St. Louis Provides Double Dosage of Excitement
3/05/2007
Janesville, WI - Round nine of the Amp'd Mobile AMA Supercross Series will go down as one of the greatest all around races ever as both main events had spectators out of their seats the entire time. Coming off a mechanical failure last week in Atlanta, Ben Townley out dueled teammate Darcy Lange and rookie sensation, Ryan Dungey to earn his first U.S. Supercross Lites win. Meanwhile in the Supercross division, Chad Reed and James Stewart both went down early on and both had to battle back to earn third and second respectively while Ricky Carmichael ran away with the win.
Rocketing off the line and grabbing the Progressive Direct Holeshot was heat race one runner up, Ben Townley followed closely by Mike Alessi, Ryan Dungey and Darcy Lange. As Alessi and Dungey battled for second, Lange was able to slip by both on lap two and by lap six the running order was Townley, Lange, Dungey, Alessi and Ryan Morais. Out front, Townley and Lange ran closely until lap eight when Townley made a mistake and allowed Lange to briefly go by and Dungey back in the mix. On the following lap, Dungey was able to get by Lange for second and the top three would seemingly settle in until Dungey went down hard in the second set of whoops and struggled to re-fire. Meanwhile, Townley and Lange were way out front and battling back and forth in the closing laps until Lange gave it one last shot coming out of the second set of whoops. Lange tried tripling and came up way short with the result of being planted into the St. Louis soil with one corner to go. Townley went on for the win while Morais and Matt Goerke rounded out the podium. Lange was able to salvage some points by finishing sixth while last week's winner, Dungey remounted to finish a distant 18th.
Chad Reed once again grabbed another Progressive Direct Holeshot with Eric Sorby, James Stewart and the rest of the pack in tow. Seemingly determined not to be outdone by the Lites class in the excitement and drama department, Ivan Tedesco and Tim Ferry began the drama early on as the two went down in the sand section only to have Ferry get up disoriented and grab the wrong bike. Up front, Stewart made his move to the front early on but Reed fought back and the two came together and went down. Reed was the first one up and going in around eighth place while Stewart struggled to restart and was dead last. With all the drama, Sorby was able to grab the lead while Carmichael charged from a poor start to steal away the lead on lap three. Once in front, Carmichael cruised to the victory while all eyes were on Reed and Stewart as the two frantically worked their way up into second and third respectively. On lap ten Stewart would make an ultra aggressive pass on Reed in the same corner and from there the top three spots never changed. Afterward, Reed and Stewart exchanged heated words, blaming one another for overly aggressive riding.
Supercross Results
- Ricky Carmicheal
- James Stewart
- Chad Reed - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Kevin Windham
- Nathan Ramsey - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- David Vuillemin
- Paul Carpenter - Moose Racing
- Heath Voss
- Eric Sorby
- Cole Siebler
Supercross Lites Results
- Ben Townley - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Ryan Morais
- Matt Goerke
- Mike Alessi
- Broc Tickle
- Darcy Lange - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Jeff Alessi
- Ryan Sipes
- Zach Osborne
- Justin Brayton
Supercross Overall Points
- Stewart 210
- Reed 191 - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Ferry 149
- Windham 137
- Carmichael 116
- Byrne 114
- Voss 107
- Tedesco 103 - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Vuillemin 101
- Preston 97
Supercross Lites Overall Points
- Morais 40
- Goerke 40
- Lange 37 - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Dungey 28
- Brayton 26
- Osborne 26
- Townley 25 - Parts Unlimited & THOR
- Sipes 25
- J. Alessi 22
- M. Alessi 18