The first thing you need to know about round-one of the WEC sanctioned DirtyBikes Sprint Enduro series, held at the Burnt River Off-Road Vehicle Facility Sat, June 12, is that you should have been there.

What a great concept: Take the no-nonsense FIM enduro special test sections and stick them all into a small spectator-friendly area with no long trail sections in between. To do well you have to be an excellent all-around rider with the cajones to keep it wide open through some very tough terrain. It was awesome! The riders loved it and the industry people loved it. “This is way better than Hare Scrambles,” said Machine Racing’s John Nelson while enthusiastically helping riders through some of the more difficult parts of the Extreme test, adding “I’d rather focus on this kind of stuff any day.” Other riders agreed; in fact after the wet, sloppy race Wojo and some of the other riders went back onto the course to play ride. Here’s a little photo essay about the coolest breath of fresh air to hit the off-road scene in Ontario in a very long time.

Everyone found the extreme test to be a real eye opener on the first lap.

Bruce Moffat works his YZ over the first batch of tires.

Lots of different techniques were used to get over the logs.

Jamie West took the aggro-approach to log jumping all the way to second in the A class.

By the second lap riders were getting more comfortable dealing with the Extreme-test’s man-made obstacles.

Wojo put his trials skills to take the overall Sprint Enduro win.

Every inch of the Sprint enduro course was on the clock, so riders kept it pinned come hell or high water.

John Nelson kept himself busy helping riders over the more difficult obstacles.

Adam Millson hammered his way to second in the Pro class.

Offroadmotorcycles.ca test pilot Matt McCarthy finished second in the C class, despite having to pull the clutch cover off his RM in the middle of the enduro-test with an 8mm open-end wrench to fix a loose clutch spring bolt.

It was wet, it was hard and there were lots of crashes. In fact we’ll be doing a Sprint Smash Spectacular crash and burn photo essay asap! One thing for sure, everyone who raced on Saturday was a better rider by the end of the day.

DirtyBikes Matt McAnanama deserves a huge round of applause for putting together such an exciting new series! The WEC guys had the timing system working very well, and the crew at Burnt River Off-Road Facility deserve recognition for hosting the event and building an excellent endurocross-style track!

We didn’t exactly whoop it up Saturday night, instead giving the beat up ‘Zook some much needed medical attention. Thank you VanHove family for putting up with our tool mooching!!

Results: WEC DirtyBikes Sprint Enduro Series round-one, June 12 2010

Pro: (1) Brian Wojnarowski (2) Adam Millson (3) Kevin Cockyane

Vet Mstr: (1) Rome Halfotis (2) Bruce Moffat (3) Craig Kennedy

A: (1) Chris Culbert-Castello (2) Jamie West

B: (1) Dave Lewis (2) Shawn Fitzpatrick (3) David Mignon

C: (1) Eric Decotret (2) Matt McCarthy (3) Cameron Lowe

AM Vet: (1) Rob Martin (2) Rob White

AM Spr Vet: (1) Mark Zimny (2) Stephen Hart