Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1068866
CHAMPIONSHIP VOL. 56 ISSUE 1 JANUARY 8, 2019 P63 in the process (a 1:02.476 on lap 12; the next-best lap time was Barcia's at a 1:03.362 that came on lap three). Barcia will have the red plate on his motorcycle for the first time in his 450SX career at the next round in Glendale, Arizona. BONES IS BACK During intermission, Pro Circuit's Jim "Bones" Bacon was caught off guard when he was awarded the Mickey Thompson Award of Excellence. Bacon retired at the end of 2018 after working for Pro Circuit for 34 years as one of their tech experts. "I really didn't expect this, so I don't really know what to say," Bacon said from the podium. REEDY'S NEW RECORD Chad Reed set another new record at Anaheim 1—making his 18th consecu- tive Anaheim 1 main event. The previ- ous record was held by Mike LaRoc- co. Reed was also hoping to take down his 45th win of his career on Saturday night as well, which would've removed him from a four-way tie with eight Anaheim main-event victories (along with Jeremy McGrath, Ricky Carmichael and James Stewart—all of whom Reed has actually raced against), but it wasn't to be, despite conditions that likely would've favored him if he got a start. "Wasn't a pretty start to my 18th consecutive A1," Reed said on Instagram. "My 205th career top 10, more top 10s than anyone else even has starts (except LaRocco and Windham)...choosing to reflect on the positive." He finished ninth in the main event despite starting nearly last. WESTON PEICK Weston Peick (JGR/Yoshimura Su- zuki) showed up at Anaheim 1 to do some PR work for Road2Recovery, who has been helping Peick since his injuries he sustained at the Paris Su- percross a couple months ago. Peick suffered multiple major facial fractures and a pretty big head/brain injury in the crash. To help support Peick, visit www.Road2Recovery.org. AX RACERS GALORE With the Amsoil Arenacross series now officially shut down, quite a few top arenacross racers showed up at Anaheim 1, including reigning champ Jacob Hayes and Chris Blose. When asked if Hayes would've signed up to race supercross with his CycleTrader/ Rock River Yamaha team if the aren- across championship was still around, Hayes thought hard about it, then said, "It's hard to say. On one hand, it was really good money, but on the other hand, I want to be in supercross. All the guys I used to race with, and beat, in the amateurs are stars in supercross, and I feel like I should be here, too. So, I'll just say that, yes, I think I'd still be here rather than defending my arenacross champion- ship." PSYCH The very first gate drop of the 2019 season served as a psych-out for everybody lined up in 250SX heat one at Anaheim 1. The gate is supposed to drop, by rule, between one and five seconds after the 30-second board turns sideways, but in this case, the revs picked up, and then after about seven-eight seconds, they slowly died back down again, the gate failing to drop. The track crew quickly got to work to figure out what went wrong. "The hard part for me was that we got the bike all hot, and then just shut it down," McElrath said. "I could feel the heat between my knees when I started it back up again, and with the engine that hot, the clutch doesn't engage the same and stuff like that, so it made it difficult." Ferrandis had a more positive spin on it. "It was a little bit weird, but actually for me it was a funny thing, because I was so much focusing on the start that I wasn't go- Briefly...