VOL. 51 ISSUE 38 SEPTEMBER 23, 2014 P81
Skyler Howes—who was fourth
in points—crashed early and suf-
fered a possible broken arm,
dropping him to fifth in points,
unofficially.
Things couldn't have gone
better for Brabec, who started
off by snagging the $300 Speed
Freak Bomb Run Award and
remained in front all afternoon
over the two-loop course (59
miles for loop one and 30 for
loop two).
"I think if I didn't get a good
start, maybe the outcome
would've been different," Bra-
bec said. "Me and Jake [Argu-
bright] were kind of pacing each
other the entire first loop; he
was just out of my dust."
But when Argubright had
problems at the start of loop
two, Brabec gapped the field on
his Hoosier Precision Machin-
ing/Bonanza Plumbing/O'Neal
KX450F, eventually finishing
almost eight minutes ahead of
Burson, 2:18:36 to 2:26:03.
Burson said, "I got off to a
decent start. I kind of struggled
Briefly...
to fill their Saturday with other races.
Braydon Bland was one of those,
as he races himself back into shape
from a broken arm and a concus-
sion suffered earlier this summer. He
won on Saturday and followed that
up with the Super MIni victory on
Sunday, after passing early leader
Jarett Megla on the last lap. (Megla
was riding with a slightly injured
shoulder.) Blais Racing Services
KTM's Bland then lined up for the big
bike race in 200cc B, but when he
came upon injured teammate Skyler
Howes, he was among those who
stopped to help the downed rider.
The autograph session held in con-
junction with signup at Wild West
Chevrolet in town saw Nick Bur-
son displaying all of the fund-raising
items he's using to get to the ISDE
in Argentina. Among the items are
a Jeremy McGrath-autographed t-
shirt, a vintage Yamaha jersey auto-
graphed by Bob Hannah, an electric
guitar and plenty of one-off Burson
ISDE T-shirts.
As Ricky Brabec looks to the finale
and what could be his first AMA Na-
tional championship, he insists, "I'm
not nervous, but there's a lot of pres-
sure. I mean, anyone that knows
how it feels to be in the points lead,
it feels like you have a big target on
your back. I do really good with pres-
sure and trying to keep myself calm. I
go into the race not saying the thing's
for sure; I just go into the race and
say I'm going to go have fun with all
my friends, and I finish where I finish.
If it's not the right time, it's not the
right time. I'm doing this for fun, and
that's how you've got to look at it."
