Rob McElnea (19) leading his Loctite Yamaha teammate Terry Rymer with Fred Merkel (1) and Pascal Picotte (44). (Larry Lawrence photo)

In the 1980s and ’90s I was a Canon shooter and was a member of Canon’s Professional Services, which meant they would send me lenses, let me test new bodies and make sure my equipment was repaired and within specs. Canon was a sponsor at Mosport during the World Superbike event there in 1990 and I found an angle to take a photo that I thought sure Canon would buy or do a trade for equipment.

This is one of the shots. It’s Rob McElnea (19) leading his Loctite Yamaha teammate Terry Rymer with Fred Merkel (1) and Pascal Picotte (44) bringing up the rear.

With the Canon billboard in the background I thought I had a winner and had visions of a sweet 600mm Canon lens on its way to my house from Canon HQ. I sent a couple of sheets of transparencies to Canon and never heard back from them.

In retrospect Canon Canada’s lame slogan “The comforting choice” probably didn’t help my case. And I’m guessing that every photographer who shot Mosport had the same thought and Canon probably had thousands of images taken from this very angle. Hey, at least they knew their advertising was working. Some of my photos taken from this spot ran in motorcycle publications around the world.