Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

AMAlEA Sports Supercross Series Round 13: Pontiac Silverdo which was relatively constant, depending mostly on traffic. "I was doing really good, riding really smart," Carmichael said. "Lappers messed me up a little bit and he put some time on me, but he got tangled up in them too and I was able to pull back out my lead." Lusk felt he could not only match Carmichael's pace, he was beating it. "I think I was probably the fastest guy," he said. "Once I got into second, I could see Ricky. We must have stayed on the same] Oth of a second. I couldn't do anything. It seemed like I made up time that lap and I got to that point that I'd look at him every lap and it's like the same." Between the lappers and a deteriorating track, Lusk decided to conserve his position, which was safe from attack. e LaRocco dropped Windham to fourth on the ninth lap and set out for Lusk and Carmichael, but it was too late. "Ezra was pretty much on Ricky's pace and pushing him a little bit, and I was tailing behind there and then we got to lapped traffic and I lost Ezra, and I don't think the track ever really cleared out. I ended up not being able to do a couple of sections it seemed like two or three laps in a row and I fell back and was pretty much stuck in third." Windham would lose one more spot when McGrath passed him on the ] 5th lap. The defending champion came into the race in high spirits. The team had improved the suspension on the YZ250 and McGrath felt he had momentum from his heat race win. "I was having fun," he said. But it wouldn't last. Every week, Rich Winkler and his Dirt Wurx crew seem to find a new way to challenge the riders. This week, it was a set of whoops so deep that Ricky Carmichael said, "We looked like German soldiers, our helmets popping out of the ground." Carmichael was bitten by the whoops, as were others, Jeremy McGrath making a nice save for an almost crash. And nearly all of the other front-runners found themselves eating dirt at one time or another. The list included Kevin Windham, Sebastien Tortelli (twice), Tim Ferry, the aforementioned Cannichael, and a slew of others. Carmichael's crash might have been the most spectacular, the championship leader losing control near the end of the whoop section, the rear swapping back and forth like a windshield wiper before cleaning him off and throwing him over the bars. Luckily, he was clear of his KX250 as it tumbled toward him and he was able to remount and finish second. "Just got a little wild there the last lap trying to carry more speed through there and the thing bit me in the butt," Carmichael, who injured his groin in the crash, said. While he was down, Ezra Lusk zipped by for the second heat-race win. ·You know Ijust told myself, it's not over, it's not over, it's not over," Lusk said. "I just fought all the way to the very end. Kept my lap times real low. I was trying a couple of new things on the track. Trying to get it together if something happens. That's what I kept telling myself. I was able to capitalize on it that time." Cannlchael had owned the heat until he went down on the final lap, three turns from the checkered flag. Lusk had moved into second on the second lap after passing Stephane Roncada, the Frenchman in his first race since Injuring both heels during the Daytona Supercross a month ago. "They didn't bother me too much in a race situation," Roncada said. There was another injured Frenchman in the second heat, Sebastien Tortelli. Tortelli had punctured his knee in a practice crash at St. Louis last week, but felt well enough to race (See Briefly...). He didn't get the chance. Just after the two lefts following the start chute, Tortelli was accidentally taken out by Kevin Windham. "It happened so quick. I kind of high-sided," Windham said. "I think me and Roncada may have just slightly touched, enough to break my front end loose. I hit the ground pret· ty hard, was slow getting up. Just kind of rode around." "Kevin crashed and threw the bike on the left side and I was there and received the bike and crashed." Tortelli said. "After that, I crashed again on my own [on the fourth lap). I landed in a hole in the bumps actually, and it threw me over the bars." Both would head to the semis. The first heat had been less dramatic. McGrath caught a flyer and was gone, generously padding his lead with every lap, leaving Yamaha's Tun Ferry to try to catch him, with little success. On the sixth lap, Ferry fell in a slow left and Mike laRocco zoomed past to take second. "I was trying to push hard in one of the comers and just washed the front end out and fell over," Ferry said. "laRocco got by and I couldn't get back by him." McGrath won by over 10 seconds with laRocco second and Ferry third. TheEdgeSports.com's Casey Johnson was fourth in front of St. Louis Powerspor1$' Pedro Gonzales. Gonzales got the jump in the first semi, soon to be passed by TheEdgeSports.com's Michael Byrne, who would leave him for about a three-second win. Pro Caliber's Jason McCormick and Moto XXX's Kyle Lewis were third and fourth. TortelU and Windham were the only factory riders in the second semi, even if they didn't ride that way at the start. Blackfoot Honda's Doug Dehaan and Jean-Sebastien Roy were quick out of the gate, Tortelli back in fourth with Windham in sixth at the end of the ftrSt lap. Roy moved Dehaan back on lap two and TorteW dropped him another spot on lap three, Windham easing his way to the front. Tortelli used a jump sequence to take the lead on the fourth lap, Windham making his way to the front, up to third on the same lap after passing Dehaan at the end of a whoop section on the track perimeter, Dehaan getting bounced out of the seat while trying to keep up. Windham used the same section to pass Roy for second, where he'd finish, about 2.5 seconds back. "I got a pretty bad start and was way back and was able to come up to second," Windham said. "Sebastien rode a good ride there. Definitely had my share of laps there." The final two riders into the 20-rider main were Shenandoah Honda's Kevin Crine and Dreyer CVC's Jeffrey Baker Jr. Crine led start to finish and Baker.got the better of Jimmy Wilson on the fifth of sixth laps. - 16 APRIL 18, 2001 • cue I • n • _ s The motor mount bolt fell off on the third lap, while he was in third. "What happens wh.en you get vibration like that or ·the motor mount's loose or falls out, you lose forward momentum, because it's not tight anymore," McGrath explained. "So you can't get forward momentum. So that's why I was so sucking in the whoops. I could get through the whoops, but it was vibrating so bad it had no pull forward and I was frying the dutch trying to get it to go. It was a few things. It's not really a safety issue. It's just hard to ride." He fell from third to fourth before realizing he wasn't in danger. "I kind of figured it's not going to fall apart on me, 'it's just vibrating really bad so I'll just make the best of what happened,'" McGrath said. "I saw Windham kind of fading back a little bit and I thought if I could get him I'd be doing good. That's really about it." At the end of the night Windham would say it, "Was a struggle." He'd had to ride the heat and the semi, but that didn't affect him. It was more that he "Just kind of wasn't quite ready to go with those guys," he said. Tim Ferry was able to pass him once on the final lap, but couldn't make it stick. He made a final run at him in the last left hairpin before the finish jump, the two bumping, but Windham held on for fifth. A loose motor mount held "eremy McGrath to a fourth-place finIsh. "We made contact in the last corner," Ferry said. "( was going to try to go inside, he kind of knew it though, and he moved it over a little bit, which was smart for him. I kind of barely bumped. I knew I couldn't make the pass. I wanted to let him know I was still there." Ferry had been cursed by a bad start. The track offered plenty of traction he said, but the YZ426F was wheelying really badly, and somehow he ended up ] 5th out of the first tum. From then on, it was target practice, picking off riders wherever he could on his way to sixth on the ] Oth lap. The last rider he passed was Roncada. "He had a pretty good lead and in front of him there was a pretty good gap to Windham and McGrath," Ferry said. "I just caught up to [Roncada] really fast and couldn't get by him, but I think from his weeks off he was kind of tired. Once I got past him I started catching Jeremy, and Windham was fading and I passed him once on the last lap." Having not ridden for a month, Roncada said the main was, "Pretty tough." He finished the first lap in fourth before dropping back to sixth on the next lap, a spot he'd hold until first Ferry, then Reynard passed him.

• Cover