Does the GOAT have feet of clay…?
Published: 16th October 2007
Author: Pondo
Maybe the des Nations was Ricky’s final race after all - the Makita Suzuki legend won’t be coming to Bercy…
RC’s final hurrah has been long anticipated, even if the actual event has not widely known - as farewell tours go, this has been bigger than the Beatles. But it seems that the end may already have passed us by - scheduled to ride the US Open and the Paris Supercross, one of the toughest riders the sport has ever seen got hit with what seems to be Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. This poorly-understood disorder is highly debilitating with exact causes not easy to ascertain, and many medical terms have been associated with the syndrome, without any single one being the definitive proven diagnosis - amongst the linked terms are Epstein-Barrs, raphe nucleus encephalopathy, and Yuppie flu… Whatever the tag, it seems likely that the final chapter in one of the most astonishing careers in the sport has already been written - that it should pass us by without notice is a tragedy, but it should not and does not take anything away from Ricky’s incredible accomplishments. On the contrary, it just means we’ll have to celebrate them twice as hard whenever the opportunity occurs…
Outside of that, there has been some racing this weekend - the US Open was supposed to be RC’s last showing on home soil, but neither he nor James could make it, with the Monster Kawasaki star still recovering from his knee injury. On paper, it was there for Chad Reed to sweep up, and he kicked off things in fine form, taking superpole, the holeshot and the main event win, but a repeat on Saturday, which would have won him a tasty $250 000 dollars, was not to be - quick out of the start, Reedy lost the front end and gently dropped Andrew Short, Mike Alessi, Tim Ferry and Grant Langston out of the running along with himself. Out front, Jake Weimar made the running on his SoBe Samsung 250f , but the question was, how far back could the top boys come? Chad was making frightening progress through the pack, but it all went wrong when he misjudged a pass on Shorty, colliding with him again and taking them both down. Then, just to seal the deal, he immediately ran into Langston again, and fell for the third time. Weimar cruised home for a brilliant victory on the small-bore Honda, whilst the overall for the weekend went to the quick-remounting Grant Langston, crowning a fine year for the South African, ahead of Reed and former Arenacross champion Josh Demuth.
The British Masters championship wrapped up this weekend - on an immaculate Foxhills circuit, Mark Jones battled to a brace of strong wins in the Open class. Brad Anderson suffered an incident-packed day, but fought back to take second overall and seal the title, coming from dead last after a problem on the start in race one, then battling through the pack after having a Shaun Simpson get stuck in his back wheel in the second race. That same Shaun Simpson won the Pro 125 class after an epic battle with Lewis Gregory - Lew won the second after a last-gasp pass, but his first moto third gave the win to the son of ex-GP star Willie Simpson. Elliot Banks-Browne took third, but only after having to dig deep to beat Jonathan Pettit in the second moto - the TM-mounted veteran gave EB-B almost as much as he could handle on the screaming 125 two stroke…
Weston next week - will it be Knighter again? Everts’ revenge? A Coppins coup? Or a Ramon raid? Get down there - it’ll be a corker…