Anaheim II – A Battle for the Ages
With worries of a rain soaked track at Anaheim II this past weekend, the track was spared of rain and looked better than ever. So that means no slippery conditions, no mud flying action, and no Get Dirty MX’ers? Boo! None the less the action on the track was more than exciting. This was one of the closest races we have seen all season. Unfortunately it was the most we have seen riders go down, some in horrific fashion.
Starting with the Lites class, in Heat 1 Ryan Morais had the scariest crash we have seen all season. On the 1st lap Morais doubled the end of the rhythm section as Phil Nicoletti tripled it. Nicoletti’s front tire landed on Morais’s back side and sit flipping him and his bike into the air. Morais landed hard on his back on the top of the jumped and shot forward off of it. Nicoletti picked his bike off of Morais and continued on.
Word is Morais has a bruised lung and bladder, but no broken bones. He will be out for a while and will hopefully be back for the last 2 Rounds. Josh Hansen went on to win the Heat #1.
Heat #2 belonged to Jake Weimer as usual. Jake cruised to the win and transferred easily to the Main Event. KTM rider Tommy Searle also went down in the Lites heat and like Morais was done for the night.
The Lites Main was business as usual for Jake Weimer as he took off from the pack took his 3rd straight win in the Lites series. Trey Canard finished 2nd followed by Wil Hahn. Those are your point leaders thus far.
In SX Heat #1 it was Stewart’s teammate Josh Hill taking the win followed by Stewart. The Heat #2 winner was the rider with the most momentum this season, Ryan Dungey; followed by Ryan Villopoto who took 2nd.
So you think we would have a clear cut winner for the SX Main Event with Chad Reed being out, and Stewart still a little banged up right? Well that wasn’t the case at all.
Stewart came out and took the holeshot and the early lead. Teammate Josh Hill was in 2nd followed by Stroupe and his teammate Dungey. It was the Yamaha vs. Suzuki race with all 4 riders racing closely behind each other. Dungey passed Stroupe in Lap 3 and Stewart was passed by Hill in Lap 6. Next Dungey went to work on Stewart and finally caught and passed him in the Lap 12. Only one more rider to go and Dungey would be on his way to his 2nd straight SX Win, and that he did passing Hill in Lap 14! Hill finished 2nd followed by Stewart who had to settle for 3rd.
Dungey is first in points and racking up the wins with 72 followed by Hill, Villopoto, Short, Stewart and Windham. Only a few points separate 2-6 in the standings right now so it should be a nice battle going into San Francisco on January 30th. Dungey is off to one heck of a start in his rookie season. Look for him to continue to dominate as Stewart and the rest of the top riders try to find a way to beat him.
