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/128150
AMA Grand National Cross Country Series Round 4: Big Buck GNCC (Left) Mike Lafferty is proving that he Is more than just an enduro specialist. The multi-time National Enduro Champion pulled off his first GNCC win. (BelowI Cole Caulkins (13) grabs the hoIeshot ahead of Robbie Jenks 181 and ~ Smith (1). to finally get up here." Even Lafferty's strongest challenger, series points leader Jason Raines, couldn't rattle him. "You could tell it was going to be his day," Raines said. "I was all over him, and he didn't make any mistakes. I was right on him, revving, yelling at him I tried to do everything to break his concentration. He was really riding with confidence today." "Whoever was there, it didn't matter," Lafferty said. "I was just going fast, and even if they passed me, I knew it was a long race, and I would be able to get them back." In fact, it was Raines who bobbled when he stuck his bike in a deep mudhole late in the race and dropped STORY AND PHOTOS BY JASON WEIGANDT CROSS ANCHOR, SC, APRIL 7 month ago, four-time AMA National Enduro Champion Mike Lafferty was on the verge of grabbing his first AMA Grand National Cross Country win. But after leading all the way to the white flag, the KTM rider faltered under pressure, relinquished the lead, and dropped to third. At the fourth round of the series, Lafferty held the lead all day again, but this time, there was no stopping him. "No way was I going to give this one up after the last race," Lafferty said. "I've been working really hard at this for the last four years. It feels really good 40 APRIL 17, 2002' cue I e n __ s back to third, opening the door for SCR Yamaha rider Robbie Jenks to score a career-best second overall. Just five seconds separated Jenks and Lafferty at the finish. Mike Kiedrowski was fourth on his FMF Suzuki, and Fred Andrews finished fifth aboard a Team Green Kawasaki, but they crossed the line over two and a half minutes behind the lead trio. Kiedrowski, a four-time AMA National Motocross Champion and the current WORCS king, summed up his distant fourth-place finish simply: "I have to figure out a way to go faster." Andrews and his perennial series rival Rodney Smith both suffered through tough days, as Andrews couldn't make up ground after a bad start, and Smith smashed the pipe on his FMF Suzuki and finished seventh. Shane Watts, the 2000 GNCC Champion, missed his fourth race while waiting for his broken wrist to heal. So the Big Buck belonged to the young guns, especially Lafferty, who grabbed the lead from Smith early and never looked back, pulling no more than a 3D-second gap on his pursuers, but never allowing them to get close enough to seriously challenge him. With the win, Lafferty has closed the gap on Yamaha's Raines, who has 91 points to Lafferty's 87. Andrews is third with 72. The Big Buck race took place in the rolling hills of South Carolina, and featured an 11-mile course composed almost entirely of tight woods. The track got rougher as the day went on, exposing tree roots in each comer. GNCC Trail Boss Jeff Russell, who like Lafferty has won AMA Enduro titles and GNCC events, added two deep mud pits and a spectacular water jump to the track as well. "The track got really rough," Jenks said. "Some sections were hardpacked, and some were really soft, so you had to adjust to staying on top of it in one section and then digging down through it in another." The top pros raced six laps around the course, which put the race just under the three-hour mark on time. Between the ATV, minicycle and bike classes, nearly 1000 riders contested