Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Vulllemin's last AMA Supercross win came In April of 2000. Yamaha, just couldn't get up to speed at Anaheim. The seven-time champ locked bars with Kevin Windham down the start chute and rounded the first lap in 11 th place. He got as high as ninth before tangling with Mike Brown on the fifth lap and dropping to 16th. From there, McGrath just rode around the track, seemingly unmotivated and stuck behind Honda rider Heath Voss. He eventually got around him and a couple of other riders to finish out the race a very unMcGrath-like 13th. "Thirteenth, that's ridiculous," McGrath said. "It's weird, a freaky deal. I got up there, got a little tight. I wasn't able to ride, I wasn't able to go - I couldn't go. "It started off with a bad start," McGrath added. "Me and Kevin kind of got together a little bit there and the first turn was kind of mayhem. I started to go and got tight, I don't know, it's weird. I haven't really experienced that before." questionable - and was rewarded with a third-place trophy. He did, however, spend much of the race dicing with fellow Honda rider Michael Byrne, of the Amsoil/Dr. Martens/Honda/Factory Connection team, but finally got the Aussie for good late in the race to secure a podium finish. "I'm happy," Fonseca said. "It's my first race on the 250 and I'll take third, for sure. I was really nervous the whole day, but after the first race, it will be a lot better. I didn't really expect to get third in my first race ever on a 250." As for Carmichael and McGrath, both riders had a miserable first round and, between the two, earned just nine points on the night - one for Carmichael and eight for McGrath. Usually, it's closer to 47 combined points, but not tonight. Carmichael, the defending champion who was hoping to win his 14th supercross race in a row (including last year) to break McGrath's record, was off to a good start before suffering a frightening-looking endo over a step-up table-top jump, the same jump that he had problems with earlier in the day during practice. The Honda rider was running second at the time, on the fifth lap, and had Vuillemin in his sights and LaRocco on his tail when he cartwheeled. Carmichael slammed his face onto the ground and was obviously dazed by the impact. He laid on the track for several minutes while medics attended the downed rider, and the once cheering and screaming sell-out crowd went silent with concern. But the crowd roared to life when RC got back on his feet and walked, with some assistance, back to the Honda pits with a bloody nose and a gash on his chin. Carmichael was immediately transported to a hospital to get checked out. "There was that steep jump there everything is okay. The only thing I that he hit, and it just kind of threw is know [about the injury] is that I talked front-end down, over the top," When asked if he suffered arm pump during the race, he admitted to Dr. [John] Bodner [the official that he had. "Man, it's funny, the two guys everyone was hyping up, just blew Carmichael's team manager Erik Supercross doctor], who said that he Kehoe said. "He clipped the top and was complaining a little bit about his went over the bars. He landed really neck and his head, he just hit the hard; that dirt over there was like ground really hard. He got up and he Byrne, who ran as high as third while pavement, and then the bike kind of kind of knew what was going on. He dicing with Fonseca. After Carmichael drilled him. He's really sore, he hit his appears to be okay." up!" he said. One rider who certainly didn't blow up was Honda-mounted Michael face and they wanted to transport McGrath, meanwhile, who was crashed and things spread out a bit, he and Fonseca were supplying most him, check him out and make sure making his debut on the Bud Light of the entertainment for the rest of the iiJD0 [PGfJfJiJD[j)@@} afd@@@@ da, Jean-Sebastien Roy, Steve Lamson and Brown, before taking the checkers in fourth. Supercross newcomer Chad Reed took fifth ahead of Lamson and Roncada. Nathan Ramsey, on the factory Honda CRF450R, took eighth after getting off to a bad start. Motoworldracing.com/ Suzuki's Damon Huffman took ninth, while Brown rounded out the top 10 afterfalling. Carmichael was the star of heat race two, but he had some tough competition in this race, such as Kevin Windham, Ezra Lusk and David Vuillemin. But Carmichael was up to the challenge, as he put his Chad Watts-tuned Honda into the lead right off the gate. Windham pulled in right behind him, as did Vuillemin on Windham. Lusk, however, didn't get the start he wanted, putting his KX into sixth behind Michael Byrne and Kyle Lewis. Windham gave Carmichael a race for a few laps, but just couldn't quite hang on to Carmichael's flying Honda. Pretty soon, Vuillemin started challenging Windham and eventually got him through one of the whoop sections. Meanwhile. Lusk was making forward progress, passing both Lewis and Byrne along the way. Pretty soon, Lusk had Windham in his sights and reeled him in, too. Lusk eventually swooped past Windham in the whoops and went on to take third behind winner Carmichael, who had a comfortable lead on Vuillemin. Lusk finished fairly close to Vuillemin in third, while Windham took the fourth and final transfer. Finishing a close fifth was Byrne, while Moto XXX's Nick Wey grabbed sixth. Seventh went to Wey's teammate Lewis, on the CRF450R, while Ryan Clark, Heath Voss and Ted Campbell rounded out the top 10. In the first 250cc semi, where the top five riders transfer to the main, Brown nailed the holeshot but Reed cut to the inside of him through the first tum and took the lead. From there, Reed took control and rode off with the win, though Ramsey, who got around Shark/plano Honda's Scott Sheak and Brown, made things close for Reed at the end. Ramsey took second, followed by Roncada, Brown and Motoworldracing.com/Suzuki Damon Huffman. Sheak missed the transfer by one spot. Blackfoot Honda's Heath Voss and Byrne had a heated battle for the win in the second semi. Voss led for a while until Byrne stuffed him in a tum. A lap later, Voss returned the favor and took back the lead. Byrne slammed Voss again, forcing Voss to role the triples, sealing his fate. Byrne went on to win, followed by Voss. Lewis, Tyler Evans and Wey. Jean-Sebastien Roy and Lamson squeaked into the main event after finishing 1-2 in the Last Chance qualifier, while Mike Craig finished third. {Jf}[j) @(}j]ffJD5lJ;f5OD@]» With Jeremy McGrath seeded in the first 250cc heat race and Ricky Carmichael in the second heat race, many were expecting McGrath to have an easy time of it in the first 250cc race of the season, but Mike laRocco and Travis Pastrana weren't about to give up without a fight. As pretty much expected, McGrath put his Bud Light Yamaha YZ250 into the early lead after passing Mike Brown through the first couple of turns. Brown, on the Pro Circuit/Chevy Trucks/Kawasaki, nailed the holeshot, but, before the first lap was over, dropped back to fourth behind McGrath, laRocco and Pastrana. McGrath opened up a small lead, but LaRocco and Pastrana closed the gap right back up a few laps later, and then laRocco started actually turning up the pressure on the seven-time Supercross Champion. By the fifth lap, LaRocco was hammering on McGrath's back door and was setting him up for a pass. laRocco eventually cut underneath McGrath and drove him to the outside, taking over the lead. McGrath did not have an answer for laRocco, who immediately started pulling away from the Yamaha rider. And McGrath's troubles weren't over yet, as he now had Pastrana breathing down his back. Pastrana was on the attack as he zeroed in on the fading rider. With a few laps to go, Pastrana pulled alongside McGrath and outrode him through the whoops to take over second. McGrath didn't seem to put up much of a fight after that, as Pastrana quickly pulled away from the Yamaha rider and actually started gaining some ground on laRocco, who, at this late point in the race, had the win in the bag. laRocco eventually took the first 250cc win of the 2002 Supercross Series with a few seconds to spare over Pastrana, while McGrath finished a few more seconds back in third. "That was nice, because this isn't my favorite kind of dirt and felt a little sketchy in practice," laRocco said of the win. "But I tried to do some homework this fall and get my speed up early [in the race] and for me to win an eight-lap race is good, because I don't normally. I'm usually better in a long race, so I was happy with that." As for McGrath's mysterious performance: "I just got real tense and pumped up," McGrath said. Fourth place went to Ernesto Fonseca. The two-time 125cc SX champ started off in eighth, passed such riders as Stephane Roncao U c •• n • _ 50 • JANUARY 16, 2002 7

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