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/128325
Round 4 OFF-ROAD i~ GPR/AMA District 37 Big 6 Grand Prix Series Mark Tilley and Scott Myers find Shamrock pot 0' gold By KANDY THORNTON PHOTOS BY TONY lAMPl~ Shamrock GP • Cookin' T riple-digit tem peratures an d a short 3.S-mile course th at mostly featu red motocross te rrain made for some very hot and tight racing action for the more than 1000 par ticipan ts wh o came o ut for round fou r of the GPR/AMA District 37 Big 6 Grand Prix Series. This was the third year tha t the Sunland Shamrocks have held their even t at Los Angeles Co unty Raceway in Palmdale, California, and the course featured the main motocross track, a small, rocky off-ro ad section and a drag st rip-style asphalt section. The Team Race leaders t u rned in 19 lap s fo r the 90 - minute $3000-purse event, which is almost twice as many laps as the typical Big 6 Grand Prix event. Mike Meadows blasted off the sta rt ;f Mike Meadows (82) charges through a tum in the early stages. He and Sean Collier would later go on to tak. second behind thll team of M ~ and Mark Tilly . 66 MAY 26, 2004 • CYCLE NEWS and grabbed the holeshot in the premier event - the Team race - but faded to fifth when the leaders came through the scoring chute and into the rider exchange area. The XR's Only Honda-mounted team of Ross Garcia and Mike Childres s came though first followed closely by KTM pilot David Rees, who handed off to his teammate Brent Harden . Scott Myers was the third rider into the pits and qu ickly handed the Te mecula Motors ports CRF4S0R off to Mark Tilley. Tilley was all business as he set his sights on the two riders ahead of him. "I caught Childress on the drag strip and just shut the door on him in a tum," Tilley said. "I caught up to Harden coming through the over-under on the MX section, and he fell when he went outside on a turn ." The to p three teams co ntinued in the same order until lap seven , when Meadows passed Rees and took ove r the t hird-place positio n w hen Meadows handed the bike off to teammate Sean Collier. Collier got by Childress on lap eight when the rear hub broke on Garcia, and they had to drop out of the race . Meanwhile, the American Honda team of Johnny Campbell and Steve Hengeveld began making their move from sixth place up to third . "We were running great the first few 40th Anniversary laps," Hengeveld said. "We were right there with Tilley and Myers. I bo bbled in a corne r by the annou ncer's tower and couldn't get the bike started. Bike after bike passed us, and we were playing catch-up the rest of the race ." Despite some hard-c harging efforts by the Meadows/Collie r team, they cou ldn't catch Tilley and Myers, who rode away with the largest share of the $3000 purse, plus a $SOO bon us that se ries sponsor GPR Stabilizers awa rds to winning tea ms runn ing its sta bilizer. "Man this race was stressful, " Tilley said. "We were changing riders every five minutes . It was pretty nerve-wracking. I have to tha nk my mechanic Robe rt Goodnough, because the bike ran awe some today." The Meadows/Collier team finished in second place, followed by Joh nny Campbe ll and Steve Hengeveld on the MSR/Precision Concepts!American Honda CRF4S0R. More great racing action followed on Sunday in the Four-Stroke/2S0cc eve nt. Tilley added another notch in what would eventually work out to be a triple -play weekend for him by winning the FourStro ke Expert class in front of Nick Burson and He ngeveld. The la-year-old Burson grew up racing motocross and found the course well suited to his riding abilities on his BRP /Simpson/RMC-backed C RF4S0R. Tilley also wo n the Open Expert division later that day. Kendall Norman found some inspiration from a smack-ta lking competitor in the 2S0cc Expert race . "I was sitting on the line minding my own business whe n