Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

the race. "Me and Lafferty passed J.R., and a few turns later, we came out, and I thought we were with the Bs [class): he said. "Lafferty was leading, and I was second. The next thing I know, we're in the midpack of the Pros. I pulled off and talked to J. R. for about five minutes about it. That's bullshit; I should've just pulled off and protested right then, because that's so wrong. It totally changes the scenario of the race. Me and Lafferty got good starts, which was important to keep your goggles clean. Well, now all of a sudden we're midpack, fighting, throwing our bikes all over everybody else's bikes. It's not right." Andrews said, "We just came to a section that had extra arrows; we went right, and it happened to be a half-mile longer than everybody that (Jeff Russell), who later admitted that the course mix-up was his fault, but nothing doing. Smith, Lafferty, Andrews and Caselli continued racing but were now well down in the field, and all four riders would later drop out due to problems unrelated to the course markings. Following the race, Smith, Andrews and Lafferty all filed an official protest, which is still pending. "They say two sets of arrows were up," Lafferty said. "We got into the woods, I was third or fourth, passed couple of guys, got up to the f nt, Rodney wa eading. d of moved'. ~v I VVil!'f'JFJ"'I. by d got BRIEFLY•• • Quote of the day: "Do you know who is the smartest rider of them all?' joked Mike Kiedrowski the morning following the Palatka race. "Ty Davis." Kiedrowski was referring to the Yamaha nder who showed up Tuesday morning at Palatka and turned around and went back home. Davis. who had won the WORCS race in Ocala. Florida. just two days earlier. was plan. ning to ride the Palatka race just for fun. since he doesn't follow the GNCC series. He showed up for Monday's practice (though he didn't ride. nor did hardly anyone else) and said that if it was still raining Tuesday morning. he would not race. Davis said that he didn't want to hammer his equipment. including his brand-new fifth-wheel rig. but would instead head on back to California and prepare for his next race. the WORCS race in Lake Havasu City. Arizona. Speaking of equipment. some of the team managers were hoping the Palatka race would be called oft in order to save wear and tear on their expensive works bikes. Webb said before the race that their race bikes will have to be compietely tom down afterward but they wouldn't have the time to do so before the next GNCC race in Georgia just a few days later. He would have to instead prep three brand-new bikes for the Georgia race, But as things turned out. only Smith's bike. which sucked water and drowned out in a mud hole, would have to be rebuilt. Speaking of Team Suzuki. the squad showed up in Palatka with its brand-new 18-wheel hauler. The trailer used to belong to Pro Circuit but is now painted up in Suzuki yellow... well, sort of, Unfortunately. the yellow had already faded, "Yeah. it's going to get repainted." SuzukJ's team man· ager Mike Webb said... Apparently it was too cold when it was painted, which caused it to fade ... Yamaha also showed up in a brand-new 18-wheel hauler, Randy Hawkins found the hauler on eBay and split the cost with Yamaha. "It came from a car-rac,ng team, which was good because it was already set up with all the cabinets and stuff." Hawkins said. "I offered the guy a price. and he took it." Unlike some of the other race-team haulers on the supercross and motocross circuit. Hawkins' hauler isn't designed to be a workshop on wheels. "We can do what we need to do at the track, but this rig goes home after every race where we do all of our major work on the bikes." Former GNCC Champion Shane Watts showed up at Palatka but could only watch. as his bro· ken leg is still healing. Even though he couldn't ride, Watts helped out his fellow KTM riders the best he could, He loaned Brian Garrahan one of his personal bikes, a 250 SX. and pitted for him as well. Watts also loaned out his other bikes to various people. And he did this in spite of the bike-destroying conditions. What a friend. Garrahan held on to the lead for quite some time until he lost his brakes. He pitted for repairs and went back on the course when his motor seized while he was running fourth. Around that time, Pearson put his YZ450F into the lead, and the desert racer was flat-out hauling in the mud. He opened up a big lead until a lapped rider torpedoed him in a water hole, which sank his bike. Many minutes passed before Pearson was able to dry out his bike and get going again. '" moved my way into the lead, and going into the second-to-Iast loop it's like. 'Cool, everything's going perfect,''' Pearson s.aid. "The "bike was running good, everything perfect. Then we came into this little water hole; you're passing people all the time; all of a sudden this lapper swerves over into me, knocks my We went from the front of ~fack of the pack. A ~th the mud and all ;~, a big part when and you have to I .; I ide your butt off to catch up and take chances you don't need to. You have to try to make the time up, but I shouldn't have been back there because it wasn't my fault." Caselli had the same experience. "When we went into the woods, I was right behind Rodney Smith, and I could see Lafferty in front of him," Caselli said. "We're going through there; I was doing okay, lost a few seconds or so - those guys are way too fast through the woods - when we got to the stop check, I yelled, 'Hey, what place? What place?' And the guy goes, '17th.' I'm thinking, 'How did I go from getting a good start to way back in 17th?'" Meanwhile, the race went on. Garrahan emerged from the first 1O-mile lap in the lead, followed by Jenks, Raines, Blackwell, Hawk, Smith, Josh McLevy, Hawkins, Pearson, Jarrett and Andrews. Caselli moved up to 15th; Kiedrowski, who had fallen in the second turn, was 18th; and Lafferty, now covered in black mud, was running somewhere around 30th. front end out, and his bike lands on top of me. My bike is completely under water. I was about to cry [laughs). I get the bike back up, go to kick it, and it's locked solid. I sat there three or four minutes. After that I just thought I'd ride the best I can and finished up ninth." Meanwhile, Hawk, Raines and Jenks got together for a while and battled back and forth for the lead, until Hawk started to take control and pull away. Jenks eventually put the move on Raines for second in the late stages but could never let his guard down, because Raines was never too far behind. efuhd I cue. e n e _ so • MARCH 19,2003 41

• Cover