ROSSI'S RANCH - LA 100KM DEI CAMPIONI

It's not every day you get the invite to trade paint, drifts and stories with Rossi and a bunch of world champions, but that's how life played out for the Neave twins a few weeks back.

It's only a matter of weeks postcompeting in the coolest motorcycling event I've ever experienced and I'm still absolutely peaking! My brother Tom and I were fortunate enough to be invited to race in Valentino Rossi's La 100km dei Campioni ninth edition flat track race at his purposebuilt flat track ranch in Tavulia. Mind blown! We owe a big thanks to team boss John McGuinness for firing a WhatsApp over to his old mate Vale and pulling this off; we couldn't believe it when the voice note came back from the man himself saying he'd heard of us two... who would have thought it, aye? Two old farm boys from Lincolnshire.

Anyway, it all came about at very short notice, and we didn't have long to get our 450 motocross bikes converted into flat track with lower suspension and 19-inch wheels, but soon the Edwards 1902 van was loaded, and the team was primed for the 1200-mile road trip to Italy.

We caught the Dover-to-Calais ferry and went flat-out across France, through the middle of Switzerland, and finally into Italy, before making a direct diagonal across the country to Cattolica, where we were staying. Light work for the designated van drivers, I'd say.