SUPERCROSS QUALIFYING
SUPERCROSS HEAT ONE
Muscle Milk/JGR’s Michael Byrne grabbed the start to the first 450 heat and was immediately displaced by GEICO Honda’s Kevin Windham who pulled away by tripling on a tabletop and then tripled off. It was the first time all day that someone had done that and KW showed that he was a man on a mission early on in Seattle. Behind KW was the new Supercross champion Ryan Dungey who rode a smart and steady race the whole way. The track was definitely getting chewed up at this point and the riders were making mistakes everywhere you looked.
Privateer Ryan Clark was in the mix and ran third for a little while before some mistakes dropped him back to ninth. There was a four-way battle between Rockstar/Hart & Huntington’s Chris Blose, the newly minted Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Nick Wey and Wey’s teammate and two-time SX champion Chad Reed. Reed would drop it in a turn and be forced to make his way up from the back.
In the end it was Windham with the win and a full three seconds faster than Dungey when comparing fast laps. Motoconcepts Yamaha’s Kyle Chisholm came from the back to get third.
1-Kevin Windham
2-Ryan Dungey
3-Kyle Chisholm
4-Michael Byrne
5-Nick Wey
6-Chris Blose
7-Troy Adams
8-Chad Reed
9-Ryan Clark
SUPERCROSS HEAT TWO
Muscle Milk/JGR Yamaha went two for two as far as pulling holeshots in the heat races as Justin Brayton joined Byrne and pulled the start in heat two. Behind Brayton were San Manuel Yamaha’s Josh Hill, Honda Red Bull’s Andrew Short and Davi Millsaps. Hill and Short went at it for second behind a disappearing Brayton and it was shaping up to be a good race. Millsaps was getting into his groove and starting to make a move towards the front.
Hill, racing in front of his home crowd, went down in the whoops and had trouble restarting his Yamaha YZ450F. He was way back when he eventually fired his bike up. Millsaps snuck by Short on the inside before the rhythm section and took off after Brayton, who is battling an ankle injury. One rider that was really on the gas was Rockstar Suzuki’s Tommy Hahn who was way back early in the race. Hahn would eventually make it all the way to fourth in a great ride. Kyle Cunningham, normally a 250 rider, jumped up to Valli Yamaha’s vacated YZ450F (Ivan Tedesco’s ride) got a direct transfer to the main event via his fifth place finish.
Out front Millsaps completed his impressive charge and made the move on Brayton and captured 450 heat number two. Honda riders Windham and Millsaps set themselves up to be the men to beat come main event gate drop.
1-Davi Millsaps
2-Justin Brayton
3-Andrew Short
4-Tommy Hahn
5-Kyle Cunningham
6-Matt Boni
7-Jarrod Browne
8-Jason Lawrence
9-Kyle Partridge
SUPERCROSS LCQ
Yamaha’s Josh Hill redeemed himself for his heat race crash by leading the 450 LCQ wire to wire. Behind him Jeff Gibson fought off Jason Thomas and then, after a JT crash, Justin Keeney. Unfortunately for Gibson, Keeny tripled by on the last lap to take the last spot into the main event.
1-Josh Hill
2-Justin Keeney
SUPERCROSS MAIN EVENT
The gate dropped and the man of the hour was the man of the day as GEICO Honda’s Kevin Windham grabbed the holeshot and then laid down some blistering laps in pulling away early. It was a tour de force performance for the veteran as he put on a riding clinic on his way to the win. He was five seconds ahead of second place Ryan Dungey on the second lap. Chad Reed’s comeback to Supercross continued to be rough as he was down in the first turn and way back. Another rider that was down early on was Davi Millsaps; the #18 had his work cut out for him if he was to back up his heat race performance.
Ryan Dungey was in second early and made a small mistake in the turn before the whoops which allowed Justin Brayton to sneak by into second. The Iowa native looked to be charging hard and trying to get his first ever podium. Another rider in the mix was Motoconcepts Yamaha’s Kyle Chisholm as the Florida native put his sand skills to use and moved up to fifth early on.
However, the rider on the move was Rockstar Suzuki’s Tommy Hahn as he moved up from inside the top ten and right by Dungey and then later on, Brayton. As the race wore on Hahn continued to figure out a way around the ruts and kept on jumping all the jumps.
Another rider that was very impressive was Honda Red Bull’s Davi Millsaps who absolutely shredded through the pack and moved from 19th to 4th! Unfortunately, Davi suffered from some sort of mechanical problem on his bike and was forced to quickly pull into the mechanics area for a look-see from his wrench. The detour caused Millsaps to drop outside the top ten and once again, he had to get on it if he wanted to get into the top ten.
But get on it he did and Millsaps worked though the same guys once again to get up to 5th. It was unfortunate for the crash and then the small bike problem; otherwise there was no way that Millsaps would not have secured second on this night.
So, two years after his last win, Kevin Windham won the Seattle Supercross in a dominating performance. Congrats to Tommy Hahn on his first-ever 450 podium and Justin Brayton joined him as a first-time 450 podium man.
1-Kevin Windham
2-Tommy Hahn
3-Justin Brayton
4-Ryan Dungey
5-Davi Millsaps
6-Nick Wey
7-Michael Byrne
8-Chad Reed
9-Andrew Short
10-Kyle Chisholm
TAGS: dirt bike racing, dirt bikes, Monster Energy Supercross, qwest field sx, Seattle Supercross
