It's Tuesday night, about 8:30pm. I'm packing my bags to leave San Diego to go to Faenza, Italy for the first FIM Motocross World Championship event of the year - Round 1 in Faenza.

In the Grands Prix, they have two classes - MX1 is the premier 450 class. And MX2 is the 250 class.

 Each class will race two 'motos', or heats for a combined overall score.

 David Philippaerts from Italy, riding for Monster Yamaha, is the defending MX1 World Champion. Can he repeat?

Tony Cairoli, also from Italy, and a former world champion in the 250 class, will be riding a full season in the 450 MX1 class. How will he do?

Have to be at the airport at 5:30am, so it's time to pack. I just looked at the weather report for Sunday - it's supposed to rain. It wouldn't be motocross if it didn't rain!

 Next, I'll share with you how my flight and drive are ... 

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March 25: 3:30am. Woke up. Definitely not enough sleep. I should be super pumped and excited - I AM going to the opening round of MXGP in Italy! But it did take me a few minutes to really get up to speed this morning.

Drove to the airport, alone, in the dark. Checked in with my favorite airline in the whole world (they treat me so nice - I'm always upgraded to first class!)

Next, it was time to go thru 'Security'. Always fun.

It is just me, or do they (the Security staff) all have the same 'dynamic', compelling, and engaging personalities? Or are they auto-matrons built by Walt Disney??

Now that I'm "in", I can sit for almost three hours before the flight (first leg to New York, second leg to Milan, Italy) takes off. I'll sit in Starbucks and people watch - always fun at an airport!

You certainly wouldn't know there are any 'economic' issues by sitting in Starbucks for an hour. It's packed. And in airport Starbucks, they charge even more for their coffee 'beverages' than a 'normal' Starbucks. And this place was jammin'. They were cracking out the drinks and the people and there was always a line of at least 15 people deep.

Another observation about airports: why is it that I have to hear, in extremely loud volume, every one's cell phone conversations within a hundred yards of me? I don't care if Aunt Betty has hemorrhoids. I don't care to hear how 'wasted' you got last night. I don't care about the database issues you are having at work. Of course, all the conversations are not only loud, but overly animated and acting as if it's the most important phone call in the history of mankind. And who the heck are you talking to at 5am in the morning??

The most compelling conversation I heard? A 16 year old girl so excited to meet her friend at the Mall of America later in the day so they can get together and drink beer! (What's the drinking age in Minnesota anyway?)

Now Amanda's not with me on this flight. I'm a little bit bummed. We can take a normal day, flight, trip and turn it into quite an adventure! Traveling solo is definitely different, but she gave me some last minute instructions that I think will help me make it thru the weekend: "Have fun!" Thanks A! U r the best!

 I board my flight from San Diego to New York. Something strange happened though - my first class ticket (seat 2a) suddenly had been changed to to 7f - not first class, but economy section. How did that happen?

I asked about it, and they told me that someone had paid $7000 for a first class ticket at the gate and they decided to move ME. They did reward me though for the change - another first class ticket for the future, lots of free beer, and tons of their airline 'currency' to use in the future.

Being the big spender I am, I used some of my courtesy currency to buy a few beer for all the folks I made friends with near my seat : )

I guess I really need to keep in mind the larger goal - get to Faenza for the first MX GP and work!

The next leg of the journey is New York to Milan, Italy. Hopefully my first class seat will be there this time! : ) I also hope that I'll be able to get some sleep on this flight, because once I hit the ground, it's five straight days of work - just about non-stop.

I think you'd be surprised at how much work and time goes into publishing something you might think is so simple - publishing a complete article about a race - the story, results, points, photos, and video. Also, when you are away from home, especially in a different country, it's a very different work environment. Murphy's Law definitely comes into effect - anything that can go wrong does go wrong. Or will go wrong!

We'll see how the flight from New York to Milan goes next ...


Well, my favorite airline has more than made up for that previous part of the flight. I've flown lot of flights, domestic and international, and many times first class.

But this jet - literally brand new, and I am in first class now, is something very special. The service you receive as soon as you get on board is extraordinary. They great you by name, serve you champagne, and then give you a menu to choose your dinner for later. The dinner menu is created by one of the top chefs in the United States. I thought I had order just the dinner of Chicken Tandoori. ( was wrong!)

The seats in first class on this airliner are plush ... they each have a personal flat screen TV, with hundreds of choices of movies, including the recent Academy Award winner for Best Picture, Slum Dog Millionaire, and Changling starring Angelina Jolie. The seats themselves can lay all the way flat as if you were in bed. (And which I hope to be testing out soon. The seat in front of me ... I'm guessing it's about 8 feet away.

I could get used to livin' like this!

The staff and personnel of my favorite airline - exquisite.

Champagne - check
Various great wines - check
Fantastic food - check
Great service - check
Wonderful seating - check

But wait - a few people are missing, and we'll have to mark them absent today: Amanda, John, Gerald, Dan, Michelle, Dina, and Rocky (although Dina and Rocky are cats).

When dinner came, out came the fine white linen, and nice silverware, along with more wine of course. I was a bit confused by all the silverware though - they gave me four forks, 3 knives, and two spoons - what am I supposed to do with all that stuff?

Since I'm not all that sophisticated and cultured and refined, I just took all the extra silverware and hid them under my seat.

I know this all sounds glamorous and wonderful. And what I've described here is!

But ... a couple of thoughts - once at the race, Murphy's Law always goes into effect - anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. Computer breaks. Computers break. You can't connect to the Internet. People take up too much of your time and you miss your next meeting or the start of a race. It never ends!

And once you hit the ground running Thursday morning, it is literally non stop work until Monday morning when you board a flight back home, and then even still, you are working on your computer and the next couple of days to publish all the materials correct.

Do not get me wrong - I am truly blessed! I get to follow a dream and a passion and do something I truly enjoy. It's not a 9 - 5 job.

On the other hand, the media has tremendous time sensitive issues that must be dealt with - it's incredibly time consuming and stressful .... but I wouldn't have it any other way.

The wine keeps coming. The service - impeccable. I used the men's bathroom - it's huge! Like nothing I've ever seen! I don't know what other people do in there ... but I decided to play a game of racquetball.

Back to dinner. I'm on my third course. Totally stuffed. And I haven't even gotten to the salads or main course ( we won't even mention desserts after that!) Sattay Chicken, Lobster Bisque, mini raviolis with spinach, mini lasagnas - all cooked and taste way beyond how I can describe them.

It was a three choice Appetizer (enough to fill me up to begin with!). Then we had the 'Temptations' ... another three choice selection of which most people (including me) had all three.

That was followed by Veal Osso Bucca, Grilled Halibut, and the Chicken Tandoori. Then desserts (you'll be proud to know I passed on the desserts). All this in a dinner that was a 2.5 hour extravaganza!



4 hours of sleep. Arrive Milan. All is good. Then I get into 'passport' control' line. Not good. I always seem to get into the wrong line.

One hour later - I'm thru that and onto the rental car area. The three employees there look at my Google map of directions on how to go from Milan to Faenza. They each want to give me different directions, so now I have four ways total on how to drive there.

Pretty soon - the employees start arguing about who has the best directions. I just walked away from the counter and went to find my car ...

Once I find my rental car (a 30 minute adventure) I notice something - the weather is perfect, beautiful. Awesome!

After I drive around the same f@#$ing loop to try and exit the airport, I'm on A8 heading towards Bologna.

Along my (supposed) 3 hour drive to Faenza, I stop at a ristorante on the side of the highway. This ristorante is a combination McDonald's (for real!), deli, gift shop, coffee shop. Michael Jackson's "Beat it" is playing so loud you can't even hear yourself think. And everyone there speaks Italian! Go figure! : )

I had a Caprese sandwich (awesome) and an espresso.

Toll roads suck. And there was a lot of them along the way. About 88 Euro total (maybe 120 dollars). Toll roads suck.

So, after the FOUR hour drive, and leaving San Diego almost 30 hours ago, I make it to the race track - beautiful - vineyards abound, green hillsides ... and you wouldn't believe all the colorful big rig trucks lined up for miles to get into the race track and park - on Thursday.

The weather - again - perfect. I park my car at 2:30pm - brilliant sunshine and beautiful scenery. Just like a GP should be!

The hillside track already has colorful banners and flags in place for the first GP of the season. The place is packed, considering it's only Thursday. A lot of activity going on everywhere.

Friday, March 27 - things are buzzing here. KTM just introduced their 2009 team members including Rui Goncalves, Shaun Simpson, Jonathan Barragan, and Max Nagl.

 
To see the rest of the trip from the race track, including results, photos, points, video and more from the first Grand Prix Motocross of 2009, please visit this link:

http://www.supercross.com/race-results/fim-world-motocross