Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Briefly... "When I holeshot the heat race from the bottom and watched other guys holeshot qualifying he ats from the bottom, I knew that was whe re I wanted to start if I had the first pick: ' said Chris Ca rr of his great starts a ll night. "I was able to get into the comer and roll through the middles pre tty good , which set me up for good drives. This is the type of track w he re you had to kee p your momentum up. I wouldn't say the rain bother ed me. but it did make me a little nervous. My lap times dropped about a tenth, sometimes two -tenths of a second a lap. O nce I started seeing the rain a little bit more, I wasn't quite asaggre ssive going into the turn. I started to slip a little bit, and I know Joe was start ing to gain a little bit mor e time . I still think they did the right thing. There was a guy that crashed as soon as the red nag came out . The track was definitely getting slicker. For safety's sake. they did the right thing. Fortunately, we got enough of the main in to be past halfway. We got the points and one step closer to the championship. That's what it's all about. So far, so good, for the race , for the cham pionship. Hopefully it will stay that way, and hopefully I will keep inching away." The day started very poorly for Jared Mees. As he sat on the starting line for his qualify heat race . his Rotax self-destructing ed . "I was so stressed out, " Mees said. "We were 50 fast in practice on that bike . We were turning 14.88s, Chris was 14.85. We were right there. When we came out for he AMA Progress ive Insu ran c e Flat Tr ack Champ ionship r e tu rn e d to the Knoxville, Tennessee , area for round eight of the 19race se r ies , a race that had originally been rained out when it was scheduled to be a part of the Honda Hoot in late June . One month later, rain would be factor in the race's outcome. A large crowd faced the heat and hum idity of late July to almost fill the stands that ring the Atomic Speedway's high-banked quarte r-mile. The su perfast track created a lot of close action all night. Unfortunately, that action ended early, as the National had to be stopped a nd ca lled complete on lap 15 when a light sprinkle turned to a light rain , forcing AMA Pro Racing officials to call the race. That was good news for defend ing series champion and current points leader Chris Carr, who had led all the way to that point on his Quality Checked Certified Pre-Owned Ford-backed Rotax, Carr had dom inated all night , and the stoppage was merely an early reward for that dominance, as he picked up his th ird win of the season. "I was able to ride the track the way I wanted to ride it, and it felt good," Carr said . "To lead that many laps around here is good. When you get out fro nt on a track like this , you can run your own line. You can go into the corners as deep as the qualifyingheat, it blew right up. I was all bummed out. I had to ride my dad 's SOOcc J&M dual-shock er, It's an old-school kind of deal. I didn't even take it ou t in practice. I didn't know what it was like. We didn't make it out of the heat race, then took it out in the sem i and won the thing. I was all pumped up . It was really working well. I wish it hadn't rained . Johnny Goad and my dad really put that bike together. They made it the best it could be. I know how to ride that bike very well. I've bee n riding it since I was 13 years old. I was picking peo ple off in the main." Johnny Murphree's frustrating season continued at Atomic Speedway, as the Californian was still looking for his first w in of 2004. "It was frustrating, because I felt like I'm ready to go to the front now," Murphre e said. "I'm ready to be at least where we were last year. I'm working harder, and I feel like I'm going backwar ds. It's fun racing with these guys. I'm enjoying riding now more than I ever have. Actually, coming through traffic and trying to pass, I'm enjoying that more. The bad part is finishingseventh and ninth place In the main. I th ink we you want. When somebody is in front of you , it's kind of hard to gauge. You can 't always go in as qUickly as you'd like." Even though Carr had led every lap, his main nemesis in the points race, Joe Kopp, was positioning his KTM/Jones Powersports/Mid -America-backed KTM for a late -race charge. That charge was halted by the ra in. '" was closing in on him [Carr] at the last... the track was getting slick," Kopp said . "I noticed it [the rain] more in turn one. It wasn't like I was backing out of it, yet. I th ink if it would have been a few more laps , I would have caught him, but it was one of those things." The start of what was supposed to be a 25 -lap race saw Carr blast off the inside pole position to lead fellow heat-race winners Kenny Coolbeth, Mike Hacker, Willie McCoy, Rob Pearson and Joe Kopp into the first turn . They fanned out and www.cyclenews.com made more progress on our setup . We are working on subtle changes to get the thing working better than everyone else. We are trying to go forvvard, and I think we did that ton ight with our setup. Every week last year. we were in the top five. We never finished worse than eighth. I'm not worried about points or any of that stuff. I need to go out and ride the motorcycle and have a good time like I know how to do," CYC LE N EWS • AUGUST 4,2004 41

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