Thanks to you jerkys for checking this place out and here are the 15 articles that caught your eye.
Thanks to you jerkys for checking this place out and here are the 15 articles that caught your eye.
Just like I did last year on the site, I went through the stats here at Pulpmx.com to see what exactly struck a chord with you people out there and the results were somewhat surprising. What you can count on is people being into the scandalous, the juicy center of controversies. Here’s where I point out that it’s no wonder why sites and shows like TMZ.com exist and do so well with the general population.
We are what we are I suppose. One of the most popular stories on Pulpmx.com in 2010 was the “Jason Lawrence Sentenced to Jail” blurb I wrote when J-Law’s sentence was passed down. The reason it didn’t make this list is because it was written in 2009! Yet it was firmly inside the top 20 of stories that I did on the site. Of the just over one million page views, people still couldn’t get enough of that scandal and carried it into the top twenty of 2010.
Anyways, I’ve compiled the top ten stories of the year here on Pulpmx.com leaving out the obvious permanent tabs that people click on like The Pulpmx Show or About Steve Matthes and just get to the stories that resonated with you people. Keep in mind that the stories posted in January have an inside track to get more views than stories posted in December…I hope you guys realize that.
Thanks again for checking the site out and helping it grow into…something. I’m just going to keep on posting stories that make me laugh, make you guys think and maybe isn’t the most relevant to who won the supercross on the weekend but it is relevant to me, a 36-year old fan of the sport. As well, I don’t need to remind you guys that I’ve always said this site is yours as much as mine. If you have a story to tell, send it in and who knows, maybe it will make it up! I mean, c’mon, I just posted a pic of a guys sweet ’86 CR250 with a scrap of paper saying it’s a Pulpmx bike.
Ok, and off we go!
1- Little Hanny visits the morning show in Phoenix!
Yep, Josh Hansen, the guy who wouldn’t piss on me to stop me from being on fire, takes the Pulpmx.com number 1 newsmaker spot! I actually had a reader send me this link from out there in Arizona with a tirade about what an idiot Josh is in this clip. I don’t think he’s an idiot in it but I have to admit, what he has to say doesn’t come across very well. I happen to think it’s more humorous than anything, like why would he possibly think that this is funny or cool to say? I love how Josh always talks about keeping the drama out of his life and just focusing on riding but then he hires a Hollywood publicist, goes out with B-list celebrities, says these types of things on morning shows and then says “Oh man, the drama just follows me around. Screw you haters, etc, etc” but really, he’s bringing it on himself. I’m ok with that just don’t complain about media/people coming down on you when you invite it.
Anyways, this show got him some nice meetings with the Feld guys and as well, his boss Mitch Payton wasn’t exactly thrilled about it.
I try to stay back in Florida around Daytona time to hang out, enjoy the sun and watch some of the sports top riders do their thing during the week. I’ve been doing it since I was a mechanic for Tim Ferry and even now, although he’s retired (pause for me slamming my head in a door) I still go down to the sunshine state to hang out. I bring my camera and make the rounds. One year I even went to James Stewart’s place and then the next day to Chad Reed’s. I guess some people didn’t like that very much because…well, I don’t know why. So in 2010, I stuck to going to Ferry’s track to watch the big one-five ride around a bit and then the next day go to Reed’s to watch Reedy, Brett Metcalfe, Michael Byrne and Jason Thomas get busy. When I was there, Reed went down and badly jacked up his hand. This after coming back from his other hand being broken in Phoenix. He asked me not to say anything in my reports which I honored. Then he went out to Daytona, rode practice, set the fastest time and pulled out before the race. People love this behind the scenes stuff and even though my photos absolutely suck balls, it’s still a good report.
Here’s a column that was written recently but became pretty popular for me. Probably because Reed retweeted it to his followers. Anyways, I found the whole NBA basketball star LeBron James’ decision TV show fascinating for a number of reasons (not all good) and thought that Reed’s decision on what he was going to do in 2011 along the same lines. It was cool to watch Reed Tweet away each day what he was doing, where he was riding and what his choices were. He was taking the fans and the media with him along the way as we waited to hear his decision on what he was going to do. In the end, he went with the option that I thought was the farthest fetched, which was starting his own team. Good story, I enjoyed writing it and looks like you guys enjoyed reading it.
Here’s another column that came out the second of January and was the first of two Davi Millsap’s columns I wrote this year. This one was all about whether or not Millsaps, one of the sport’s most talented riders, can finally figure things out and give Honda a return on its massive investment it made in him. It was good story, it got Davi and his trainer mad at me and judging by the fact I wrote a second column on Millsaps and his 2011 JGRMX ride, 2010 didn’t quite work out like Davi and Honda wanted it to.
This one got me in a little bit of hot water with some people but I stand behind it. With Glen Helen and MX Sports failing to come to an agreement over the national, the guys at MXA took out their axes and pretty much ground them to a very fine point at the expense of Davey Coombs, John Ayers and MX Sports. It was ridiculous and just showed how small the moto industry is. MXA (or should I say editor Jody Weisel) rides at Glen Helen exclusively and is buddies with the owners of the track. Nothing wrong with that but as a media member, maybe you should show a little neutrality? Smash-cut to a few weeks after the two parties couldn’t come to an agreement and GH announced they were holding a GP at the track same date as they had a national on. The poop PR machine really started churning up after that as MXA produced story after story about how awesome the GP’s are, how everyone should go to Glen Helen and how Youthstream (FIM GP promoters) are so awesome. This turnaround was quite amazing after the orange helmeted crew also spared no ink in going after Youthstream for years and mocking the GP’s. This story was one of the reasons why I didn’t get a press pass at the GP but when some people at MXA agreed with me and my satirical article, I felt very vindicated.
I was surprised to see this article in the mix as it too isn’t that old but it’s good to see people liked it, spread it on and spoke about it. It certainly took me some time to find the parallels between 1990 and 2011 and it also took some time to get over Larry Ward’s hair in the 1990 SX recap tape I watched to get inspiration for the column. Or even Damon Bradshaw’s awesome poofy squirrels nest that he had going on. As Swizcore told me, the 2010 Damon Bradshaw would probably kick his own ass for having that hair in ’90. Anyways, thanks to Swiz for the awesome photoshop handiwork for this story.
7- Twelve Minutes, Forty-Seven Seconds with Chad Reed
Another Reed story makes the list and in this interview, Reed talks about forming his new team, the upcoming season, choosing a Honda and much more. This interview was done for my Italian magazine that I freelance for and I thought I would put it up on-line after Chad asked me if it was going to be read in America. But that caused some problems when an Italian website took it, translated it and put it up for all the pizza-eating Italians to read. Needless to say my Italian editor was not too happy with me and I sent a nicely worded email to the Italian website asking WTF? They replied that they thought they were doing me a favor in getting my work out to the world. By the way, they didn’t link to Pulpmx, they just stole the interview, translated it and but in their generosity, they did leave my name on it. Thanks guys!
8- Hanny doesn’t like me, here’s the proof
Remember what I was saying at the top of the story about all of us just wanting the juicy gossip? Well Hansen went on DMXS radio and called me a douchebag and whatever else so of course, I had to play the clip for all of you. I just think it’s funny…
Again, the day before I went to Reed’s- I went to Ferry’s and he rode with Kyle Chisholm. Despite not riding for a month or so (because his head gasket blew, which he made me change out for him so that he could go riding), he was about a second off of Kyle’s time each lap. He still had the magic! Good times…
The first appearance of a podcast (but to be fair, most people just get them off iTunes and my Google stats does not track those) and it’s with the man Roger DeCoster shortly after he announced he was leaving his Suzuki team manager job for one at KTM. It certainly sent shock waves throughout the industry and the Friday afternoon at Pala was when RD and I sat down to get this podcast. I’ve never really spoken to Roger very much over the years but he was very cool throughout the interview and even made time for me when he suddenly got busy. He also talked very frankly after I hit the stop button about some other things and I appreciate it.
The next five:
11- The Des Nations Decision– Just all about whether to take James Stewart or Andrew Short. Interesting problem to have for DeCoster and no one can say it didn’t all work out in the end.
12- SX Ride Day Out at the H&H Track– With the rains battering Southern California, a bunch of really fast guys came up here to Las Vegas to ride the Hart & Huntington SX track and I went out there to get the low-down.
13- Nine Minutes, Eight Seconds with Dean Wilson– One of the better interviews among young riders (or maybe it’s just me because he’s known me for a little bit), Dean talks about his Texas race that went well and then maybe not so well for him. I did another interview later with Wilson and it was only nine minutes also. I guess that’s all I’m allowed with him.
14- You Asked, I Answered- A mailbag column that somehow broke into the top fifteen of the year. I love doing these things and I’m going to try and do more in the coming year.
15- Salt Lake City Showdown- People loved to read this story about what happened behind the scenes at the 2003 Salt Lake City SX. Whenever there are a bunch of industry people around having some beers, I’m almost always forced to tell it again.
