By Dave Mathieson
The Record
JOGGINS - The higher Damon Burbine soared through the air on his 50 cc motocross bike, the higher his reputation soared among the 1,500 racers who competed at the Walton TransCan National Motocross Championships recently in Walton, Ont.
The six-year old from Joggins, N.S., came home from the national competition ranked fourth in Canada and, in the process, earned the respect of the motocross community.
"He did really good," his dad Jason said. "In each race he was in second by a long shot but crashed and ended up in fourth.
"He crashed towards the end of each race and didn't have time to catch up."
Burbine race last Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and one reason he crashed was because he was riding a junior bike, while his competition rode senior bikes.
"The ruts were bad for his bike. They were really deep," Jason said. "The senior bike has lot bigger suspension, they have bigger wheels and they're longer.
"It's the same size motor but because they have a lot more suspension it goes through the ruts really easy compared to the one he's driving."
Jason knew going into the nationals that Damon should have a senior bike, "But I didn't want to switch him because he was so comfortable on his junior bike," he said.
On Thursday Damon's performance on the smaller bike led one father of a fellow competitor to lay a formal protest to the competition's organizers.
Jason said that, "The referee came up to me and said, "you have to go to the office."
"I said, 'What for?'"
"He said, 'You're being protested.'"
When they got to the office the official said, "A parent came up to him and said that they owned a junior bike and they don't go that fast."
The officials marked the bikes engine so Jason couldn't take it apart.
"As soon as his race was done on Saturday we had to go to their trailer and they tore the head off to measure the piston to make sure it wasn't bored out," Jason said.
The complainant made a $200 bet that the engine was tampered with. $150 of that bet went to the Burbines.
"He was the only bike up there out of 1,500 participants to get protested," Damon's mom, Stacey Gilroy, said. "That was a big compliment."
Besides having a smaller bike, another disadvantage Damon has is age and size.
His birthday is on Christmas day, while other competitors in his age class were born in January. That means he races against many kids who are seven-years old and, therefore, kids who are much bigger than he is.
People couldn't believe the size of him," Jason said. "You walk through the pits and people say oh my god, that's that little 77 (Burbine's race number). They can't believe it."
Gilroy said a moto-cross magazine writer came up to Damon, shook his hand and asked him his name, then said, "I'm sure I'll be writing about you because you're an amazing rider to watch."
Another disadvantage Burbine has is that he doesn't practice but hopes to get a practice track built by his home.
Damon was told that, if he did well at the nationals, he would receive a gift.
I told him if he did good up there I'd buy him a new bike, so I got him a new bike," Jason said.
He'll be riding his new senior bike for the rest of this season and next season as well.
