TMX SAYS: Life’s too short for this lunacy

A man that I had known and respected since childhood and shared many a laugh with over the years since had lost his fight with cancer. 

 

Charlie Holmes is someone that many of you might know and over the years has been labelled many things – plumber, AMCA motocrosser, Dakar mechanic, motorbike fanatic, tinkerer, fool, father and granddad amongst others. 

 

He was a good man, loved by many and he will be missed. I hadn't actually spoken to Charlie since the Dirt Bike Show a couple of years back when I hoodwinked him into buying a bundle of printed products. 

 

Rumoured to be fairly careful with his spending, it tickled me up that it was hurting him deep inside to have to part with even the smallest amount of his hard-earned.

 

It sounds quite cruel but he knew it was amusing me to put him through such torture and could see the humour in it too. 

So we finished the transaction and said our goodbyes with smiles on our faces. 

 

And that's the last real memory I have of him, which is actually okay with me as those last few minutes more or less sum up our whole relationship – always joking, always happy, never a bad time. 

 

Death is never a nice thing to have to deal with and in recent months I feel like I've seen enough to last me an entire lifetime. 

With that in mind it saddens me that something so trivial as a dirt bike race could lead to a situation which in turn ends up with someone delivering a blow that would ultimately kill a man. 

 

The incident I'm on about happened in the USA last week at Portland International Raceway where it would seem that an on-track altercation boiled into the pits. 

 

The top and bottom of it is that 50-year-old Michael Taylor apparently sucker punched Anthony Mancuso, 61, who collapsed and banged his head on the ground. 

 

That impact caused a skull fracture and hematoma and basically means that Taylor's gonna go to jail for manslaughter all because two kids were rubbing plastic out on the track and their daddies didn't like it.

 

While you might say that could only happen in America that's definitely not the case because I'd quickly run out of fingers and toes if I tried to count how many times I've seen things get a bit heated both off the track and on it. 

 

In fact, a friend of mine recently spent a weekend at a youth motocross meeting and was shocked by the amounts of antisocial behaviour – parents shouting at kids, parents shouting at officials and parents shouting at other parents. 

 

At the end of the day all forms of off-road motorcycling are meant to be fun and if a hobby is stressing you out to the point where you're getting that angry that you need to vent verbally or even physically then you've got to question whether this is really the sport for you and your family. 

 

I know one man who would never let himself get stressed out by any such nonsense. 

 

So long Charlie and thanks for all the good memories...