DVD Review: One Chance to win!

[wfopete]

If your are into 70's MX this DVD is for you. The focus is on the 1975 500cc AMA National Championship. You can tell from that early footage that the producer; Charles Bush took cues from the Bruce Brown "On Any Sunday" success, but who could blame him. So you get the same kind of hokie '70's background tunes and such that Bruce Brown played with. The quality of footage is great, not fuzzy or grainy like some other films, maybe that is from the high-definition restoration. The camera crew got some great but brief shots of race action throughout the film, I just wish there was more of it.  I thought some of the best parts of the DVD were the behind the scene parts on the bonus documentary: "Behind the Battle".  In fact, I think it if you have not seen the DVD, you would enjoy it more if the "Behind the Battle" part is viewed before the feature movie.  The only Penton that I saw in the film was the word "Penton" on a guys t-shirt.  Interesting film with great interviews and footage, overall a thumbs up! //www.onechancetowin.com

Pete Petrick

[Ernie Phillips]

Pete,  You're right – One Chance to Win is a great flick.  I didn't know the American riders disliked Pierre Karsmaker so much.  Also interesting was Karsmaker's view that indoor MX events would be the future.  You just gotta love Karsmaker getting a hit of oxygen from the ox-acetylene torch held up in from of his face!  Short Stack taking the last moto win on his lowly Maico is cool.  Visually stunting and oh so much behind the scenes going on – don't miss it.

Ernie P.
Chattanooga, TN

[OhioTed]

I was fortunate enough to catch a round of that championship, when for the one and only time, an AMA National was held at Ohio International Raceway. (Hope I've got my facts straight, as I believe that was in '75)  Anyway, for someone who had only seen the mx pros in action on the pages of motorcycle magazines, seeing those guys perform in person was unreal.  We walked around the pits (outside the fence), and saw all the riders, mechanics, and teams.  It was very low key as I recall, with not a huge crowd on hand.  We were able to stand front-row at just about any vantage point on the course.  I've got some old, 126-film photos from that day, plus I've still got the event's program.  How great it would be to go back in time and see it all again.  Seems I recall that some of the best racing of the day was between two Bultaco riders, in the 250 Support Class.  They were getting HUGE air over the big ski jump, 'till one of the bailed, big time.