2011 Club 57 Challenge

Hey everybody!  The Club 57 challenge was today!  And it couldn't have gone much better. 

I knew I was going to have a lot of riding at this race, so some extra rest from day light savings time helped me out a little.  We even got to the track early! That's a little different than usual.  So I had plenty of time to get ready for the sight lap.  Ahh, the sight lap.. Some parts of the track were so slippery, especially the grass track part.  At that point I got a little nervous for the race.

But what was there to worry about, anyway?  This was the first race I've done where we had a dead engine start.  This was good for my 250 races, but not as good for my 450 races. Ok, on to the racing part...

450 moto 1:  Didn't get bike started on first kick.  I was like in 8th place about 3 turns into the race.  Made some passes and then got into a good battle with Malachi Messenger.  I almost got by him halfway through the race, but I missed a line.. That's ok. On the last lap there was someone down, Malachi went to the inside, I went to the outside.  And I just pinned it past him.  Lucky me!  So I got 2nd in my class in that race, but 3rd with the combined classes...

250 moto 1:  Boom, holeshot!  Push push push.  30 second lead. Win! :D That's about it for that moto.

450 moto 2:  Bad start again, hectic first turn with some guys going down in front of me.  But I got by it fine and started pushing.  The guy who beat me in the first 450 moto was right in front of me, and I knew I had to pass him to get the overall win.  And guess what happened on the second to last lap: he fell over!  Boom, I got around and just kept it on two wheels for the rest of the race. 1st overall!

250 moto 2:  Ok, at this point in the day I was pretty tired.  But I had to try and win the overall.  So I started it off good with another holeshot!  About two turns into the race my fingers and my legs started cramping up.  Ouch.  But I got relaxed and kept pushing.  It was on the second or third lap when I stalled my bike, which allowed Scott Zont to get by.  He was right on me, anyway.  At that point there was absolutely no one behind me for quite some time.  So all I had to do was ride out the race to get the overall win.  Well, I kept pushing but I also didn't stress about it too much.  I had to focus on not messing up in some rutted woods sections..

So today was a successful day!  Two 1st place overalls.  So now I'm super tired from the four 30 minute motos...

Have a nice day! -Greg