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Jeff's o lder brother, Eric
(4 ), didn't get the holehot
in Fonnula Spartbike ,
but he did take
home the victory.
last lap when they encountered lap traffic
coming into the last tum, but Wood hung
on for a .2 1 of a second win.
The Formula SportBike race can be
summed up in two words - Eric Wood .
He took the lead from his pole position
and dominated. For the first nine laps he
increased his lead by at least half a second
each lap. Bylap nine he had an 8.3-second
lead, finally topping out at 9.3 seconds on
the 12th lap.
"That is about as good as I can ask. My
bike was absolutely perfect," Eric Wood
said. "We got a good start, and I put my
head down . My goal was to go out , pull a
gap, roll back, cruise home and hope the
battle was behind me for second."
It was . Scott Harwell , jensen and
Greenwood battled from lap two to the
end . Although it was close, the only position change involved third place, with
jensen passing Greenwood on lap three.
Greenwood regained the position with a
last-lap pass only after a hair-raising
exchange two laps earlier where he
passed jensen and jensen ducked back
underneath him to take back the position.
"I passed him in turn six, and he passed
me back," Greenwood said. "I tried him
again on the next lap, and he held me off.
Then on the last lap Igot him in turn six."
But the race belonged to Eric Wood .
He carried out his race strategy perfectly,
cruising to an eight-second win. With his
racing done , he could root for his brother.
jeff jumped to the lead off the line in
the Thunderbike race and never looked
back. His Bettencourts Ducati stormed to
a two-second lead after just one lap. He
built the lead to over five seconds. It
looked like he was on cruise control, but
he was actually on the verge of being
black-flagged. A bolt broke on his seat
assembly, and he had to hold the seat
between his legs.
"I had to take it easy because I was
worried about the whole seat falling off,
and the transponder is on that ," jeff
Wood said. "I did not want to get blacknagged because of that . Iwas just trying to
keep it on the bike."
Wood's problems allowed Bryan
Bemisderfer to close on his Harding
Buell/Harley Davidson. But he was in the
midst of holding off the Ducati of Rob
Nigl. Nigl chased Beimisderfer over the
I.6-mile course for eight laps, but he
could not find a way around .
"I'd like to say I was outriding him, but
I think it was the motor today,"
Bemisderfer said. "They had to pass me
some place, and I am a pretty big guy. I
can make myself pretty wide."
But when Nigl fell, Bemisderfer was
able to concentrate on reeling in Wood .
He cut the lead to 2.1 seconds at the finish. The runner-up finish allowed
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Bemisderfer to take the points standing
lead from Dave Estok, who went off in
tum six early on.
Richard Doucette took advantage of
Nigl's fall to capture the final podium
position. jerry Wood almost joined his
son on the podium, the elder statesman
of the Wood family finishing fourth.
"I had a good ride for an old guy, and
my kid won ," the 57-year-old racer said.
"I am feeling good . Life is good ."
It certainly is. The brothers also added
four wins in support races for total of
eight in two days. A nice weekend .
Father's Daycouldn't get any better. 01
NEW HAMPSHIRE Im'L SPEEDWAY
louDON, NEW HAMPSHIRE
RESULTS: JU NE 20, 20 04 ( ROUND 4 )
SPT/BK: I. JeR Wood (50,): 2. Seon Gn>enwood
(5"'): l . RDbenJensen(Y>m): ~ . M,ke Himmelsbach (Y
am):
S. BrianStokes (S