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Formula USA K&N Filters Pro Series Round 1 : Sheboygan County Fairgrounds keep him stuck in third. Eventually, King lost touch with Schnabel and cruised to the bottom rung of the podium for the second year in a row. "I won it the first year here, and then the last two I've gotten third, so I think that we're going to go back to winning it next year because the bottle of 'champagne is bigger," King said. "With the Blast, it's just so different the way the power comes on. You really have to use momentum." HEATS/SEMIS It was clear from the beginning of the night that the polished, baby-smooth Plymouth track was going to reward good starts, and last year's winner Kopp proved it by jumping into the lead off the start of the first eight-lap heat race. Coolbeth latched onto Kopp's rear fender and tried to find a way past. Kopp helped him by drifting up just enough in turns one and two to allow Cool beth to get underneath him and take the lead. The two KTM teammates ran one-two to the stripe, with Audiovox/Quaker State Honda's Brett Landes finishing third and Cheney Engineering's Jerad Cheney finishing fourth to land the last direct transfer from the heat. "You need a start here for sure," Coolbeth said. "I got off second, and luckily he went wide, and I got him PHOTOS By SCOTT ROUSSEAU By RAY GUNDY AND PETE EMME PLYMOUTH, WI, JUNE 7 ones Powersports/Team KTM's Kenny Cool beth left last year's Formula USA National Dirt Track Series opener with some unfinished business. After chasing his KTM teammate, Joe Kopp, for much of that main event, Cool beth was unable to seal the deal. What a difference a year makes. Cool beth came from behind again on the wide, slick-grooved third-mile Sheboygan County Fairgrounds • track, but this time he was on fire from start to finish, running down the competition and then pulling away to earn his first career Formula USA Kf,N Pro Series victory. The win was even more significant in that Coolbeth topped the first all-factorybacked dirt track podium to include three different brands in Formula USA history, proving that the sanctioning body's commitment to true production-based machinery is starting to pay big dividends. Coolbeth came off the pole to run fourth at the start of the 25-lap National, but he was able to weave his way through to catch Memphis Shades/Yamaha's J.R. Schnabel seven laps into the race. Cool beth then put a move around the outside of Schnabel off turn four to take the lead and win by a margin that belied the fact that Cool beth had thoroughly dominated all but the last two laps. J 50 JUNE 25. 2003' cue I Lappers played a part in Schnabel's ability to make up the lost ground. "The KTM was working really well tonight," Coolbeth said. "Mike Rosso put this whole thing together, so I want to thank him. J.R. definitely made me work for it. He made me nervous because he got off pretty good, and I was afraid that he was going to run off with it. Then I got around Rich pretty quick and ran J.R. down. And hey, we won the thing." Schnabel, who so desperately wanted to win the race in front of his home area crowd, rode as hard as he could aboard his YZ450F. He appeared to be equal with Cool beth off the corners, but Schnabel's Yamaha YZ450F constantly banged the rev e n e _ s limiter at the end of the straightaways, the result of a poor gearing choice. "I just got smoked," Schnabel said. "Kenny was really on a rail tonight. We should have done something a little different with our gearing, but I made a bad call. We needed to take a tooth off. The Yamaha was pulling so good off the comer, and I wanted that in case I got behind so that I could pass a guy. I should have known I'd pull the holeshot with that bike because it's so good. We just ran out a little on the straightaway, but we're getting it. We'll be running with 'em." Third place went to Harley-Davidson's Rich King, who appeared at times to be as fast, or faster, than anyone else on the racetrack when going into the turns, only to get held up just enough when coming off of them while battling with Schnabel to and kind of pulled away a little. Everybody's going pretty fast. Rich [King] and J.R. [Schnabel] are going fast, so who knows? Everyone's pretty much equal here." After two delayed starts, King battled with Innovative Technologies/ Mack Daddy Racing's Jeremy DeRuyter in the second heat, the latter a local rider hanging tough on a track that he knows well. The Bill Werner-tuned factory Harley Blast proved to be the hot ticket on the ever-slickening groove, and King was able to hook up and get away. DeRuyter hung on to finish second and gain entry into the main event, as did South Sound Honda's Kyle Ragsdale and Kersting Cycles Yamaha's Kevin Atherton. "I got a few chances at the start there," King said. "First, half of the guys on the front row jumped and got sent to the penalty line, and then we had a red flag. The Blast feels good.