Cycle News

VOL. 51 ISSUE 30 JULY 29, 2014 P63 corners, my adjuster on my le- ver, never tightened it up off the line or something like that and it ran out and starting pulling the clutch, slipping real bad. It's a lit- tle bit disappointing for sure, but we'll be there next week." Behind Mees was another Kawasaki—Brandon Robinson. Robinson was under the weather in the hot weather, but was still able to get into the mix with the lead pack. Robinson had a sniff at the lead, but towards the end, he struggled to hang with the top three and had to settle for fourth. In fifth was Zanotti Racing's Kenny Coolbeth on the Harley- Davidson. Coolbeth got off to a good start and was lurking be- hind Smith, Mees and Johnson My Own Race: 44 BRANDON ROBINSON 4 TH It was a tough day for Brandon Robinson who was not feel- ing well and had to jump on the backup bike for the main after crashing out of the Dash for Cash, but he was able to end it fourth. "Long," Robinson summarized his race. "First of all I'm kind of sick, so it's not helping me with this weather and stuff, but no excuses. We kind of had a little bad dash there, went down and had to regroup and ride the backup bike. I was able to get a decent start, hang with the front draft and halfway through the race, I kind of felt like the track was coming to me. I made a little charge there and almost took over the lead and then all of the sudden the track just changed again. The way that the sand was to- night, how dry and dusty it was, it just kept on, sand would blow on the groove, back off of it, it just kept changing the track all night. Fourth was all I had. Those last couple of laps, I was struggling to hang with those front three [Bryan Smith, Jake Johnson and Jared Mees]. And that's all she wrote." 1 BRAD BAKER 6 TH Baker made up for a poor start and came back strong. He recovered to sixth, beating Stevie Bonsey and Sammy Hal- bert across the line. "We kind of started off right at the tail end of the front pack," Baker said. "I was having bad troubles with the bike spinning coming off the corner, I'd have good entrance to make corner speed, but couldn't seem to quite keep it right on the groove coming off the corner and was spinning up really bad. I ended up losing the lead pack at one point almost by a full straight away. "About halfway through the race I just kind of started to dig a little bit deeper. I got by one person—I think it might've been Briar Bauman—poked a wheel in on me and I just pretty much said, 'un uh, at least I'm already upset with where I'm right now, so I'm going to put on a charge.' I kind of got my mind right and started finding some really good lines for both corners and started to notice I was starting to reel in both Sammy and Stevie, who were running sixth and seventh. And slowly but surely, heck I was just making up more and more ground by then in the race. Finally, on the last lap, I was really making up some time. "I really found something out there the last half of the race and ended up slingshotting past Stevie going into turn one on the last lap. I was able to pass Sammy going into turn three, as well, and made a pretty good block for the draft at the start line. I was able to come home in sixth." 80 STEVIE BONSEY 8 TH For the Salinas-native, Sacramento is one of Stevie Bon- sey's home tracks and, although he fell off of the lead pack, he put up a good battle for sixth. "I kind of got a bad start being off in the inside on the front row and the front group got away a little bit. I charged and charged and caught up to them and made a couple of silly little mistakes and lost a lot of time. I just couldn't get into the group with them and make any time up. Come to the end, I knew I could get Sammy, so I was kind of waiting, waiting. We got the white flag and I waited on the front straight, and I was waiting for the back straight and Brad Baker went around me, I didn't know he was there. So then we go into turn three and drafted up the inside of Sammy, and Brad and I slipped up. Brad got under me and I sucked down under Brad and Sammy. I kind of got onto my foot and ran my foot over a little bit. Then it was a drag race to the end. All in all it was a good race. We learned a lot. We got a good setup I think. From what I was going to set the bike up we went 180 difference and I learned a lot today." 17 HENRY WILES DNF At first it looked like Henry Wiles was back. The Michigan- native made a run for the lead and then unfortunately had a mechanical and had to withdraw. "I'm not sure what went wrong—the bike shut off. It was running good. I don't think there was anything wrong with the motor, I think it might have been something electrical. I'm thinking it's going to be a pretty quick fix. It was for sure kind of a bummer there. I was in about fifth I think and worked my way around Kenny and just kind of sat behind those guys for a lap. Then I went to the front. It was shaping up to be a pretty good night for me, I think. We struggled early on we made some changes for the last qualifying session and we kind of jumped up in there a little bit better. We were kind of right there where we needed to be, we knew the track was going to get better. It was kind of a tough track for the Kawis early on. Come time for the main event, the bike was perfect. It was easy. It was easy to be up front and passing for the lead at the Sac- ramento mile. We had enough horsepower. Unfortunately it's a bummer for my whole team, because we've all been working hard."

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