FLAT TRACK
AMA PRO FLAT TRACK SERIES
ROUND 9 / JULY 30, 2016
CHARLOTTE MOTOR SPEEDWAY / CHARLOTTE, NC
P56
able to clear Brad and once I
cleared him, Jared and Sammy
were kind of going at it. Jared
just cleared Sammy before I got
to them. He just got a couple
bike lengths or so. By the time
I got to second we just main-
tained that distance the entire
race. He would pull a little and
I would gain on him or make a
little mistake here and there."
The top of the field still re-
mained tight even after Halbert
was no longer a factor. Kenny
Halbert, who was making his
debut on the Wiebler XR750
Harley-Davidson, was able to
stay in Mees' shadow until lap
14 when he lost his chain end-
ing his night with an 18th-place
finish.
Halbert's misfortune opened
the door for Brandon Robinson,
who is having a solid season
on his Kennedy Racing/Brent
Armbruster XR750. Robinson
had passed a fading Brad Baker
(Harley-Davidson Motor Compa-
ny/Vance & Hines) for second
just as Halbert hit the sidelines.
"My start was mediocre. I
was about fourth; it felt like
for about 10 laps. We were
bunched up there for a while,"
said Robinson. "Finally I was
then I'd pull off his line, which
was my line, too, to go by and
I'd just make a mistake. I'd lose
the front, so I would run back
up. Finally I decided that I had
to get by him."
The cat and mouse game
played out until lap 10 when
Mees took over. "I kind of put an
aggressive move on him. He was
skating through the middle so
bad and he was losing so much
time in the middle, so I knew I
needed to stick him in the middle
to where he couldn't pick up the
gas," said Mees. "That is kind of
what I did. I just drove it in there
and kind of took the block pass
away from him. It was clean, but it
was an aggressive clean pass for
the circumstances."
(Above) Halbert tries to
hold off eventual winner
Jared Mees (1). Halbert later
dropped out with a broken
chain. (Right) Brandon
Robinson (44) followed Mees
home in second place.
