VOL. 50 ISSUE 21 MAY 29, 2013
"Tyla blew a head gasket and
the engine lost all the water and
he lost a lot of horsepower," said
Lumgair while he and two other
Pro Circuit mechanics thrashed
to insert a brand new engine into
the bike's frame. "We changed
the engine just to be safe."
Rattray would gate ninth in the
second and final moto, but still it
wasn't enough as Stewart, Dungey, Villopoto, as well as Honda
youngsters Trey Canard and Justin Barcia held down the top five.
Rattray was forced to deal with
the likes of Ryan Sipes, Andrew
Short, Mike Alessi, Dean Wilson
and others for track position.
When all was said and done, he
crossed the finish line in ninth again.
An hour later, back inside the
Monster Energy/Pro Circuit/Kawasaki hauler, Rattray sat on a
P101
mechanic's bench and recollected on his day at the races. While
he knew his 9-9 moto scores
were nothing to put a match to
gasoline to, he was both pragmatic and optimistic about the
11-round road ahead.
"It'll definitely get better, you
know? We're also going to try a
couple things engine-wise this
week. My race bike is very fast.
A stock 450 sportsman Kawasaki is very powerful. I think
we have to kind of de-tune the
engine a little bit. We need to
make it somewhere where it is
still rideable and I can push it. I
think we have quite a bit of power
now - which is a good thing to
have. It's better to have too much
power than too little power. This
track is different. The bumps are
weird. Last year we had a lot of
ruts and this year we had no ruts.
I'm happy, though. It's good to
get the first one out of the way.
We'll go to Colorado next week
and see what we can do there.
Everything is good. My fitness is
good and all that. I just have to
work on a few little things and I'll
be up there."
Payton – certainly no stranger
to this game of motocross – was
pleased with Rattray's day.
"Look, his moto scores
weren't awesome, but I thought
he rode hard and he rode well.
He's healthy and his speed is
there. I have full faith in him. He'll
keep getting stronger and stronger as the season goes on. Just
CN
watch."
