and Anne Bosman in slo-pitch baseball. Don’t forget the benefit dance for Brad and Gayle Spieran this weekend. They lost their dairy barn to fire a few weeks ago. Scott Leonhardt and Scott McDonald who play for the Kitchener Outlaws were competitors in the ISC II World Fastball tournament in Kitchener last week. They were two wins and two losses in the round robin and advanced to the playoff round on Friday. They were defeated by Waterdown Hammer to end their tournament play. They played Bucktown, Tavistock Merchants, Lindwood 86s and AI Taylor Farms, California in the round robin. They had a good time and saw some great fastball. It’s great! The new Dauphin General Store is now open. It’s bright and spacious with lots of things to offer. From farm to food to fun, it has workwear, groceries and ice cream with more to come. Ann Bosman, Pat Nolan and Cassandra Banks are just a few of the locals to be working there. Congrats to Dauphins. Continued from page 1 local boy, I think that’s quite an achievement; quite remarkable.” The top honour, placing first in the MX1 class was Paul Carpenter of New York State. Lee knew Carpenter had a huge advantage coming into the weekend and he expected nothing less, but Carpenter exceeded all expectations. “He had pretty much wrapped up the competition coming in, so he didn’t have anything to prove, but I guess he had nothing to lose either. He was very impressive,” he said. “In the end, he was head and shoulders above everyone else.” Jeremy Medaglia of Kemptville took home the Rick Joseph Memorial Award. The honour is given by a panel to a young intermediate rider who exemplifies strength of character, personality and potential to succeed. The RacerX Total Devotion award went to Kyle McGlynn of Wembley, Alberta. This award is given to a young rider who never gives up. The award includes a week at the world famous Millsaps Motocross training facility in the United States. Walton TransCan proved to be an important stop in the Canadian National Motocross Qualifier series once again as competition proved to get even better this year, than it was last year. “The level of competition went way up. In terms of level of participation from across the country, we went way up. There was definitely more depth of competition and the majority of the classes had some representation from all the different parts of the country. That was important to us,” Lee said. Lee insists that Huron County’s pool of motocross talent is there and developing, but with the Walton event being an event in the qualifier series, amateur riders were not able to participate. Lee says that local riders are developing and one day will represent the county well in the event, but many talents are still developing. Two local riders of note who participated were Tyler Listman who ran in the 12-16 class from Seaforth and Scott Vande Borne who ran in several junior classes from Egmondville. Lee says this year’s event was more successful than last year’s and it only seems to be getting better. “We had really good weather all the way through. Our attendance went up, participation was up and out daily attendance was up,” he said. “Basically everything went very smoothly.” More information and results are available at waltontranscan.ca. Freestyle It may appear a little out of control, but this rider taking part in the freestyle event at the Trans Can moto cross in Walton on the weekend, was riding high. (Vicky Bremner photo) Our fall mums are blooming. We have a large selection of colours to choose from GREYHAVEN GARDENS 1/2 mile west of Londesborough Open Mon. - Sat. 519-523-9781 Gorgeous Garden Mums FALL SALE All perennials & shrubs on sale now By Jo-AnnMcDonaldCall 887-6570PEOPLE AROUNDWALTON Lee says winner exceeds expectations A whole lot more than great rates and friendly service. Saving doesn’t have to be this uncomfortable *Limited time only. 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