Personal History
Lets start with the basics. My name is Mike Key, I'm from southern Wisconsin, and I ride dirt bikes. I started riding when I was about 10, which is kind of a late start, but better late than never, right? I rode on mostly mx tracks, but was also to ride around my yard and some trails. I developed my skills on my 80cc four-stroke, and after a couple years and hard working summers, I got a 2007 Honda CRF150R for my birthday in November 2006. After a long winter itching to ride, I got out to the track and started riding the new bike in March of 2007. A couple months later, I was able to enter my first race, a Hare Scramble at my local track. It was a muddy mess, and my first race, but I was able to get 5th overall!
For the rest of the summer I rode hard and continued to push myself on the bike, and slowly progressed in my riding capabilities. I got the chance to race again the first weekend of September, and did okay, but I was unfamiliar with the track and the other riders. After that, I went home and started training harder than ever. I started making some leaps and bounds on the track, and really focused on corner speed. The last weekend in October, I found myself at another race, but this time I was prepared. I did well in all my races, and went home satisfied. For about another month, I was able to get out to the track on the weekends and continued to hone my skills.
Winter finally came, so now the bike is parked for the winter (unless I can do some arenacross..), but I came away pretty happy with my progression on the bike this year. In school, I am and always have been an A student. I have a lot of friends in and out of school, and my teachers say that I am very hard working and I a try my best at everything I do. I get along with just about everyone, and I am usually the leader in groups. I love to do anything a bit more extreme, less mainstream, and no matter what I do, I'll try my best so I can come out of the race/practice on top. I think that a lot of people say they want to be the best at what they do, but they won't put forth the effort in training or practices to come out ahead of the pack.
Riding Goals
This riding season was pretty much a learning year for me, but I did make a lot of friends at the tracks. Next year, I'm planning to hold it pinned 'til I win (but ride smart), in practices and especially in races. I trained about 5 days a week this year, mostly swimming and biking. I've been swimming since I was about 6, and now I'm on a team year round and in the summer we swim about 6 miles a day plus core work outs (about 1,500 reps of assorted stomach, back, arm, leg, and cardio exercises). I bike about 4 times a week in the summer, and really feel that helps my leg strength on the bike. I'm going to continue these exercises next year, but I'll make them harder so I can really unleash my potential in races. My parents and I have agreed on getting me out to the track about 3+ times a week next year, which is great, and I should be able to race an entire mx series and one of my regional tracks and hopefully I'll be able to race the main track I practice at. (I didn't get to race there last year because they had no class for my 150R. I put up a petition and got a bunch of kids to sign it, requesting that the track added a supermini class. It worked well, and the board said they would seriously consider adding one for the next season!) Other than that, the next couple years I'll do some Loretta Lynn's qualifiers and hopefully make it to the ranch by the time I'm 15. If I can make it there, I'll also probably be able to go to some of the other spring nationals.
Competitive Highlights
As you can see, I didn't get the chance to race much this year. I learned a lot about how the races work, though, and made a lot of friends and riding buddies while doing it. In my race results section, there is all the info on the races I was in this 2007 season. By the last race I was in, I was actually running top 4 for most of my races. So bad luck in some motos cost me the top 5, but I still rode hard and had a blast while riding. My parents hardly put any pressure on me while I'm racing, and that keeps it really fun. I keep the pressure on my self to do well! Next year I'll be racing a ton, along with riding a lot and training. I know that if I keep progressing steadily, I'll be running top three in every race, and hopefully winning. This was a fun year of racing, and I really learned a lot and had a good time.