IN
THE
WIND
P44
A
mPro Yamaha's Ricky Rus-
sell wowed his home crowd
by taking the win at round seven
of the 2015 Rocky Mountain
MC World Off-Road Champi-
onship Series at Straddleline
ORV Park in Washington.
KTM's Gary Sutherlin netted his
second runner-up finish on the
weekend, and Jacob Argubright
rounded out the pro podium.
RPM/KTM's Eric Yorba claimed
the Pro win Saturday night in
the WORCS X event.
After just over a two-month
Summer break from racing, the
racers headed to the Pacific
Northwest, which is typically a
cool and damp race location.
That was not the case this year
with record heat and dry condi-
tions, making for an unusual
dusty race through the trees.
Besides the normal Pro main
event on Sunday, racers also
competed in a special WORCS
X race on Saturday night,
which also counted toward the
WORCS Pro championship, so
this was one round not to miss
for those in the hunt for the title.
For the Sunday event, Justin
Seeds jumped out to the early
lead followed by Russell, but
Seeds let Russell by once they
got into the woods, allowing
Russell to build a gap on the
competition.
"I wanted to prove myself
here," said Russell. "We have
a lot of people here. We're only
an hour and half from home,
so it's nice to win. This is the
driest Washington has been in a
while. So it was a dust fest, but
we got the win. After the sight
lap, I knew the start was going
to be very important. We were
off to a good start. I passed
Justin [Seeds] in the woods and
then just ran my own race."
For Russell this was redemp-
tion after finishing in the run-
ner-up position in 2014 when
Sutherlin made a last-second
pass. Russell focuses on rac-
ing in the GNCC series, where
he currently sits second in the
battle for the GNCC XC2 Pro
Lites championship, but made
the trip to Washington to race
WORCS while the GNCC sea-
son is on its summer break.
Sutherlin had a difficult
weekend, although he finished
second in Saturday's WORCS
X, as well as Sunday's event.
"I guess this weekend was all
about second-place finishes,"
said Sutherlin. "I fell in the first
turn and I instantly knew it was
going to be a long day. I just
stayed patient, but I didn't have
anything for Ricky [Russell].
I know he was looking for re-
RUSSELL TAKES FIRST WORCS PRO WIN
AmPro Yamaha's
Ricky Russell took
advantage of the
break in the GNCC
series to race—and
win—the Washington
WORCS round.
