Once upon a time the National’s were on Sunday’s. As we’ve heard more than once, “It’s On Any SUNDAY, not Saturday”.
Once upon a time the National’s were on Sunday’s. As we’ve heard more than once, “It’s On Any SUNDAY, not Saturday”. The switch to a one day program on Saturday was a bold one which had it’s share of positive and negative affects. The positives were a condensed schedule which got the racer’s home earlier and more programming available to get a better TV package. That second one is huge. Clearly its huge because the fan backlash surrounding the switch to Saturday was heavy to put it mildly, yet MX Sports forged ahead. The condensed schedule added pressure to the teams and industry as a whole. Time was precious and logisitcs became a hurdle for all. Even janky media dudes.
The BTO Sports.com Bottom Line Show as it became known was a behind the scenes, comedy-enfused, skit. There was an episode per National-round, each with it’s own unique theme while retaining a common-thread feel which held the series together with laughs and oddity. It went the way of the Do-Do because with a one day format, those damned logisitics were just too much to handle with so many other aspects of the media job taking priority.
Matthes- Thanks Swiz for digging these up again. They were a lot of fun but at the same time they were some serious work for myself and my camera man Rob Swiatek (Teenwolf). Trying to come up with new angles and skits that would be funny wasn’t always easy. The show’s first idea was from Davey Coombs but he wanted it to be a rumor show where I just stood there and reported pit gossip. That was too boring for me after about two shows so I started coming up with these ideas. And sometimes it cost some money but DC always said to go ahead with it. It got to a point where I would be going into the nationals a day early to get to the track and do some filming.
And so now when I see guys who have total access to the pits and the permission to shoot anything they want, yet the produce the same garbage week after week, it makes me shake my head. Try to be creative, try to push the boundries and try to make people see some side of a rider or the sport that they’ve never seen before. Or just have a girl shake her ass I guess. Over and over.
Anyways, watching some of these things I forgot about some stuff we did and it made me laugh. And I was in them! There’s no possible way with the one day format and how busy everyone is at the nationals that I could do this show again- it would be impossible. But for a couple of years, we had a lot of laughs and I think came up with some funny ideas. There’s a complete season out there that’s not on Youtube, they’re lost forever I guess. Too bad because there was one skit where I got into a giant garbage can with a “hidden” mic to flesh out silly season rumors. I slowly moved around closer and closer to a source like you see in those movies. Took about two hours to cut this stupid can up also!
Hope you enjoy these. Ok, back to Swiz-
If you’ve never watched these, here’s your chance— nay, it’s your responsibility to be familiar with this series. Good laughs for all.
I give you, The Bottom Line Show 2010.
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Round One. Hangtown. Matthes strolls through the pits “taking the pulse” of the teams on how excited they are to have the BLS back for 2010. Gotta love Stefan Everts at the end being a trooper and in possibly the most shocking BLS moment ever, Weege spends ome money. |
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Round Two. Freestone. Matthes makes a valiant effort to get Red Dog a ride but it’s all for naught. And Matthes kicks the bucket due to the Freestone heat to end the show. |
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Round Three. High Point. Reed and Metty talk some crap on Matthes. Matthes is doing his best to get BTO more exposure and he’s definitely losing it as he thinks Red Dog is at the race but no one else is buying it. |
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Round Four. Budds Creek. We finally get to the bottom of the Dean Wilson Scottish or Canadian debate. And as you’d expect, being Budds Creek, Matthes has lots of reminscing to do over 2003 when he and Red Dog defeated all…in the first moto. |
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Round Five. Thunder Valley. Matthes got himself a new 3G iPad and he does his best to justify the purchase at the race. There’s also a goggle assembly head to head race between Matthes and Knowles. Weege even refers to the inaugural Goggle Race from the 2008 BLS. |
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Round Six. Red Bud. Matthes is still really shoe horning his new iPad into his media job but all the teams are pretty into it. Look forward to the end of this episode when Matthes gets nearly an entire jar’s worth of Mandingo Pickles in his mouth as Big Nasty loses it. |
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Round Seven. Millville.
Good stuff in this episode. Matthes’ former riders share their memories of Matthes when they were teamed up.Possibly the funniest part of this episode is Matthes and his innapropriate antics when on screen with Erin Normoyle. The simulated boning with the microphone is high class and hilarity. |
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Round Eight. Washougal. Matthes infiltrates the teams for some top secret scoops with a GoPro mounted to his hat. Mitch lets on to the nitrous setup they run and Kenny Watson bum-rushes the Team Honda truck for a can of contact cleaner. |
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Round Nine. Unadilla. Weege kills it as he taps into his old bag of tricks and runs the Yellow Flag throughout the episode. |
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Round Ten. Southwick. Lots of memories of the Junkyard Dog. Shorty gets mic’d up on the track so we get an idea of what he thinks when he’s racing at the elite level. Matthes and Teenwolf battle it out to see who has the best hockey shot… sadly both need some more practice. |
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Round Eleven. Steel City. Lots of Ferry Memories here as Red Dog gets his farewell lap from racing. |
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Round Twelve. Pala. This farewell episode of the BLS is pretty creative. You can see they forgot, didn’t enough time or just didn’t give a rip as it was the last race and filmed everything at the end of the day but set it up as being early in the day. |
