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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1503475
AFT SINGLES Earlier this season, Turner Rac- ing Honda's Chase Saathoff strung together five consecutive podiums in which he missed out on earning his maiden Progres - sive AFT win by a combined 1.673 seconds. In the end, his latest runner-up result was far from the clos- est of his near-misses—adding another 1.100 seconds to that total—but it may have just been the cruelest one yet. The lead-up to the race pointed to an all-out brawl be- tween reigning class champion Kody Kopp aboard the factory Red Bull KTM and rising star Tom Drane on the Estenson Racing Yamaha. Together, the two topped every session and then fought it out for top honors in the Al Lamb's Dallas Honda Challenge. Their main event rematch took place as scheduled—only it the number he tallied in '22 en route to the crown. It was also his fifth in the season's most recent six races. As a result, he now leads the standings by two points over the ever-present Daniels, 257-255. "Oh man, that was a dogfight for me," Mees said. "It wasn't a battle, but mentally, again, I didn't feel like the guy. But the track came to me. If the track would have stayed the same, I don't think I would have had the same result. I got a good start and just ran my own race. I stuck to my lines, and it was awesome that the lines I chose at the start of the race ended up being the fastest ones the rest of the night." Briggsauto.com/ Martin Truck - ing's Henry Wiles and Fastrack Racing's Bronson Bauman to complete the top 10. The win was Mees' seventh of the season, more than doubling ROUND 12 / JULY 8, 2023 ORANGE COUNTY FAIR SPEEDWAY / MIDDLETOWN, NEW YORK FLAT TRACK I AMA/PROGRESSIVE AMERICAN FLAT TRACK P92 And then I came back for the restart and almost got the holeshot and passed everyone. I led over half the race, and then Kody snuck in coming into [turn] one. He just kind of turned straight, and it was either let off the gas or run into the wall. [I'm] brushing it off and moving on to the next." 20 JAROD VANDERKOOI 7TH SUPERTWINS JMC Racing's Jarod Vanderkooi pulled things together well enough to leave with a decent seventh-place result, but it was a serious struggle getting to that point. "We struggled so bad from the first practice on," he said. "We didn't feel bad on the motorcycle; it was working good, and I was comfortable on the track. But we were just a half second off all day long. Probably the best thing that happened was we went to that LCQ and got a couple more laps in. The bike broke and we nursed it across the line and got the last transfer spot. We went to the backup bike—actually the bike we started the day on. We went from 18th to seventh, which is like where we've finished the last few races. It's kinda where we belong right now, but I'd really like to crack that top five and get back on the po- dium. That's where we need to be." MYOWNRACE Dallas Daniels (32) continued his 2023 perfect podium streak, but the Estenson Yamaha rider lost the championship lead to Mees. Daniels' teammate JD Beach (95) was fifth.