Cycle News

MOTOCROSS LUCAS OIL AMA PRO MOTOCROSS CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 2 / MAY 28, 2016 SAN BERNARDINO, CALIFORNIA / GLEN HELEN RACEWAY P62 The RCH team talked a bit more about Roczen's fork failure. "It's always frustrating when a mechani- cal issue derails a good run but the biggest disappointment was seeing Ken have to back off and ultimately surrender the lead in the first moto," explained RCH Director of Competi- tion Mark Johnson. "The part failure was in no way related to the forks themselves. The system that failed is made up of multiple components, purchased from a variety of vendors by RCH. Unfortunately, one of these components suffered a failure, which affected the front forks." It was a disastrous day for the GEICO Honda Team. Four of its five riders left the track injured. Jordon Smith and Christian Craig tangled in the first 250MX moto. Craig got catapult- ed off his bike and landed on his feet, but the impact resulted in a broken leg (tibia and fibula), and he underwent surgery later that day. Smith suffered a contusion to his back and eventu- ally pulled out of the second moto in severe pain. Pro rookie Tristan Char- boneau suffered a broken collarbone in the second moto after finishing an impressive seventh in the first moto. The team's lone 450MX rider, Justin Bogle, already came into the race dinged up after having cut his hand earlier in the week in a non-racing incident. He finished 15th in the first moto but couldn't start the second. RJ Hampshire got through the day unscathed but did have one crash that sent him into the fence and into a flag- man, who later swung by the GEICO Honda pits to say that he was okay, which was a high point for what was otherwise a bleak day for the team. "Yeah, definitely one of those days that we wish we could start over," said Team Manager Mike LaRocco. "So all the way around we just had one of those days that we'd like to forget." It wasn't the best of days for the Auto- Trader.com/Toyota/JGRMX Yamaha Team either. Justin Barcia ran as high as fourth in the first moto before slipping back and eventually pull- ing out of the race with a mechani- cal problem. He came back to finish eighth in the second moto. Barcia's teammate Weston Peick suffered a hard get-off in the first moto and was so rattled he didn't start the second moto. The team's Phil Nicoletti, however, had a pretty good outing, going 10-9 for eighth overall. Yoshimura Suzuki's James Stewart ended up pulling the plug on his day at Glen Helen. He dislocated his shoul- der at Hangtown but wanted to race Glen Helen. His plan was to ride prac- tice Saturday morning, see how the shoulder would feel, then make a go/ no-go decision. He chose not to ride, feeling that the shoulder just strong enough to make it through the day. He'll try again at Colorado next week. "I wanted to come out here and at least try," said Stewart right after prac- tice. "The first practice was okay but pretty weak, but not too bad. The track got pretty rough the second time; it twisted my grip off the handlebars a couple of times trying to hold on, so…I thought I'd do the smart thing and rest up and get ready for next week." Defending 250cc National Cham- pion Jeremy Martin has been fight- ing an illness of sorts. At Hangtown, he felt really under the weather, and at Glen Helen he felt better, but still didn't feel great. This has prompted him to make a change to his pro- gram. Jeremy's brother Alex had re- cently switched from being trained by racing legend Johnny O'Mara to being trained by former Star Rac- ing racer and current trainer Gareth Swanepoel. Alex's strength during the opening stretch of the outdoor series prompted Jeremy to also leave O'Mara for Swanepoel. Only time will tell if this was the right move or not, but as close as the Martin brothers are, one could assume this was an informed decision. Once again, the Glen Helen track lived up to its reputation as being rough and challenging, and having some pretty huge jumps, mainly a 70 mph uphill triple, which had ample run- up that even the 250s had no prob- lems doing, but some of the riders questioned the need of having such massive jumps, including Dungey. "It was a challenging track, kind of some goofy sections, kind of different," he said. "They said we were doing 70 [mph] going off the lip of that triple; I think we can chill out on the jumps a little bit; they're a little bit big. It took me a good 20 minutes to figure out how hard to hit these jumps." He men- tioned one rider who over-jumped the triple earlier in the week and had his front wheel collapse. Look who we spotted cruising the pits and hanging out with the Yoshimura Suzuki squad—Toni Elias. The 2010 Moto2 World Champion from Cata- lonia (Spain) now competes in the MotoAmerica Championship, and he won the opening two rounds of the AMA Pro Superbike class at the Cir- cuit of Americas in Austin, Texas, on his Yoshimura Suzuki Factory Racing GSX-R1000. Briefly...

• Cover