Cycle News

SUPERCROSS ROUND 16 / APRIL 28, 2018 SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH / RICE-ECCLES STADIUM P68 MONSTER ENERGY AMA SUPERCROSS iii My Own Race: 28 SHANE MCELRATH 1ST 250SX WEST "It was a tough race," McElrath said. "I tightened up at the beginning and everybody had their mistakes. You really had to just wait for a mistake from the person ahead of you, be- cause there were places you really couldn't go for a pass without losing time. When Aaron made a mistake, I had to work my way in there; same with Adam, but he got me back. It was nice racing clean, but racing hard. It was cool to battle with all of the guys. It was a fun race. It's good to battle like that because it makes us better and smarter." 92 ADAM CIANCIARULO 2ND 250SX WEST "The track was difficult, especially both whoop sections, that's where Shane really excelled today," said runner-up Adam Cianciarulo. "[After the start] Joey slid out right away and we kind of got into each other, then Aaron got by me, then he made a mistake in the whoops and I was able to sneak by him. I was then on Joey and we [McElrath and Cianciarulo] both got by him; [Savatgy] and I were both being stupid and going right down the middle of the whoops in the second set and Shane was being smart and going up the left side and skimming them. It took me way too long to figure that out—just stupid. Once I figured that out and moved left, I still wasn't skimming them but jumping them which was decent, I was at least matching his times, but I wish I could've figured that out sooner. I felt good on other sections of the track and made a run on [McElrath] at the end." 17 JOEY SAVATGY 3RD 250SX WEST "For me, I didn't get into too much; I was the one more being chased," Joey Savatgy said of his race. "They were better from the corner where Eli fell [in the 450SX main] till the finish line; they were making up quite a bit of time. I kept following that V [the main line] in the whoops; for me, I needed to be smarter and change my line up, and that's on me for not doing that. I definitely heard the battling going on behind and I went from first to third in three whoops and that was about it for me. I just got stuck in the V and that was my fault; I need to be smarter. The V was so deep it was grab- bing the bottom of your fork tubes." 25 MARVIN MUSQUIN 1ST 450SX "In the wind it got sketchy in some spots," Marvin Musquin said. "[Plus] the track dried out and got really loose on top and was easy to make mistakes. It was really challeng- ing, especially for 20 minutes." Musquin added that he just focused on not making mistakes and was surprised to hear what had happened to Jason. "I knew Jason would take it easy today to get points, but I only knew how he did when the race was over. I'm glad we still have a chance, so we'll see what happens in Vegas." 3 ELI TOMAC 2ND 450SX "It was a tough track," Eli Tomac said. "Early on [in the day] it started off pretty wet in the morning and got dry in a hurry; it reminded me of Vegas. It was marble and had road-base in it, so it was rough. We've had plenty of soft and rutted tracks this year, so hard-pack was here and we just had to deal with it. [Overall] it was a bad day of starts for me. I got shuffled too far back too early and Marv ran away with it." 4 BLAKE BAGGETT 3RD 450SX "It was gnarly out there," said Blake Baggett. "With the wind, it was like racing in a concrete gravel pit. It was hard; behind lappers you couldn't really see, and we had a lot of gnarly obstacles. I'd say it was the most mentally and physical toughest [this year]; you'd be in the first turn in a full drift and the front wheel would hit a rock or the back would step out. It was really tough out there."

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