Wed 21 Feb 2007
MTX National Champs style had it all! A big crowd, a good track,
excellent start gate and best of all, the cream of Australia’s 4X
riders
in one spot all fighting for victory.
The system started with 3 heats which allowed you to score points, with
the top 32 Elite Men going into rounds of deadman finals with the top 2
progressing to the next round. The deadman finals started with 1/8’s,
followed by 1/4’s, 1/2’s and Finals. The finals consisted of 8 men,
with the first final placing 1st-4th and the second final placing
5th-8th.
The usual DH/4X superstars were up front with guys like Rennie,
Cavalier, Kovarik, Atkinson, Graves, Madill, Lloyd, Polc, Strom, Boyer,
Beare, Scar and Rando doing damage. No surprises there. However all
these guys were about to be surprised by 2 WA boys in the form of Ben
“Gritzy” Bell and Daniel “Sproggy” Sprague.
As many of the big names failed to make the cut, Gritzy and Sproggy
battled their way through to birth’s in the 1/8’s with 1st and 2nd
place
and a crash to their names. From this point on the two WA boys stepped
it up a few notches with Sproggy winning his 1/8 and 1/4 and Gritzy
finishing top 2 eliminating some big name riders on the way, including
Boyer, Strom, Polc and Scar.
Come Semi Final time Sproggy and Gritzy lined up in the 2 outside
gates.
Sproggy grabbed a great start an raced into turn one just behind Madill
with Gritzy going for the tight inside line. This wasn’t to pay off as
it pushed Gritzy further back from the front runners. Sproggy however
was giving it and looked like making the transfer to the final 4. He
went for the tight line coming out of turn three and this was all that
was needed for Lloyd to see an opening. Lloyd powered to the outside
and carried a heap of momentum into the rhythm section. Sproggy had no
answer as he couldn’t make up the speed difference to shut the door.
Lloyd and Madill advanced leaving Sproggy and Gritzy to battle it out
for positions 5-8.
Final B (Positions 5-8)
Starting Order was Rando, Beare Gritzy and Sproggy. When the gate went
down, Sproggy sprung out to lead down the first straight. Rando
followed
with Beare and Gritzy battling for 3rd. Sproggy went the outside in
turn 1 with Rando shooting for the inside. This move paid off with
Rando exiting just in front of Sproggy. Gritzy also going for the
inside got shutdown and crashed as both Beare and Rando used the same
line.
Sproggy through everything at Rando but just couldn’t find a was
through
and settled for 2nd. Gritzy dusted himself off and came in for forth.
This result saw Sproggy and Gritzy finish in the top 8 in the MTX. Not
bad for a few guys that don’t really race MTX too often. Yeeeooowww!
Final A (Positions 1-4)
With Madill, Graves, Lloyd and Atkinson lining up, it was always going
to be interesting. However as soon as the gate dropped, the biggest
upset began to unfold. Graves unclipped and shot straight to the back.
Madill to the early lead. Graves got tangled up with Atkinson and went
down by turn 2. Madill then had a pretty cruzy run to the line with
Lloyd following his lead for 2nd.
This capped off a great day of MTX racing. Props has to go out to tall
the WA boys that competed and lets hope we can get a few more MTX races
and tracks organised in WA so the guys can go back bigger and better
next year!
Daniel