Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

, Briefly··· Brae Hepler landed his first $1000 But terfi nger Hol e sho t Awa rd in his first try from the outside on his factory RM·Z250 . Chad Reed grabbed the $1500 prize for the 250cc holeshot. Clear Channel Entertainment - Motor Sports reported the a ttenda nce inside Houston's Reliant Stadium at 45,126, despite extremely cold weather in the area. The stadium seats 70,000, according to the Houston Texans website. During the week prior to the Houston Supercross, Kevin Windham saw a threeperson panel during his AHA appeal of his I O-point penalty and won a reversal in a 2-1 vote. "l'rn glad that members of the board had a chance to view the video footage and to see that the intent to take him out wasn't there," Windham said. "It's kind of like winning a court case - I was kind of found innocen t. And it's a good feeling to know that, not necessari ly the manufacturers, but to see the public actually come out and see it the way I was racing it. The door's been close d on it, it's a done deal, and I'm happy. I hope to never be in that situation again," He says it won't change the racing as far as he's concerned. "As everyone is well aware now, this is the first time in my 23 years of racing that I've been involved in an incident like that," he said. "So to say that it's changed my racing I would say is not accurate at all because I've raced the same all my life. I'll say it untilI'm blue in the face that it's an unfortunate incident and not one that I wanted to be a part of or ever a part of again," Grant Langsto n also received a reprieve on his penalty from San Francisco , as the AHA reversed his five-second deduction, meaning that he officially scored his first top-five of the season last weekend. Grant La n g s to n h o d a scary crash in t he mai n while runn ing t hird, landing o n the concrete. He was sore, but un hurt. Windham started sixth , and although that's normally not too bad , it is when Reed is out front and running. Windham immediately pushed toward the front, passing his teammate Mike ~Rocco and Star Racing's Erick Vallejo on the first lap to move into fourth . W indham moved around Team Suzuki's Nick Wey through the whoops on lap two for third, then by impressively fast Grant Langston in a rhythm section for second on the fourth lap. By then, though, Reed already had about a three-second cushion. Windham went to work. " I wanted to get the holeshot and then just run a consistent race," Reed said . "Kevin was coming, and he was coming, coming, coming, and then he got there, and I was ready to race." Windham started eating into Reed's lead , and he got as close as 1.1 seconds at one point, but as is characteristic of the Aussie, Reed picked it up when and where he needed to. " I could hear him and see him," Reed said of Windham. " I thought he was catching me in the whoops, and I sped up through the whoops and changed my line up a little there," That seemed to do the trick, as Reed pulled the gap bac k out to about two seconds at the halfway point and continued to stretch it out from there, until on lap 16, Windham ro lled the finish-line double. "T hat corner was pretty tricky for me th is weekend, and as I came out, it stepped a little sideways on me ," Windham said . "I come out of that corner in first , shift to second, and because it stepped a little Sideways, I didn 't make a clean shift, and I went into neutral, so luckily I was able to hit the brakes, and I wasn't too committed ." www.cyclenews.com CYCLE NEWS • FEBRUARY 25, 2004 19

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