"My expectations coming
into this race were pretty low,
honestly," said Kelley. "After the
Sumter National Enduro, I kind
of messed up my leg a bit and
was really unsure if I was going
to even race. So, I made the call
Friday after pretty much sitting
around for two weeks to give
it a try. It went better than I ex
-
pected. I felt like I rode good. My
leg held up. It was a whole lot of
pain, for sure, and held me back
a bit, but overall, I felt like I rode
really good. I would have been
really happy with a top 10, so to
come away with second place is
pretty unreal."
Surprisingly, Kelley worked his
way to the front from a medio
-
cre start.
"I didn't have the best start,"
said Kelley. "I was definitely back
in the pack. I was kind of just
feeling it out for a bit because
obviously struggling with my leg
and not riding, I just decided to
do the best I could and started
picking guys off. I think at the end
of the first lap maybe I was in
third place behind Ricky Russell,
and Stew was out front. Then
Ricky and I battled up until… well,
essentially, we battled the whole
race, but I got into second on lap
three and then still he was within
10 seconds of me pretty much
the whole rest of the race."
Russell, who was four weeks
out from collarbone surgery,
ended the race in third, as Kelley
indicated, another five seconds
back.
"I just got really tight at the
beginning," said Russell. "I was
trying to chase Stew and he
was going really fast, so I was
just trying to be the older, wiser
person and not crash myself out
like a lot of people do up here
at Big Buck because it's sketchy
here. So, I kind of just waited
until I loosened up, and then Ben
got around me and I just was
able to latch on. Really, it didn't
seem too bad. Towards the end,
I was trying to give her a push to
get hopefully by him. Every time
I'd catch up to him, I'd crash, or
a lapper would screw me up and
he'd get a little ways away and
then I was able to catch back
up. So, the speed was there. I've
just got to work on little things
in that last hour."
Defending series champ Jor
-
dan Ashburn was fourth overall
on his Magna1 Motorsports
VOLUME ISSUE FEBRUARY , P65
(Above) Ricky Russell was just
four weeks out from suffering a
broken collarbone but got on the
podium anyway. (Left) Ben Kelley
came into the race injured and with
low expectations, but he came
away with second place.
Ryder Lafferty took the Pro 2 class win.
