AMA GRAND NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
VOL. 51 ISSUE 21 MAY 28, 2014 P63
measure myself instead of four
guys stuffing you every corner."
Red Flags Fly
This year's Springfield Mile final
was plagued by red flags. Stevie
Bonsey crashed twice in turn one,
stopping the race. Then there was
a bizarre situation where the start-
ing lights on one of the restarts
malfunctioned and half the field
took off and the other half stayed
stationary at the line. The race
was stopped and restarted yet
again. Then it was Mikey Martin
putting his Bonneville Perfor-
mance's Triumph down between
turns one and two for another red.
In all there were four restarts of
the race and the final came down
to a five-lap dash to the finish.
Briefly...
cent memory according to several
longtime attendees. There was a lot
of rain west of Springfield the morn-
ing of the race and radar showed
it heading east towards the track.
Fortunately the rain missed the fair-
grounds, but many felt rain in the
surrounding areas and the threat of
rain at the track was a reason for the
lower than usual turnout.
The Springfield races were streamed
live online at www.fanschoice.tv.
There were 44 expert Grand Nation-
al entries at Springfield, 30 riders
signed up in the Pro Twins class.
Brad Baker made his debut on the
Harley-Davidson factory team on
Sunday and finished fifth. Baker re-
placed Kenny Coolbeth Jr. on the
factory team, but was coming off a
badly broken left arm, suffered less
than six weeks ago in a training ac-
cident at Colin Edwards' Texas Tor-
THE SHAYNA
SHAKE
Shayna Texter had no hope
of making the Springfield Mile
main. The problem was a
severe handling issue on her
Latus Motors Racing/Castrol
Triumph that caused the bike to
go into high-speed oscillation
at the end of the straightaways.
Texter did all she could to ride
with the issue, but it was too much to overcome and she
failed to qualify for the final.
"We struggled a lot with the speed wobble," Texter
explained. "We'd kind of faced it here and there in test-
ing. We thought we had the problem fixed coming here
to Springfield and obviously we didn't. We're going to go
back to the drawing board and try to figure it out."
In her semi, Texter stayed
with the leading group for sev-
eral laps before the headshake
got so violent that it nearly pitched her off. She had ad-
ditional problems as well.
"I was riding my butt off in the corners trying to keep
up with them, but I broke a piece off my brakes and
didn't have any brakes after lap two and I couldn't ride it
anymore," she said.
Shayna Texter (25) did her best
to put the Latus Motorsports/
Castrol Triumph in the main,
but the bike had major head-
shake issues. Here she battles
with her brother Cory Texter
(65) and Chad Cose (49) in the
first semi.
Stevie Bonsey emerges from under
the air fence while Brad Baker rides
up to check on him.
continued on next page
