Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

AMAIChevy Trucks U.S. Superb ike Championship Round 1 1: Brainerd International Raceway AMAILockhart-Phillips USA Formula Xtreme Round 6: Brainerd International Raceway By HENNY RAY ABRAMS PHOTO BY BRIAN J. NELSON BRAINERD, MN, JUNE 30 n the second lap of the Lockhart-Phillips USA Formula Xtreme race on a sweltering afternoon at Brainerd International Raceway, Marty Craggill stopped breathing. Craggill's left foot, tucked inside an oversized boot, had slipped off the footpeg, then came back and bashed his instep right about where the three bones he broke in a near-crash at Road America three weeks ago were knitting themselves together. The pain was overwhelming, but there were 11 laps to go and he was near the lead. "Then I was just thinking about my foot and stopped breathing," he said. "Then I couldn't recover and then Jason [Pridmorej came by, and then, after a while, I got my act together and started racing." Valvoline EMGO Suzuki's Craggill, then at the tail end of a four-rider lead breakaway, held his position for the first half of the race before making his move. His Suzuki GSX-R1000 was the fastest of the field and he used the power on the long, front straightaway to move up. On the eighth lap, he was up to third, then to second on the 10th, and into the lead on the 11 tho He would get passed on the track by Erion Honda's Jake Zemke, but would always lead across the stripe, and fought through traffic on the final lap to win his first AMA National. But it may have come with a price. "I hope I haven't rebroken it, because I know it was re-healing," Craggill said of his left foot, set in a soft walking cast aU weekend. Zemke was second, .202 of a second behind, with Attack Suzuki's Jason Pridmore on the same second in third. Then there was a seven-second gap to Graves Motorsports Yamaha's Damon Buckmaster, who was running in fourth when he got knocked off the track by a backmarker, losing touch with the leaders. No Limit Motorsports' Lance Isaacs shadowed Buckmaster home in fifth. Because of the stifling heat and a deteriorating track surface, Craggill couldn't match the 2000 race record set by Kurtis Roberts. Craggill completed the 13-lap, 39-mile race in 21 O 14 JULY 10, 2002' cue I e minutes, 40.751 seconds at an average speed of 107.938 mph. Pridmore maintained his spot atop the points standings after six of nine races, holding 183 points - three more than Zemke, and eight more than Buckmaster. The first attempt to start the race ended on the second lap, when Erion Honda's Mike Hale pulled' his smoking Honda CBR954RR off the track. A screw in the left fork tube had come loose, sending fork oil onto the hot rotors, wheel, and track. Because he'd caused the red flag, Hale was put to the back of the grid. But because repairs took so long he was forced to start from the pit lane. He would finish eighth. Corona Extra EBSCO Media Suzuki's Steve Rapp had jumped the first start and was serving the penalty on the pit lane when the red flag was thrown. Since he'd passed the startfinish line, he thought he'd caught a break. But the AMA rulebook has just such a rule for that situation and he'd have to serve it on the complete restart. Because of a miscommunication, Rapp never came in and was docked a lap for not entering the pits after three laps. That didn't stop him from racing for the lead. By the fourth lap of the restart, there were four riders vying for the lead, Zemke from the pole, Buckmaster, Craggill, and Pridmore, each with their own strengths. "It was funny because Jake [Zemke] and Marty [Craggillj and myself, all three of us were good in different places," Pridmore said. "Marty was strong through one and n _ VIr os two, I felt pretty good in the infield, Jake was good in nine and 10. It just balanced itself out and made a good race." "With it being so slippery, I figured I better back the pace down and just kind of park the thing in the corners because straight away, from the getgo, we had no grip at all," Zemke said. "The pace definitely dropped, but I think it hurt me worse than anybody. Off the time charts, all weekend it seemed like I had maybe half a second on everybody in every session." Pridmore moved to second on lap seven, then to the lead on lap eight, Zemke to second, Craggill to third, Buckmaster to fourth. Zemke wanted to make sure he earned the point for leading the most laps and took the lead back on lap 10 with a strong move in the final comer. That gave him seven of 13 in the lead. It would be the last lap he'd lead. Craggill took over on the 11 th lap, using his power advantage to run past Zemke and away from Pridmore on the front straight. "Marty's bike is the only bike that I couldn't draft," Pridmore said. The 11th was the lap where Buckmaster's podium hopes ended. Going through turns four and five, Buckmaster clipped the rear wheel of a lapper who cut across his front wheel. "I could see he was coming in and I got on the anchors as best I could and we still hit and it n.early threw me over the highside," Buckmaster said. "I managed to keep it upright and go motocrossing a little bit." Zemke tried the same last-corner move ending the 11 th lap, but ran Jake Zemke (98) led the Fonnula Xtreme final early on, but It was Mart, Craggill(134) who took the win. Jason Pridmore (431 rounded out the podium and leads the championship. wide. Craggill was out front, with Pridmore second and Zemke pushing, knowing it would be a struggle. "In the end there, Marty's bike was so fast," Zemke said. "It was really hard to make up the deficit. He'd accelerate off the corners and he'd accelerate so far away it was really tough to try to outbrake him for the next corner. The last corner is about the only spot I had a chance to outbrake him just because you can run wide there and still make the corner. It worked one time, and the second time it didn't." Craggill knew he was getting better drives out of the final comer and had more top speed than the others, so he knew he could control the pace at the end. He was also strong in turn one, a comer he likens to his home track of Phillip Island, south of his home in Melbourne, Australia. "Everyone spins out about turn one, but tum one's like a carbon copy of tum one at Phillip Island, so for us that's no big deal," he said. "It's just about identical. Turn one at Phillip Island's just a little wider and that's the only difference - same entry speed, same banking, same angle. I've been fast into there all weekend just because of that, I think." There were lappers on the final lap, but they weren't much of a problem, and Craggill knew he could get under anyone in the final corner. He

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