Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/1546195
T he X Games Supermoto race is quickly becoming one of the most exclusive and com- petitive one-off motorcycle events in the country. The event continues to draw champions and top riders from around the world and from nearly every discipline of motorcy- cling, from road racing Supercross, dirt track, freestyle, hillclimb, supermoto, and off-road. The course gives riders a taste of everything from a motocross-style- gate drop and a full Supercross rhythm section to a high-speed road course and NASCAR-style pit stop. It takes strategy, teamwork, endurance and a wide scope of riding talent to take home the gold, and this year, Troy Lee Honda's Jeff Ward proved he was the rider with the winning combination. It was a close race with a tight battle to the finish, however, with Ward barely fending off Graves Yamaha rider Mark Burkhart by a fraction of a second at the checkered flag. Burkhart's teammate and last year's X Games gold-medalist Doug Henry took the bronze, while fellow Yamaha rider Chad Reed finished fourth, ahead of Ivan Lazzarini of Italy. "I was wearing down fast out there," Ward said, "but my plan was to just stay consistent and I didn't push it until the end when I needed to. I knew Mark was com- ing and I just tried to keep on him and try to break him but he didn't budge. This might be my last opportunity to win a gold medal at the X Games and I'm really happy to have done it." X Games 12 was Ward's third attempt in the Moto X Supermoto event, but he had some hard luck his first two times around. Early race crashes took him out of contention in X Games 10 and 11, but this year, Ward's race effort came togeth- er, and he was rewarded with the gold. Several other top contenders, however, ran into plenty of hard luck. Cernics Suzuki's Travis Pastrana grabbed the holeshot at the start of the race, due mostly to the fact that he gassed it deepest into the first turn, which also made him the first to hit the ground. The bottleneck claimed several riders includ- ing Jeremy McGrath and Troy Herfoss, but Burkhart, Henry, Ward and Chris Fillmore got through clean, and led the pack up the ramp and out of the arena to the high-speed road course. The four-rider lead train continued to charge as the rest of the pack sorted itself out. A Supercross-style rhythm section inside the arena quickly began to separate the field. Many riders were at a clear dis- advantage through it, as they simply could not quite time the tricky section. It was the site of a lot of crashing in passing throughout the course of the weekend, including practice and seeding. Suzuki rider Eddy Seel of Spa, Belgium, crashed there during practice the morning of the race and hurt his back. Consequently, Seel never made it to the starting line. On the second lap of the race, KTM Team manager Kurt Nicoll tangled with Ward's Troy Lee Honda teammate Jeff Ward made it into the X Games his- tory books as the old- est male gold medalist at 45 years old. He also became the old- est Moto X medalist, in X Games history. Travis Pastrana was named the Saturn Most Outstanding Athlete of the Games. Pastrana competed in four events, earned three gold medals, and performed the jaw- dropping double backflip - the stunt heard 'round the world. In honor of his achieve- ments over what Pastrana calls the best weekend of his life, Saturn awarded him with a 2007 Saturn Sky Roadster. Factory Aprilia rider Daryl Atkins of New Zealand raced a "Faux-prilia," a Honda CRF450R with Aprilia graphics. Machinery specifications for the X Games followed the AMA Supermoto 450-class rules, which did- n't allow Aprilia's V-twin. "There was a bit of controversy of putting me in the games or not," Atkins said. "They wouldn't let us race the Aprilia because of the V-twin. Hopefully that will change in the future. But to get exposure for the team and for me, we had to be flexible on our side. We didn't want to miss out." The team had permis- sion from the factory to race a Honda 450 single, instead. "It's pretty much a stock motorcycle," Atkins continued. "We put that together at the last minute and it was definitely not at the level of more than half the field out there. I just think my riding and our team strategy and the team effort paid off for us." Kenny Bartram suffered a big crash dur- ing freestyle practice on Friday. "I just came up a little bit short on the 115-foot-ramp hit," Bartram explained. "As soon as I land- ed, my left wrist dislocated. I knew - I felt it go right away. It bucked me over the han- dlebars and I probably wouldn't have ridden it out, even if I had been healthy. But with- out a strong wrist, I just kind of buckled and landed on my right shoulder. I broke my collarbone and separated the AC joint." Despite the horrific accident, Bartram still competed in the Rally Car race. "We checked, and there's no rule against drivers and co-drivers swapping. So my co-driver's going to drive for me and we're just going to buckle me into the passenger seat. Since there are no stage notes to deal with on a super special, I'm just dead weight in the car. So as long as I can handle the pain for a minute and a half, we're going for it." In Briefly... Continued on page 47 Strikes Gold at Summer X Games BY JEAN TURNER PHOTOS BY RAYMOND GUNDY AND KINNEY JONES C Y C L E N E W S • AUGUST 23, 2006 43 Slower traffic keep right -riders with Supercross experience, such as Chad Reed (22) and Jeremy McGrath (2), had no trouble with the dirt rhythm section, unlike many other riders.