Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/776700
SUPERCROSS ROUND 3 / JANUARY 21, 2017 ANGEL STADIUM OF ANAHEIM / ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA P64 MONSTER ENERGY AMA SUPERCROSS SERIES fourth place in both, but that all end- ed when the FIM/AMA deemed he got overly physical with MotoCon- cepts Honda's Vince Friese follow- ing an on-track incident in their heat race. During the heat race, Ander- son, Marvin Musquin, Friese, and Malcolm Stewart were all battling near the front when all four tried to occupy the same spot at the same time. Friese went low just as Ander- son cut down to try and make a pass, and Anderson was met with Friese's rear wheel. Anderson went down, then collected Musquin as well, and after the race, Anderson was having words with Friese as they headed into the tunnel. Friese—with his me- chanic on the back of his bike—en- gaged in the disagreement, at which point Anderson reached out and sort of slapped Friese on the back of the helmet. At the same time, Friese's mechanic seemed to reach over to- ward Anderson and shove him and/ or pull his front brake, because An- derson went down pretty quickly. The FIM/AMA has a zero-tolerance policy about hitting anybody in the head like that, and they ruled to dis- qualify Anderson for the rest of the night. RCH/Yoshimura Suzuki's Justin Bogle went to the hospital having trouble breathing after crashing in his heat race. It was discovered that he actually bruised his lungs and "some other minor stuff," which he said in an Instagram post, adding "not sure on recovery yet…" He also admitted having suffered a big crash earlier in the week. While discussing the Friese/Ander- son incident with MotoConcepts team manager Tony Alessi, he men- tioned that his son Mike Alessi should be back on-track within a week, maybe two, after recovering from a concussion suffered at Ana- heim I. We saw Red Bull KTM's Trey Ca- nard in the pits at Anaheim II, and he was as bubbly as usual, despite the fact that he's not yet ready to get back to racing. The initial hope was that Canard could be back in time for Anaheim II after suffering a mi- nor shoulder injury during practice at Anaheim I, which he then ag- gravated further with a crash in his semi. For now, Canard is week-to- week depending on how his shoul- der feels. He could be back racing as soon as Phoenix in one week's time. Red Bull KTM's Ryan Dungey and Marvin Musquin both had to make unusual trips to the semis at Anaheim II. Musquin had the aforementioned crash with Anderson knock him out of a qualifying position in his heat, while Dungey fell off the start of his heat race and damaged his throttle, causing him to exit the race and re- turn for the semi. Anaheim II marked the 450SX de- but of Malcolm Stewart. Stewart showed up in a Ride365.com/Sev- en-backed race hauler with a Suzuki RM-Z450, and set the 10th-fastest time in daytime qualifying. In the races, Stewart showed he still has speed, finishing second behind win- ner Ken Roczen in the first 450SX heat race of the night. In the main, though, Stewart started mid-pack, fought his way up to eighth place, then suffered at least one crash on his way to finishing 18th. As for his brother, James, he's due to likely join Malcolm (if he doesn't pick up a ride somewhere else) at some point dur- ing the 2017 series, but James is re- portedly still trying to get a hold of the parts he needs to get back to racing again. Yamaha's Cooper Webb is learning what it's like to race a 450 in super- cross, as opposed to riding a 450 at a test track. "I'm starting to learn it now," Webb said. "Everybody's talk- ed about it, but you don't know until you're out there. Once you get a little uncomfortable and make some small mistakes, you just naturally hold on tighter, and it's just so much more to push around and to ride at that inten- sity level and be out there scrubbing. And for me, too, with the tracks, they're a lot rougher, and that's something that caught me off-guard, because I'm used to my races be- ing over, but that's when the 450cc races start, so I wasn't prepared for how much rougher the tracks get. I'm starting to get it, and I'm learning what I can do with the bike, and what I can do with myself and stuff like that, so I'm starting to figure it out. I just want to keep learning." Briefly... cont. on page 66