Redondi's Revenge
L
ast year saw Giacomo Redon-
di lead much of the inaugural
Cupid Classic Hare Scramble
at the legendary Chaney Ranch,
February 15, before a sheared
chain guide dropped him from
contention to a disappointing
fourth place.
Not so this year.
In one of his only planned
appearances of the AMA West
Hare Scrambles (WHS) Regional
Championship Series, presented
by FMF, the Hatch Racing/Alpin
-
estars/Acerbis KX450-mounted
privateer upset the factory stars
at round two with a convincing
win on an even more techni
-
cal course. Round-one Pro/AA
winner and early leader Mateo
Oliveira finished over two min-
utes back, the Rockstar Energy
Husqvarna Factory Team Off-
Road rider stymied by a stuck
rider in the new and notoriously
technical Pro section, with Liqui
Moly Beta's Zane Roberts third
Pro/AA but fourth overall behind
another Kawasaki privateer, Pro
250 winner Layton Smail, who
was just three seconds behind
Oliveira on adjusted time.
Sick for much of the week,
Oliveira knew he needed to
lead, and he shot into the front
right from the start on his FMF/
Motorex/Fly Racing-backed FX
450. "I wasn't going to be able
to breathe through my nose, and
I didn't want to be eating dust,
so I wanted to get out front and
kind of ride my own race," he
said. "For a while, it was working,
and I was able to manage pretty
well. I wasn't riding too bad, but I
wasn't all there."
But after leading for over an
hour, he pitted while Redondi
kept going. The Italian said, "I
saw him going into the pits, and
I say [to myself] that's the lap I
need to sprint. And I sprint, and
that's also when he made the
mistake [and got held up after
trying to go around a stuck rider
in the Pro-section rocky canyon],
and after that I had a two-minute
lead, so it was perfect!"
However, Smail was on the
move. After a review, the AMA
WIND
IN THE
P40
After a broken chain guide killed his
winning aspirations here last year,
Giacomo Redondi had both his bike and
the Chaney Ranch course dialed this year
to win convincingly.
PHOTOS: MARK KARIYA
