Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

inside/outside bermed hairpin t hat led t he riders onto the paveme nt for the urba n tableto p. Both Ward and Burkhart got by. "I do n't kno w wh at happened ," Kunze l said. "I got a good start in the 450cc race , but that wa s all. I went to pass Hen ry, and then he went so late on t he brakes, and I sto ppe d t he en gine. The n I w as fourt h." Th ings got w o rse for Kunze l, w ho sta lled o nce again o n lap 19. Kunzel went into a posi tion freefall, ultimate ly landing seventh . "By t hen it was so late," Kunzel said. "Fo r me o n t he 45 0, when I go to ride this bike more than 12 laps, then it is not so easy to ride it. I don 't know what th e pro blem is. It was bad ." Henry averaged lap times in the mid 53second range as he fended off Ward first and then Burkhart afte r Ward stalled his bike on lap six. Still ridingwith an injured left knee, Ward was never really threa te ned for position after that, but he also never really threat ened the front duo either. "I'm just t rying to co llect points," Ward said. "We didn't have th e bes t of lighting out t he re , and lappe rs rea lly ru ined my race w ith Burkh art , so that w as unfortunate . Th is was a tight track. It was really close th ere for a while." Burkhart co ntinued to battle He nry until lap 20 before falling off the pace. "Henry was taking me inside before the metal ramp, so I kept jumping alongside him on the outside in the dirt ," Burkhart said. "He kept looking over at me , but he knew there was no way that I cou ld get around him unless he messed up. T he n I started to get afraid that Ward or somebody would ge t by me, so I started follow ing him. I really started to have a lot of tire spin out there. Maybe we can get that figured out." Henry was complementary of the 3 1year-old Burkhart , who drew alongside multitime AMA National MX Champion Henry there, only to lose ground to him on the paved sections. "He was riding really goo d tonight," Henry said. "It seemed like his bike was set up more fo r the dirt and mine was set up more fo r the pavement, so he wo uld catch me more in the dirt , but I wo uld get away o n the pavement. It was kind of a tradeoff." Burkhart 's second-place ru n was the best finish of his career. "I got off to a great start, and I just hung in there," Burkhart said. "Wardy screwed up, and I got by Wardy. Then Kunzel messed up, and I got by him. Finally we had a little bit of luck go our way. I have been running good all year. I was running that good in Nashville, but we had some problems, just stupid stuff happening. But I always knew that I could run up there, and now they know." In addition to the dirt , Burkhart said he was also comfortable hanging with Henry in the paved sweeper turns, eight and nine. "I actually thought maybe I could get him the re , but then I got behind a lapper, and he almost took me out," Burkhart said. "I think the same guy nearly took o ut Briefly... Pe rhaps the mo st impre ssive pe rfo rmance of the season was the come-from-behind performance of Doug Henry in his Supermoto heat race. Henry was leading the heat w hen he crashed in tu rn four. He remount - ed dead last and tore through the field to land third place, which eam ed him a shot at Superpole, same as if he had won. "I just got up and tried to get to third," Henry said. "I knew that I needed third to get into Superpole. I was lucky it stayed running. I didn't know if I'd be able to do it or not. I just charged as hard as 1could, and I'm glad that I did because I didn't think I could catch [Steve) Drew." Jeff Wa rd managed to snag his injured left leg in practice at South Boston, and it was once again a contributing factor in his per - formance. "It didn't pop out this time, but it hurts," Ward said. "It was hurting before I got here, and I caught it again, and now my ankle hurts. It's kind of numb, and I can't shift. I'm not 100 percent. I can't ride the way that I want to ride in the dirt, and I can't throw my leg out for the turns. I have to think about it too much, and you can't be thinking about it. But we' ll be all right. We'll get through these next two, and then we have a month off before Vegas." KTM Rac Team Manager Kurt Nicoll said e that the company plans to re-sign Jurgen Ku nzel as its number-one ride r for the 200S AMA Supermoto Championship, though no contract has been exte nded to the German just yet. "We want jurgen to be our number-one rider," N icoll said. "W e have pretty much agreed what we 're going to do. But to be honest , for right now, that is allthat we have planned. It would be nice ifwe could continue on with HMC as well." As lor the prospect 01 Nicollhimself racing in America in 200S, he responded : "I don't know. It depend s on how many races they have and when they have them ." Jurge n Kunzel said that he was pleased to hear that KTM is interested in retaining his Wardy, so the AMA needs to look at that and do so me thing abo ut it." Besides t he fro nt two, N icoll ran perhaps the steadiest race of the night. It was certainly t he lo ne liest, as he clicked off laps in t he high 53s an d low 54s , running solo to fourt h place. "I had a second-row start because I didn't have a ve ry good Superpole , and that was no one e lse's fault but mine, " Nico ll said. "I had a good start, and I ran fi fth, right beh ind the leaders. I was happy wit h that because it was better than I had been running all weekend . But then on the first batch of tail-enders, I got such a bad run that I must have lost five seco nds on the leade rs. I had no co ntact w ith them, and I dropped back . I would have finished fifth, but then Jurgen had his troubles." HMC KTM's Benny Carlson came from seventh to fifth, towing American SupercampfWhite Brothers Honda's Steve Drew right along with him while trying to run Nicoll down. It was too little too late . "That was a good race, and I think this was our best day of the year, " Ca rlson said. "I qualified well , but I'm just no t go ing to be one of those guys w ho is going to be a to tal bo ne head and just charge on the fi rst lap. I just put my head down and picked my way through guys. I batt led with Steve Drew for a while, and I just e nded up fifth. It was a goo d day." Henry's w in bump ed him up o ne spo t in t he Supermoto class points sta ndings. War d co ntinues to lead the way over Kunzel, I 14 to 98 . He nry now sits third with 9 1, displac ing Fre nchman Alexandre Thiebault, who was absent from the South Boston round. "It feels good," Henry said. "We 're getting closer, moving up the ladder. We just have two more to go now. I led it wire to w ire , and that's the best way to win it." Even after a rocky start in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado at the series opener, Henry said he has no complaints about how his season is going now. "We could use a couple more races this year, " Henry said. "That's about it." www.cycienEWs.com services. "That's news to me," Kunze! said. "l like it here in America. I like the spectators and the tracks here . I hope that I do come back." Ku nzel also said that he hopes to be able to contest the German Superrnoto Championship in 2005 as wellas the AMA Championship. Forme r speedway racer Rick Pearce of Bakersfield, California, made the long trek to South Boston to race aboard the only two-stroke in the Supermoto Unlimited field , a Honda CRSO "It's kind of wild," OR. the 42-year-old Pearce said. "I haven't ridden one [a two-stroke) in abo ut three years. I rode it in Reno last weekend , and I had the most fun that I've had yet at an AMA round." Pearceuseda similarmachine to win the first three STIARSSuper TI races held in California when the sport began to re-emerge in America. and claimed the STIARS title aboard the machine. "That 500 is in the Honda museum," Pearce said. "This bike is actuallyone that a buddy of mine had Sitting in his garage. It's stone stock. I'm having a blast on it. You reallyhave to roll the throttle on it or it will spit you on the ground fast." CYCLE NEWS • OOOBER 20, 2004 2S

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