The 12th round of the Monster Energy/AMA Supercross Championship was held at the Rogers Centre in Toronto, Ontario. Also known as the Skydome, it's amongst Toronto's downtown skyscrapers and the iconic CN Tower. This made for a world-class location for this international event attended by 37,000 spectators.

In the Supercross class, the Toronto round was combined with the rest of the AMA rounds to determine the FIM World Champion. As for the Lites class, most of the contenders for the East and West Coast Lites Championships did not make the trip since it did not count toward the AMA or the FIM Championships. That opened the field to many good Canadian locals and provided an unprecedented opportunity for many of the US privateers to battle for the podium.

In case you missed the race report published yesterday, here's a link to our previous coverage in the past few days. Feel free to browse through but don't forget to come back here if you want to find out What Really Happened in Toronto.

In brief, here's What Really Happened...

In the main Supercross event, Reed didn't want to repeat his mistake from the heat race - a mistake that forced him to fight his way back from near dead last to fifth place. But instead, Chad Reed dominated from the beginning by taking the holeshot. Windham and Millsaps battled it out for second place throughout the main event. With only five laps to go, Windham squeezed by Millsaps into second position.

In the Lites main event, Ryan Smith took the holeshot, but a platoon of DNA Energy/BTO Sport's racers - made up of teammates Skinner, Boni and Cunningham - quickly took the lead and stayed out in front. The trio made a few mistakes (understandable considering the technically-challenging track), but they were able to stay up front and sweep the podium. Of note, Sheren, a skilled Canadian rider, gave the team a run for their money by finishing fourth.

This year the Toronto round of the 2008 Monster Energy AMA Supercross series is the only race sanctioned by the FIM that acts as a pre-season bonus round for the World Supercross GP Series. Vancouver was dropped from the schedule and Toronto was moved to the middle of the series, instead of acting as an "unofficial" season opener. Since 2004, Toronto has always attracted Canadian fans from coast-to-coast along with some hardcore American fans. We met people from New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia - even our friend Jonathan Baisley, owner of the Budds Creek track in Maryland, was there to enjoy the show!

Another reason why this round stood out is that Monster Energy / Kawasaki's Timmy Ferry designed it. He did a good job, most riders had great things to say about the way it was laid out, however it required a lot of work from the track builders to keep it together and frequent maintenance was required to prevent it from falling apart.

Once again the weather was to blame for that... After Ontario received near record amounts of snow, track builders had no choice but to truck in frozen dirt. In this heated facility the dirt started thawing, and the whole track threatened to turn into an unmanageable mushy substance, so a lot of sand was dumped into it. The result was an unpredictable course, slippery in some areas and extremely rutted in others.

Needless to say, soft dirt deteriorates quickly after a few laps of these powerful bikes. The inevitable rutting made it very difficult for the riders, especially the Canadians who don't get to race all year round. However, even a number of skilled riders went down in qualifying practice and during the race, including Reed, Hill, Klatt, Hansen, and Ferry himself - to name just a few. Nevertheless, a highly technical track made for some exciting racing! And not only was it technical, it was big! By far, this track resulted in the longest lap times of the 2008 Supercross series.

Speaking of Ferry, this was Tim's first race since he sustained internal injuries (bruised ribs and pancreas) while training for the Indy round of the series. He looked good on the track, and he scored the fastest lap time during the second seeded 450cc practice session. He also did really well in his qualifying race, finishing third, but his seventh place finish in the main event was not enough for a place on the podium.

On a final note, the big story everyone is talking about is the DNA Energy Drink / BTOSports / BBMX team that swept the podium, with Shaun Skinner, Matt Boni and Kyle Cunningham. In case you were wondering, team BBMX.com is a crew of privateers owned by three brothers on the AMA Professional Supercross and Motocross Series - Forrest, Karsten and Brandon Butler. Their team consists of riders in the Premier class (Jason Thomas, Bryan Johnson and Brandon Butler) along with riders in the Lites class (Kyle Keylon, Kyle Cunningham, Shaun Skinner and Matt Boni). In early 2007 BBMX announced their partnership with BTO Sports, one of the nation's largest mail order and online store. The fact that a team of privateers swept an entire podium in a professional event is no small achievement. There is no doubt that this team talented riders will be one to contend with in future AMA events.

Well folks, that's it for this week. Check back with us next week for detailed coverage of the 2008 Monster Energy AMA Supercross Series - directly from the heart of Texas!

Courtesy of MotoCross.com