Red Bud MX, Buchanon, MI 2004

GNC MX Round 7
Red Bud MX
Buchanon, MI
May 23, 2004

By John Pellan and Sean Berkey

The weekend forecast didn’t look very good as multiple storms were approaching the Buchanon, MI area. The first one hit during Friday’s practice. With it, 70mph winds slammed through the Red Bud facility and dissapointed many riders about to practice. It also dissapointed those in the pits with EZ Ups as most were destroyed.

Three other storms hit the area but all at night. Red Bud’s track crew did an outstanding job preparing the track. By the time Sunday’s main attraction was underway, the track was well groomed and ready for action. Despite the call for more rain, the beautiful rolling hills on the infield of the track were steadily gathering a nice flow of spectators. “We’re here to see Doug Gust win six in a row! It’s going to be a great race. I can’t wait for this baby”, commented one of the spectators driving down from Gust’s home state of Wisconsin.

Moto 1 – Gust Dominates
Romulus, Michigan’s own Harold “The Bumblebee” Goodman pulled the trigger the fastest by launching his white Sparks/Nicholson/PEP Yamaha YFZ out front. It didn’t take Alba Action.com/atvscene.com’s Kory Ellis long to slip by the “Bee” and take over the lead. The overwhelming crowd favorite “Digger” Doug Gust (American Suzuki /Yoshimura/ Hinson/ Weekend Warrior) quickly found ground behind Ellis and knocked hard on his back door. On the third lap, the crowd went nuts as Gust made his way past Ellis in the blue grooved “S” turns that resembled those found on a TT course. Gust’s, unfortunately former TT skills, undoubtedly helped him negotiate this track in record-breaking speed. Once in the lead, Gust poured it on even further. Typical to the theme of this year’s series, he and his Suzuki were perfectly dialed in for this track. This was most noticeable in the whoop section. Gust hammered through this section like a hot knife through butter. By the end of the moto he put a whopping 18 seconds on the rest of the riders!

With Gust long gone, those other riders would have to battle for the runner up spot. PA’s John Natalie (East Coast ATV) handled that battle well by laying his claim on the spot after passing Ellis in the same place that Gust got by. Natalie’s East Coast ATV teammate, Dustin Wimmer rode impressively and kept sight of Ellis’ number 53 target. On the last lap, both Wimmer, Tim Farr (Honda/Baldwin/DG/PEP/Sparks) and Ohio’s Jason Luburgh (Nac’s/TC) moved past Ellis after he stalled his Alba Action Yamaha YFZ.

Worth mention is the fact that Jason Luburgh passed nine riders to finish up in fifth. And Farr passed 11 riders to finish up fourth!

Moto 2 – ATV Racing History
With rain expected, the promoter and ATVA ref, Robert “Smitty” Smith, decided to cut down amateur laps to three. With this, all amateur motos were completed before the final pro moto – scheduled for 3pm. This seemed to raise the crowd’s anticipation even further. As the pro field entered behind the gate, spectators hectically scrambled for a good spot to watch behind their “gate”, otherwise known as the fence that keeps them from getting too close to the track. Everyone seemed to know that moto two would be something special and nobody wanted to miss a bit of the action.

The twenty pro riders roared to the first left hand jog in the track side by side. Seconds later several quads went flipping through the air. When the roost cleared Richard Tordoff, Keith Little, Jason Dunkelberger, Jason Luburgh, Donald Lysinger, Jeremiah Jones and Doug Gust scrambled to get going again. “I got into the first turn around 5th. Just as I was thinking this will be a pretty good start, all of a sudden, — Wham! I was nailed in the back”, said Gust after the race, “Someone had hooked onto me and drug my quad to a stop. I had the clutch in and my LTZ was still running. I was about to take off when I looked down and saw Jeremiah Jones under my quad! I saw his eyes looking up at me. I somehow had run him completely over during the pile-up. I pulled it back a little, popped it up on a wheelie, and he scrambled out from under. Once he got out, I dropped it down, looked around, dumped the clutch and took off.” Gust left the mess a little quicker than the rest of the downed riders but nonetheless in 14th place. This is where the legendary come from behind victory would start.

Duncan Racing’s Tavis Cain led the race followed by rookie Dustin Wimmer, and veteran Tim Farr. Cain would soon lose his lead to Wimmer, while Farr kept a mental inventory on Wimmer’s lines. By the second lap, Gust caught up to the first wave of riders (Gilbert Attix, Joe Haavisto, and Matt White) that were in his way to a sixth straight overall. “Once I got free of the mess I thought to myself – man, I gotta go now! I was just going hard as I could and passing riders as fast as I could

As Gust charged from the rear, Wimmer and Farr represented the front. Wimmer rode an incredible moto, as did Farr to keep him within striking distance. Their race for the lead was more of a chess game compared to Gust’s Rambo-like charge through the field. Nonetheless, Wimmer and Farr earn major props for twenty minutes of mistake free professional racing.

Gust amazingly charged his way up to Natalie’s third place spot. “I finally caught all the way up to Natalie in 3rd and then I stalled it! I couldn’t’t believe it. I lost all that ground and had to charge all over again in order to catch him.” If he could get past Natalie, the overall would be his for the record continuing sixth straight time! After the finish line table top through the corner, he slipped by to do just that. Gust later said, “Once I got past John, first and second were within one straight. I started off after them and then saw on my pit board that I had the overall wrapped up. After I saw the board and thought of everything that happened so far, I decided to back it down a notch and take the 3rd place and the overall.”

Meanwhile Farr rode like his usual flawless self and in the process wore down Wimmer. Farr’s pass for the lead gave him the moto two victory and the runner up spot for the day. “I’ve always done pretty well here. This track is one of my favorites. I know it inside and out, so I was able to use that to advantage.”

Gust definitely earned the billing of “star of the show” with a legendary piece of come-from-behind-ATV-racing-nostalgia, but he wasn’t the only rider using the whole moto to advance through the field. Murietta, CA’s Kory Ellis put on one heck of a show as well. Ellis never seems to put two good starts together. As typical he was forced to do something about his lap-one 13th place position.

Tavis Cain, (celebrating his 23rd birthday), was on the gas and managed to keep “Ironman” Natalie at bay all the way to to the last lap checkers. Unfortunately for Cain, Ellis was reaching deep inside on that last lap and wanted one more spot. He poured it on through the newly formed whoop section to pull along side of Cain, then passed him through the “S” turn just before the finish to take the top five spot for the day.

Gust happily said this on the way to his Suzuki headquarters in the pits, This is the closest track for me. I’m about three hours from here, so I have a lot of friends and family come to this one. I signed over three pads, (750 sheets), of autograph sheets” Gust said, “There was a line around our Weekend Warrior team trailer all day long. It was great! Unfortunately I seem to have a lot of problems at Red Bud though. If it’s not a rock stuck in my rotor it’s something else. I really wanted to make it sixth in a row in front of all those rooting me on. So it’s really nice to shake that bad luck and win here today”.

Amateur Racing
In the Plus 40 class Dave Porter aboard his PRP/K&K/TC Honda would pull the holeshot in moto one and leave Tommy Tantillo and the rest of the pack. Art Brown on his Polaris would roll in third.
In the second moto Tantillo aboard his Walsh machine wouldn’t’t let Porter pull to such a dominating lead early and would keep him in striking distance until the last few laps when Porter swept both motos, and took the overall followed by Tantillo and Oklahoma’s Art Brown on the Polaris.

With the introduction of the new Sport Quads within the last year the new Production classes have become very popular. They allow only new current production based ATVs. The Production A showed some exciting racing on both days.
In qualifier #1 Josh Upperman aboard his Honda pulled the holeshot followed by Nate Morello and Illinois rider Marc Fechtner, and Iowa’s Jason Watt. Fechtner would take over the lead until Trent Kandel slipped past him and took the moto win, followed by Fechtner, Upperman, and Justin Hanusosky in fourth. Morello fell to tenth missing the cut. Watt had ignition problems sending both to the LCQ.

In qualifier #2, Iowa’s Jesse Barnes would grab the holeshot in front of Bobby Ross, and Jason Rich and Ohio’s Adam Clark. Ross would take over the led from Barnes before the valley and would go on for the moto victory followed by Barnes, Indiana’s Randy Shilling, and Clark in fourth. Rich would just hang on to the final qualifying spot.

The final moto saw Honda rider Josh Upperman pulling the holeshot just in front of Pro Motorsports/PEP/Scott USA/FMF rider Jesse Barnes on his Yamaha. Ohio native Media All-Stars/JB Racing’s Mark Kendall would sweep around Barnes in the valley along with Bobby Ross. The battle for the top spot would revolve on, as Upperman couldn’t shake Ross, or Trent Kandel. Ross would force Upperman into spinning out on the last lap at the top of the monza wall handing the lead over to Ross. Ross would go on to win the moto and the overall, Upperman would finish third behind, Kandel and third overall as Trent Kandel’s second would give him second overall and, Illinois rider Marc Fechtner would take fourth in the moto and fourth overall.

The Pro Am 265 class win would come down to two fast riders that would put on a great race for the fans. Lost Creek Cycle’s rider Pat Brown & JPMX/Walsh rider Jeremy Lawson would both come out of the hole 1-2 in both motos. In moto 1 Brown would pull away from Lawson and go on to an easy win, but moto 2 wouldn’t as easy. In moto 2 again it would be Brown and Lawson followed by Illinois rider Chad Wienen aboard his Baldwin/PEP/Wiseco/SF Racing CRF450 machine. Lawson was all over Brown and in the early minutes would actually power by Brown up the monza wall, but Brown would soon take over the lead again. The two riders would pull away leaving Wienen to battle on his own, while Klint Anderson and Jeffrey Thompson would fight for fourth. It look as if Lawson wouldn’t be able to hang with Brown, but Lawson would soon charge back with around four laps to go and try to make his move several times in the whoops, but would get squirrelly and have to settle for second behind Brown. Brown would take the overall followed by Lawson, and Wienen, Anderson would finish fifth in the second moto, but take the fourth overall spot ahead of Jeffrey Thompson.

Pro Point’s Race (after seven rounds)
1. Doug Gust 205
2. Tim Farr 130
3. John Natalie Jr 130
4. Kory Ellis 122
5. Jeremiah Jones 117
6. Tavis Cain 105
7. Dustin Wimmer 86
8. Jason Luburgh 85
9. Keith Little 84
10. Jasmin Plante 80
11. Jason Dunkelberger 80
12. Joe Byrd 67
13. Joe Haavisto 47
14. Gilbert Attix 43
15. Matt White 39
16. Dana Creech 36
17. Harold Goodman32
18. Shane Hitt 31
19. Nate Frees 29
20. Michael Walsh 16

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