IN
THE
WIND
P28
Taylor Robert Wins Glen Helen WORCS
T
aylor Robert (FMF KTM)
returned to his familiar spot
at the top of the podium, winning
round nine of the Rocky Mountain
ATV-MC WORCS Series, Pre-
sented by Polaris RZR and Dirt
Bike, at Glen Helen Raceway,
September 8. Robert's seventh
win of the season will allow him to
clinch the Pro Championship by
merely finishing the next race.
Zach Bell finished second,
ahead of Dante Oliveira, Thad
Duvall and Gary Sutherlin.
The two-hour race was held
on a shortened version of the
typical WORCS layout. Officials
shortened the track by removing
a lot of the single track to allow
them to better keep it watered
and keep down the dust. That
made the track much faster. They
also added a new section with an
uphill triple, which only a few of
the top pros attempted to clear.
Temperatures were brutal all
weekend with the mercury climb-
ing past the century mark on Friday
and Saturday. On Sunday, an
onshore flow cooled it off in the
morning and temperatures fell to
the mid-80s at the start of the race.
Robert and Bell fought it out
at the start, and Robert took the
holeshot on his KTM. Bell, who
set the top qualifying time on his
Kawasaki, stayed with Robert for
the first hour before pitting. Due
to a tight riverbed section that led
to a bottleneck, several bikes in
other classes got stuck. During
the last 40 minutes of the race,
Taylor had to wait for the traffic
to clear and his lead evaporated.
However, Robert pulled away in
the waning laps and went on to
take the victory.
"I got off to a great start and
tried to do everything I could to
stay in front of Zach," said Robert.
"It was a flawless race other than
that one bottleneck. This track was
even fast for what I like to do. They
used all of the wide-open stuff so
they could keep water on it, and it
made for a high-speed track."
Bell netted his fourth runner-
up finish of the season and now
sits third in points. After pitting,
he crashed and spent precious
seconds getting his bike back on
track. Though a motocross racer
by experience, Bell is learning
quickly to adapt to the many dif-
ferent types of terrain that com-
prise WORCS tracks and had it
not been for that one mistake,
he likely would have challenged
Robert at the end.
"That one mistake just sent me
back and put me in second," said
