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/128154
Emesto Fonseca (241. Cannichael (41. Nick Wey (281. Stephane Roncada (211. Lusk (111 and Yuillemin (121 grab gears at the start of the final 250cc main of the year. series at Salt Lake, finished out his year on the podium with a third-place showing. After a so-so start, Vuillemin never really had a shot at the win in Vegas. He completed the first lap in sixth and fought his way up to third by the fifth lap, but by then, Carmichael was too far gone for Vuillemin to catch. The Frenchman did have a shot at Lusk, though, and he went for it. At one point, near the halfway mark, Vuillemin trailed Lusk by eight seconds, but he had whittled that margin down to just three seconds at the finish. It was a valiant effort by Vuillemin, but Lusk got the upperhand on this night. One of the best rides of the evening belonged to Team Honda's Nathan Ramsey, who rounded the first lap in ninth. He quickly went to work, picking off riders one by one until he had control of fourth by the ninth lap. Ramsey even made a run on Vuillemin in the late stages, finishing about three seconds behind the Yamaha rider and well ahead of McGrath. McGrath was hoping for a win at Las Vegas, which would have prevented him from experiencing his first ever winless season in supercross, but a bad start doomed the seventime supercross champ. The Bud Light Yamaha rider rounded the first lap in 10th, ending any thoughts he had of winning. He did, however, charge to fifth, where he would finish out the race ahead of Honda's Ernesto Fonseca, Chevy Trucks Kawasaki's Stephane Roncada, Moto XXX/DGY riders Nick Weyand Lewis, and LCRRacing.com's Keith R. Johnson. MAIN Kyle Lewis, on the CRF450R fourstroke Honda, nailed the holeshot for the second time of the evening (he also took the holeshot in his heat race), but when Carmichael went by him a few turns later, many fans started thinking about making an early run to the casinos. Their assumption that Carmichael was about to run away with another win was, as it turned out, right on the money. The Team Honda rider opened up a comfortable lead and was never headed, but he really couldn't relax completely, because Lusk, who had gotten around Lewis through the track's under-over section on the second lap, was always within a Carmichael mistake, or crash, of making this one a race. But that mistake from Carmichael never came, as Carmichael maintained about a four-, then five·, and then six-second advantage over Lusk for most of the race. That gap would peak at 8.1 seconds on the secondto-last lap, when Lusk decided to cool his engines a bit, giving up what was until then a gallant effort. "I wanted to put in 20 good laps," Carmichael said of his race. "I saw Ezra back there, and he was riding good. I was wondering if he was going to catch up to me - we kind of stayed the same; I'd pull a little bit, then kind of stay the same. I wanted to get in a rhythm and ride the same lines for 20 laps, and that's what I did." "I wanted to try and get up there and just fight with Ricky and try to make a race out of it," Lusk said. "I wanted to get close enough to try to put some kind of pressure on him. I fought and fought and fought. I was blowing this one section about five or six times and lost about half a second there. With probably five or six laps to go, he got a little bit more of a gap on me, and I just decided to play it safe; it was the last race, and I just started thinking about the next weekend. I guess I should've raced all the way to the end, but the track was so f!J{§5@@@ @®&JD!J(};J!J[ff]@ §fi]~[l fX]il@)@ffrB Jeremy McGrath had it easy in the first heat race. Kyle Lewis beat him out to the first tum, but McGrath got him before the first lap was over. From there, McGrath steadily pulled away and ran away with the win, taking the checkered flag 13 seconds ahead of Ernesto Fonseca, who came up through the pack, made a nice pass on Lewis, and finished all alone in second. Lewis held on to third, but not by much. David Vuillemin had problems on the first lap and spent the whole race making up for it. At one point, Vuillemin was running in 15th place, but that didn't last for long. By the fifth lap of the eight-lap race, Vuillemin had taken control of fourth, and he caught Lewis on the last lap. He couldn't get dose enough to attempt a pass, but he did make the fmal transfer, well ahead of MotoworldRacing.com/Suzuki's Damon Huffman. McGrath's best lap during the heat was a 54.064. Ricky Carmichael led the second heat race from start to finish and was never really challenged, though Ezra Lusk wasn't too far behind after passing Sebastien Tortelli and teammate Stephane Roncada. Lusk was definitely on the gas, and his lap times proved it. Even though Carmichael's winning time was the fastest of the heat races, with a 53.047, Lusk's was second-fastest with a 54.052. Roncada finished out the second heat in third, while Tortelli took fourth and the final transfer. The semis didn't provide a whole lot of action, but that was jllS! fme with Nathan Ramsey and Moto XXX/DGY's Nick Wey, as both riders had an easy time of winning their respective semis. Ramsey won the first semi but had one uneasy moment when he bobbled on the first lap and saw Damon Huffman pass him for the lead. Ramsey, however, came right back, cut underneath Huffman and went on to win with five seconds to spare over the Suzuki rider. Finishing right behind Huffman in third was Blackfoot Honda's Jean·Sebastien Roy, who was followed across the finish line by Canadian Darcy Lange and Fast By Ferracci/Husqvama's Tyler Evans, who took the final transfer. After passing Chaparral's Zeb Armstrong 00 the first lap, Wey went on to win the second semi quite nandily over LCR Racing riders Ryan Clark and Keith R. Johnson. Armstrong dropped back to finish fourth, while Moto XXX-backed Michael Young took fifth and the final transfer. In th.e last-chance qualifier, from which only the top two riders transfer, Pro Caliber/Suz).lki's Isaiah Johnson managed to avoid a big fust-tum pile-up and go on to win, but not by much. Blackfoot Honda's James Povolny Jr. gave Johnson a race to fin· ish, while YSA Sport's Ted Campbell finished a dose third, but one spot out of a transfer. c U c I e n e _ 55 • MAY 15, 2002 9