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/128103
AMA G rand N ational C r o s s Country S es : R o u n d 5 AM A N a t io nal Champion s h ip Hare S c r a m b le s S erie s : R o und 3 Loretta Lynn's R a n c h Kiedrowski had to be atte nded by medics fo r dehydration , bu t the "MX Kied " was not al o ne . T hree -time AMA Na ti onal En d ur o Cham p ion Mike Laffert y also nearly ran him self int o the g ro und while try ing to earn his fi rsteve r GNCC overa ll. Lafferty le d the race int o the third hour before succumb ing to exhaust ion. The KTMm ount ed rider took the white flag still in third p lac e, but had to quit the race a short time later. La ff erty was n' t the first KTM factory rid er to drop out of the race before the fin ish. Sh ane Watts , th e us ually bull et -proof A ussie star, had battl ed bac k through th e pack to lead at the end of the first hour, but then parked his KTM near the halfway po int , saying that h is hea rt just wasn't in it. " Before th e end of th e second lap, I was in the lead, and after that, I just wasn 't hav in g fun, true and sim p le," sai d Watts , matter -of-factly . "I wasn 't havin g fu n a nymore, and it' s b een like th at fo r a while, I have to ad m it. I j ust g o t t o t he st ag e where I d id n 't want to rid e anymore. I like to have fun no m atter what I'm doing, and it wasn 't fu n anymore, so I needed to sto p . So I just pulled in. I gotta apologize to all my sponsors and all my fans for pulling in but, at the end of th e d a y I 'm j u s t tr ying to please myself, and I was not enjoying things whatsoever. It' s hard to explain." In the new GNCC points system , where ev er y race counts toward the B y D AVEY C OOMB S PHOTOS BY BRIAN NYLANDER/ D IRT RIDER APRIL 22. HURRICANE MILLS, TN n an action -packed afternoon of offr o a d rac ing at its finest, Team G re e n ' s Fred Andrews came from dead last to take the lead on the last lap and win the annual "woods racing summit" in Tennessee, known as the Loretta Lynn's GNCC/National Hare Scram b les. Andrews , a 35-yea r-old v e t e r a n rac er from Salem , Ohio , dropped his KX250 in the first turn along with defend ing GNCC cham pio n Sh ane Watts , then spent the rest of the nearly 3 hours, 10 minutes of rac ing tr y in g to cl imb back i nt o con te ntion . Andrews finally secured the lead just before the end of the fifth of six laps, then held off a la te charge from T e a m FMF/Suzuk i's Rod ney Sm ith for his first win of 20 01. "I knew Rodney 's b e st sh o t of pas sin g me was on the grass track at th e finish , so I just hung in there and, when we got closer to the grass track , I just floored it and tried to get some lapp ers i n b etw een us , " ex p l ai ned Andrews wh o , like Sm ith, is a former professiona l motocros s rac er . "Luckily , it worked out tha t wa y . A couple of guy s s lowed h im down , and it allowe d me to ge t away from h im a little bit , and I finall y won one!" I 32 MAY 9 , 2001 • II: U II: I e " Fred di e was riding strong, and I was m a y b e sav ing if for the e nd around the grass track and m otocross stuff, but he was prepared and read y for it, " expla ined Smith of the sp rint to the finish. " A s soon as we shot across the road , he di d n 't back off. He rode a good race. " Andrews blasted his Kawasak i KX250 across the fin ish line j ust five seconds ahead of Smith , who was looking for his th ird win in five GNCC races to date. Smith 's Suzuk i teammate Steve Hatch was just another 18 seconds back in third, followed by the im pressive Jason Raines. As a mea sure of just how close the lead pack was all day, Raines, a rising off-road star from Washington state, finished 33 -seconds behind th ird-placed Hatch, but was still within a minute of the race winner. Team FMF/Suzuk i's Mike Kiedrowski, the fo rmer fo ur-time AMA National MX Champion, again showed that he is figuring out th e easte rn off-road woods. Ki edrow sk i fin ishe d fifth for the second-straight rac e, gi vi ng h im three top-five finishes on th e season. Ho w e ve r , t he unsea son ab ly w arm weath er left the Cal ifornian ex hauste d aft er t h r e e hours o f ri di n g a t an inte nse pace . n e vv s (Top) Fred Andrews ended his win drought with a victory at the hot Loretta Lynn's Hare ScrambleslGNCC doubleheader, taking over the points lead in the former series. [Above ) Rodney Smith splashes through a stream on his way to second place, with FMF Suzuki teammate Mike Kiedrowski following. Smith now le ad s the tiUe chase In the prestigious GNCC Series.