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/127584
OveraIl wi nn er Jeff Emig showboated during the final lap of the second 125cc mota. end of lap six, a nd took over second place. Lamson passed him back soon after, but laRocco got the position for good before the ski jump. Stanton mad e a cha rge at Lamson and pa ssed him a t the halfway poin t, and from that point on, the top five positions remained the same as Kiedrowski crossed the line the winner. La Rocco wasn't able to ma ke much of a dent in his teamma te's lead, finishi ng six seconds behin d in second. Stanton was third , a full 20 seconds in arrears of Lalcocco, with Lamson close behind in fourth . Matiasevich he ld on for fifth , and Brooks was sixth . Tuf Racing 's Jo h n Dowd, KTM's Cliff Palmer, Tuf Racing 's Mike Healey and Suzuki's Guy Cooper completed the top 10. " Yamaha's Damon Bradshaw, who one year ago at Red Bud suffered the knee injury that for all practical purposes ended his season, gated poorly and dropped out of the moto early on when oil began leaking fro m a hole in his engine case. Yamaha tech nicians swapped motors between motos. • Moto two began much the sa me as the first outi ng, with Matiasevich lead ing Lamso n through tum one . Stanto n, Kiedrowski, Bro o ks , Coope r and la Rocco followed . In a corne r halfway th rough the firs t lap, Lamson mad e a bid for the lead , but came up sho rt and tumbled down the follow ing d escent. " I thought I co u l d g e t h im (Matiase vich) on the inside of that tum," explained Lamson. "I was as insid e as you can get, but he cut back in and I hit him. There was a metal po st beside the track and my handlebar hit it and I fell down the hill. My handlebar was wedged in my knee brace and I got up dead last. After tha t I was so mad at myself, I just went as fast as I could." Near th e co mp letion of the la p , Kiedrowski cut inside Stanton in a tum to move into second, then se t his sights on the leading Matiasevich. On lap two, Kiedrowski mo ved into th e lead in a back section of the track. Stanton passed Ma tias evich soon after, and the Suzuki pilo t ap peared to back off and cruise. "The power va lve broke , and I didn't have any powe r," explained Ma tiasevich. laRocco was intent on imp roving his position, and made an attempt at passing Cooper over the ski jump. Cooper held him off, bu t laRocco made a pass that stuck a few turns later. LaRocco then passed the struggling Matiasevich for third. The top three rid ers - Kiedrowski, Stanton and LaRocco - circulated the track at a blinding pace, quickly leaving fourth-place Cooper behind. LaRocco seemed particularly determined, and on the fif th go-around, he attempted to triple LaRocco's Leap, a huge uphill jump that everyone had been doubling after the take-off ramp became rutted in p ractice. laRocco had cleared the triple the year befor e on a 125, but the ruts slowed his d rive an d he came up short. Th e th ird ju mp wa s rou nded, but laRocco still landed har d, and opted to d ouble the obsta cle from that poin t on . On the next lap, howev er, laRocco got by Stanton for second on an uphill, then started closing the three-second gap on Kiedrowski. "My back 's still bothering me," said Stanton, r ef err in g to a n inju ry h e received three weeks earlier, before the Hangtown round . " I' m still not sure exactly what I did to it. I thought it was better because I rode every day during the week, but that's different (than racing) ." Erik Kehoe (22 ), Larry Ward (9) and Todd DeHoop (38) diced in the 125cc clasS: Mi ke Kiedrowski (3) and runner-up Mike laRocco (5)battled in the second 250ccmota. 7