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/128344
Action Park East/Champion Speedway Greene, NY/Owego, NY utside of the AMA National Speedway C ham p ionship Series and the U.S. National Speedway C hampionship at Costa Mesa, California, the AMA U.S. Open Cham pionsh ips, held each year in New York, is the most prestigious event on the American Speedway Ca lendar. Having just completed its 24th edit ion, and with a list of past champions that includes Mike Bast, Bo bby Schwartz, Gene Woods , Josh Larsen, Rick Miller, Chris Manchester and John Cook the event is of national caliber. The U.S. O pe n has traditionally been an East vs. West duel, with the West Coasters usually taking home the hardware. Severa l Eastern race rs have put in great rides and won the title before , but t hose wins came during years w hen the field was a little li ht g on California fire power. But the 2004 U.S. O pen may have been a signal that future title fights may not be so 40 o aOBER 6 , 2004 • easy for t he top West Coast stars. After two rounds of racing that included five main events at the two top East Coast ven ues - Action Park East and Champion Speedway - JBRlJustice Brothers/Cole Construction-sponsored, three-time East Coast Speedway Champion Tommy "Gato r" Sephton emerged as the w inner of the U.S. Open title. Not since "Stormin" Norman Robinson defeated Bobby Schwartz in the 1978 O pen has a New York rider defeated such a heavy cast of Californian sta rs. Round one began at Action Park on Saturday with two-time current reigning Champion Schwartz, 1998 C hampio n Ch ris Manches te r, two-time U.S. National Champion Kelly Moran and to p riders Shawn McConnell and Shaun Harmatiuk all on the program. Round one feat ured 20 riders in a series of fou r-heat rounds, with two semis, a last chance and a Main Event format. All of the po ints that the racers CYCLE N EWS AMA U,S, Open Speedway Championships accumulated fro m this pro gram car ried over into round tw o o n Sunday evening at Champion Speedway. Ro und one began with former world number-four "King" Kelly Moran taking home an easy victory. Other ro und victors included Schwartz, Canadian Champion Kyle Legault, Jere my Parsons and Chris Manchester. Second round heat wins went to Sephton, Moran , Parsons , Tom Burge and Legault. The round saw Sephton, Parsons , Moran, Manchester and George Lazor emerge as winners. In the last-heat ro und of the evening, Sep hton and McConnell won the fi rst two events. The third event brought about an end to Moran's t itle hopes. After o nly recently returning to the form that made him a fan favorite arou nd the world, Moran had won his first three rides and was looking like the eve ning's top rider when he caught tractio n while ahea d of Manchester in turn two and loo ped o ut wildly, breaking 40th Anniversary his ankle in the process. O n the rerun, Parsons was able to hold off Manchester, who came from the penalty line. Legault and Lazor also picked up two more wins to complete the ro und. Legault and Parsons transfe rred directly to the Main Event as a result of being the top-two po ints scorers. Semifinal number one saw the legendary Schwartz put on his race face and spank the field to earn a final position . McCon nell seemed to have second in the bag o n lap two, but he spun around and fell , dropping him to fourth on lap three. Sephton and youngster Casey Donholt took second and third. Semi num ber two saw Manchester, who was the even ing's faste st rider, de feat Burge , Lazor and Harmatiuk. Going into the Last Chance, Se phto n was in a des perate pos ition. He had to w in to gain the last main event slot, and he did that by making an awesome start and leaving be hind Burge, Donholt