Speaking to Davey Coombs this week via e-mails and he mentioned after the unfortunate news about KTM and what a crazy week it’s been. For sure, the financial troubles of KTM could have a huge impact on our sport and as the most important company involved in motocross, or off-road racing, the impact if they can’t find a way out of their struggles, will possibly be the most damaging thing to ever happen to the sport. It’s hard to think of anything that would bring our sport to its knees than motocross without KTM.

The week got only worse with the news that American legend, Malcolm Smith had passed, not to mention another American legend, but maybe not as familiar to us in Mary McGee, McGee, a woman who raced back in the day and was famous just for that, as a woman racing. Back in the 1970s, no women raced, and McGee raced motocross, road racing and also the Baja events. While the loss to most of us isn’t as significant as that of Smith, she sure opened the doors for women’s racing and for that Mrs McGee, thank you.

As for Smith, well, as a 63-year-old and like anyone around my age, Malcolm Smith was a true hero. So many of us were brought into the sport via the American movie, On Any Sunday, of which Smith was one of the stars. I know DC and his family got hooked from the film, and so too did the Meyer family.

My father was a famous motorcycle photographer in Australia, back in the 1960s 70s, 80s and 90s, and he would drag his kids from just about any motor racing event, usually speedway, road racing, or dirt track. Every weekend he would load us into the car and head off, and for me and my two older brothers, it was a childhood that’s pretty hard to beat.

We hadn’t been to a motocross race before, but after watching the premier of On Any Sunday at the Opera House in Sydney in the winter of 1971 we became fans. On Any Sunday is often credited as the best and/or most important motorcycle documentary ever made and it sure got the Meyer family into the sport.

Within a few months after that premier, we also attended a major motocross event in the summer of 72, which included one of the stars of On Any Sunday, Joel Robert and a bunch of his fellow Europeans and a few months later, we started racing motocross. A day didn’t go by without us jumping on our YZ80’s and heading into the bushes that rimmed the Sydney suburb of Allambie Heights. In those days, you could ride anywhere and all day long. Police and forest ranges usually watching as we made motocross tracks through the area. Boy has that changed.

We were hooked and started following motocross events throughout the country. Now, the big star of the movie was Mr Smith, and we were fortunate enough to meet him when dad took us on an overseas trip to America in 1978. As owner of Malcolm Smith Racing (later MSR) we got a private tour through his facility and as anyone who ever met Mr Smith, he was a complete gentleman. Stocked up on MSR gear, we left Mr Smith as bigger fans, but that is a story I read a lot about Malcolm Smith.

I was fortunate enough to meet him again in the early more than 20 years later, in the early 2000s, when his motorcycle shop hosted the USGP press conference and what a magnificent shop it was. Sitting talking to him about his special On Any Sunday Museum, which was in a part of his motorcycle shop, it was amazing how enthusiastic he was as I told him about my love of that movie.

A story he had obviously heard thousands of times, but he acted like I was the first person to mention it. That was the type of person Malcolm Smith was. Full of appreciation for life and the stories that are told in it. Amazingly, he also remembered taking the Australian family through his business back in 1978. Not just a great person, but a memory that suited his legend.

Now, anyone around my age will be losing family members, friends, former associates and just many people from our childhood. Also, heroes and it seems to be a monthly thing, that we lose somebody who gave us a lot of pleasure as a kid, or young man.

The passing of Malcolm Smith, sure broke my heart and took me back to that On Any Sunday premier at the Opera House in 1971 and the memories of that first good look at motocross made me remember why I love the sport so much. Of course, spending time with your father is a huge reason why many of us got into the sport, tagged along in the family car, then the drug of motocross got so deep into your DNA, that racing was the next step, some made it big, some, like myself took another turn.

As one of the longest runner media in the sport and owner of mxlarge, I can’t help but thank Malcolm Smith a bit for the direction I took and I hope for many of you, also sit back and appreciate his contribution to your involvement in the passionate and romantic sport we all love so much. On Any Sunday was a great name for that movie back 53 years ago, and for sure, On Any Sunday, you can find us still trekking around the World and giving our little contribution to the sport of motocross.