Ken Roczen wins Redbud ahead of Eli Tomac
The fans for the RedBud National on Fourth of July weekend lived up to their reputations and brought the excitement for Round 6 of the 2016 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship.
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Justin Bogle had the holeshot, but Justin Barcia rode up with an unseen speed and came out around him. Ken Roczen, though would not wait long before he made his presence known and pushed forward to grab the lead while still inside the first lap.
Eli Tomac had solid first lap despite a 7th place position from the start. Tomas made quick work of four spots on the first lap and found himself quickly in third and fighting for Barcia’s second place spot.
The battle for second would be an ongoing effort. For multiple laps Tomac would be within a bike length of Barcia but unable to get an inside line around turns and stuck in his third place position. After a few laps of all eyes on Tomac trying to take second, the battle changed and he found himself fighting to hold off Broc Tickle from taking third.
Tickle seemingly came out of nowhere as he made a quick approach onto the heels of Tomac and, unlike Tomac trying to take Barcia, Tickle was finding all sort of different lines to keep Tomac on his toes.Then Barcia bounced out of rhythm.
Barcia lost a little ground but not immediately hand over his second place position. Tomac did however take advantage of the opportunity and found his way around Barcia and left him to deal with Tickle.
In the fifth place position would be Phil Nicoletti who had his work cut out for him to keep back not only the fastest qualifier Christophe Pourcel, Blake Baggett (back from an early season injury), Marvin Musquin and Bogle who had settled down near the middle of the pack following his holeshot. The next rider in line would be Matt Bisceglia to round out the top ten.
The group would be tight for many laps, but a few exchanges would occur. First was Musquin to move past Baggett, then it would be Pourcel to pass Nicoletti and the next move would come from Bisceglia on Baggett. Still the pack of riders from fifth thru tenth would continue to stay close in quarters.
As the action continue to unfold in the fifth thru tenth positions, the focus returned to Tomac as he stalled his bike following a little bit of airtime. Tomac came down a landing and into a turn but found he was stalled and was forced to kickstart his bike in a hurry. He did well, though, and managed to keep his position of second despite the odds.
Roczen, however, had not bobbled and had earned more than a ten second gap over the rest of the field. Roczen held on to his lead and took the win in moto 1, while Tomac and Barcia rounded out the podium behind him.
Moto 2 started out with what seemed like a mirrored Bogle repeated his holeshot on the day earning another while Tomac rode through the first few turns right on him. Then Tomac cam flying down hill to go wide and charge past Bogle with fire.
Next up for Bogle to battle was Roczen, but it wouldn’t be much of a battle as Roczen took an inside line and left him behind. Roczen then picked up his place and headed for Tomac.
Tomac managed to lead a lap, but with the choice not to triple at the infamous LaRocco’s Leap he watch as Roczen soared over it and him for the lead. Roczen has shown all season that he is not interested in being anything but the leader, and he quickly found his way to lead again for moto 2.
A little deeper in the pack was Barcia making a move on Bisceglia to earn the fifth place position. In front of Barcia was Bogle in fourth riding just behind Tickle in third. Barcia would keep his momentum following his pass on Bisceglia and within a lap move on to overtake Bogle.
Bogle continued to lose his momentum after that pass. Coming up from behind, Musquin, Baggett and Pourcel would all find their way past Bogle over the course of next lap. Bisceglia would soon experience a similar edge from Musquin coming from behind as well as Baggett and Pourcel shortly after. With the multiple moves by Musquin he found himself in fifth place with seven minutes and two laps to continue pushing up the leaderboard.
Going into the final lap, Roczen rode strong with a 28 second gap and carried it all the way to the finish. Roczen finished 1-1 on the day while his closest competitor in the standings, Tomac, finished 2-2 on the day, which leaves a fairly clear picture as to what is expected for the second half of the season.
Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross 2016 – Round Six – Redbud National 450 Race Results
- Ken Roczen (1-1)
- Eli Tomac (2-2)
- Broc Tickle (4-3)
- Justin Barcia (3-4)
- Marvin Musquin (5-6)
- Blake Baggett (7-5)
- Christophe Pourcel (6-7)
- Matt Bisceglia (8-8)
- Justin Bogle (10-9)
- Benny Bloss (11-10)
Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross 2016 – Round Six – Redbud National 250 Championship Points Standings
- Ken Roczen, 293
- Eli Tomac, -53
- Marvin Musquin, -126
- Cole Seely, -142
- Broc Tickle, -146
- Justin Barcia, -147
- Christophe Pourcel, -157
- Ryan Dungey, -162
- Justin Bogle, -175
- Jason Anderson, -180
Cooper Webb goes 1-1 at Redbud
Hosting the halfway point race on Independence Day weekend, RedBud National was packed with diehard patrons and patriots for Round 6 of the 2016 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship.
Straight out of the gate the battle for the front of the pack began. Austin Forkner grabbed the holeshot with Cooper Webb was buried in the pack for the first corner. Then, out from the thicket, Webb snuck around the outside to steal the lead by turn two. That was just the start of a crazy moto 1 battle.
The entire first lap consisted of Forkner and Webb exchanging passes for the lead four different times. By the end of the first lap and halfway through the second lap Forker had found his in front of Webb, but that would be the end of that.
Webb not only found his way to the front of the pack but found space and managed to separate himself leaving the battles behind him.
This gave way to Joey Savatgy to gain on Forkner and ultimately pass him for the second place. Following Forkner taking a rough landing coming down a hill and losing position in the corner, Savatgy took his opportunity any ran away with it.
With a few laps completed, Jeremy Martin (fourth) and Aaron Plessinger (fifth) rounded out the top five with Alex Martin close behind in sixth. The Brothers Martin and Plessinger would hold down their positions just outside the podium for many more laps while their teammate Webb held the lead.
Outside of the Yamalube Star Racing Yamaha team in fourth thru sixth was Mitchell Oldenburg just in front of the fastest qualifier on the day Adam Cianciarulo .
After everyone seemed to have settled into their positions, Plessinger found trouble and Alex Martin found fifth while Oldenburg gave way to Zach Osborne for sixth. Osborne showed momentum and looked to take it farther toward front.
Then the action went back to the Brothers Martin as they both made quick work of Forkner with a combination effort. Following the passes on the rookie it was Alex who found his way to third place position in front of his brother Jeremy in fourth.
Looking forward to the front-runner, Webb was not only showing distance from the pack but by the 30-minute mark Webb had placed the fastest lap of the race. Webb did however have to fight his way through some lappers in the following lap and this gave the series overall leader, Savatgy, a final look at Webb but it would not be enough to catch him before the race was over.
Moto 1 ended with Webb, Savatgy and Alex Martin on the podium.
Coming into moto 2 Webb decided to lineup again on the inside most gate, which is usually not where racers choose but Webb found a way to work it for moto 1 and was ready to try it again.
As the gate dropped, Shane McElrath barely squeaked past Martin Davalos for the holeshot but they were both quickly passed by Savatgy. Savatgy made quick work to take the front of the pack. Shortly after, however, he bobbled and nearly gave up his lead but managed to maintain it for the time being.
Savatgy was looking to have started to build a gap between the rest of the riders after the opening laps. Then, seemingly out of nowhere he found himself a little caught up trying to come out of a corner and ended up dumping his bike and losing his lead.
This left McElrath back in front and leading the pack exactly as he did for the majority of the second moto the weekend prior. McElrath, though, would not be able to maintain that position following an off the track experience where the pushed his way through a berm.
The new leader for the moto would be Alex Martin with Webb right on his wheels and between the other Martin brother, Jeremy. Jeremy would not stay behind Webb for long with his line selection allowing him an open path to pass for second. At this point Alex was working hard to earn a gap in an effort to take home his first moto win of the season.
McElrath gave up his fourth place position to Osborne, which left the first four places in the hands of Yamalube Star Racing Yamaha teammates.
Right when Jeremy Martin looked to be closing the gap on his brother he experienced a kick coming out of a whoop section and took a dip into the turn and found himself on the ground and dropping back in the pack to seventh.
The next rider to bite the dust would Savatgy for the second time, making for back-to-back moto 2’s resulting in two crashes for the series leader. From the crash Savatgy experienced following a downhill jump and a few bumps to follow, he did manage to shake off the violent experience but he did have to pull into the pits and have his bars straightened. The race for Savatgy became a battle to earn whatever points possible to not relinquish the overall class points lead.
Shifting over, Webb took a lap to not only gain ground on Alex Martin but come in extremely hot to pass Alex by scrubbing a jump, staying low and hitting the gas. By the time Alex hit the ground Webb was sending dirt up and accelerating ahead.
Alex Martin would soon find himself in a similar situation with Osborne. Osborne went all out and made his way dangerously close to his teammate in order for a chance to pass. Osborne did find a route around Alex, but then immediately cased a jump and had to gun his way out of a bobble in order to keep his new second place position.
The entire final lap came down to a three-way teammate battle for the front. Without much more than stable turns and an open throttle, Webb managed to hold off Osborne and Alex for the win and a team sweep for the moto 2 podium.
With Webb’s 1-1 finish on the day at RedBud following his overall win at Muddy Creek, in combination with Savatgy having two disastrous moto 2s at the same races, Webb has now officially taken over the overall class points lead with the 2016 series being halfway over.
Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross 2016 – Round Six – Redbud National 250 Race Results
- Cooper Webb (1-1)
- Alex Martin (3-3)
- Zach Osborne (5-2)
- Jeremy Martin (4-4)
- Shane McElrath (9-5)
- Adam Cianciarulo (7-8)
- Joey Savatgy (2-16)
- Austin Forkner (6-10)
- Arnaud Tonus (11-6)
- Mitchell Oldenburg (8-9)
Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross 2016 – Round Six – Redbud National 250 Championship Points Standings
- Cooper Webb, 243
- Joey Savatgy, -11
- Jeremy Martin, -34
- Alex Martin, -45
- Zach Osborne, -53
- Austin Forkner, -79
- Aaron Plessinger, -91
- Shane McElrath, -119
- Mitchell Oldenburg, -126
- RJ Hampshire, -130
