Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

now, and he was happ y to post a strong result while s porting th e Jurassic Park III graphics and appare l (see Briefly ). F ifth ove rall went to Windha m , whi c h may s urp rise you consi d ering that he neve r m ad e it to the checkers in mota t wo . S in c e he h ad lap ped m a n y rider s b e fo re h is incident , Windh am was a ctua lly cr edited with 13th p lac e in that ra ce , a s he was the top ride r not to complete th e lead lap. (Tortelli , too . wa s credite d with 13thp la ce p o in ts in the mot a t h a t he didn 't complete.) MOTO 1 Wh en David Vuillemin re alized a few turns into his s ighting la p that h is rear bra k e wa sn ' t fun ct ion in g , h e e n d e d it p rem a t u re ly a n d m ade a b ee -lin e for th e sta rting area, whe re Yamaha officia ls madly re placed the e n tire sy st e m while the start was slightly de la ye d . "Eve rybo dy else was ready to go, so [a fte r the bike wa s fixed). I wasn 't very concentrated , " admitted Vuille m in, who is still suffering pain in h is rib ca rtila ge . "Then the brake didn't wo rk good in the beginning. " Once the gate fell, Cemics.com/ PC Wo rldwide rider John Dowd s nar ed a perfect ju m p on his big KTM 520cc fou r-stroke , which he subsequently employed to maximum benefit, roarin g to the fir st turn ahead o f Carmichael, Windham and the rest of the pack. "Ma n, I came out of the gate pe rfect !" Do wd sa id . "Just a perfe ct wheel ie, a nd I just came rig ht out of there." Dowd held hi s le a d off the sk i jum p and through th e following turn , but when he c a me up s ho rt on th e pipe jump that followed , he lost the po int pos ition to Ca rm ich ael while he focused o n avoiding a c ra s h. "I tried to go to the inside to prote ct th e line," Dowd said. "I so rt of slid on the face, an d I cased the thing . Once I got o ut of th e way, Ca rm ichael la nded right where I was. I was like , 'Wo a h, that was close!" and I kind of squ irted off the s ide of the track there . It shook me up a little bit ." With dust waft ing across the track, C a rm ic h a e l led Windham , Tortelli , Hughes and Dowd after one circuit, and although Windham made an early p us h, he wa s passed just over one lap later b y a stampeding Tortell i. The Fr enchman was fin ding sweet lines a round the track, and by the midway po int, he had pulled all the way up to Carmichael's rear fen der - no mean fea t, to be sure. To rte lli, who won here la st year, sought a way aroun d for se ve ral more revolutio ns, though he lost a. little gro un d on th e eig hth la p. He recovered , however , and finally , with a little less than five laps remain ing , Tortelli found a way by. "I was doing the double after the s ki jump, and Ricky wasn't do ing it," Torte II i said. "I came into the corner and gave a lot of pressure and was going to pass him . He saw that and gassed it hard and screwed up in the corner , and with that momentum , I pa sse d him on the outside ." " No, la s t y e a r he k illed us a ll [here] ," Carmichael said when asked if he was surpr ised by Torte ll i' s speed . "I knew the la s t two weeks that th is is the one that he was go ing to be tough at. He was riding re a lly fas t, blowing out a lot of the turns , he was riding so ha rd . I thought I wo uld be one step ah ead of where I was la st year. He had some good line s . Ther e was one of the jumps out of one of the turns th at I wa sn 't do ing . I ha d a run -in with a la pp er, and he kind o f swept ar o und th e outside th er e , a nd th at wa s it. " To rte lli wa s on fire, a nd he p ut a sm all gap on Ca rmic ha el as the mota n e a r e d it s e nd . On th e fina l go - around , ho wever , ligh tning struck Tortelli, as his bike stoppe d running on a plateau jump in the back section of the tra ck. He managed to bump start it momentarily, bu t it died again after carrying him just a little closer to th e finish , and Tortell i was left to push to the fin ish . Unfortunately, he wasn 't able to c ro ss the line once he got there , as the s t e e p j ump face before the line proved im po ssi ble to s u rmo u nt without internal c o m b ustio n . Wh ile m e ch ani c Shan e Drew lo oked on helpl essly (no outs ide ass istanc e is a llowed ), Tortell i pull ed and dragged h is lifeles s CR . b ut he co uldn' t fin d s uffic ie nt foot ing a nd finally gave up . Ca rm ich a e l, mea n - (Below left) Also making the podium for the first time this year was Stephane Ro nca da 1 21). He finis h ed third overall at Re d Bud. lBelow right) D ow d 116) has been making a habit of g etting h oleshots on the 520Cc KTM. Here. he and Roncada get a little too close for comfort. cue I e Ryan Hughes 112 0 ), here leading John Dowd 116) and Feny 115). put the CRF450R on the podium f or the first time. Hughes took runner-up honors. while, leapt by the checkers with a "wh a t can I say?" shrug , accepting To rte lli's charity. "Wha t can I say," Tortelli asked . "I tried and I pushe d , a nd the bike wouldn't start anymore . The bikes are getting better and faster , and there's more electron ic stuff - more stuff that you can't co ntro l when yo u ride . [The finish- line jump] wa s pretty high , so I couldn 't ge t it. It was pretty steep." T ortell i' s DN F me a n t ev eryo n e m oved up a spot, with Windham tak ing seco nd and Roncada raisin g ey ebrows in th ird place. Ta k ing fourt h was loca l bo y Mike La Rocco (fro m ne a rby So uth Be nd , Ind ia na ), who se Amsoil/ Dr. Martens/Journeys/ Co m- nevvs JULY II, 2 00 1 7

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