On The Fast-Trak 6-2-00

GNC Round 5 – Red Bud Track & Trail – Buchanan, MI – May 27-28, 2000
Spader 3-petes and “Rolls” on Towards GNC Title
Brick, New Jersey’s Travis Spader is having the best year of his career. He’s dominated the last three outings and proved that he’s the guy to beat for the 2000 championship. He’s always the first to tell you it’s his equipment — the Roll Design Lobo chassis with Custom Axis shocks combined with the strong running and reliable Duncan Racing powerplant are the reason he’s out front. We believe the “Doc” but there’s more to it then just the machinery, Spader himself is tuned in, on-track and riding stronger, smarter and faster than he ever has.

This year’s Red Bud national was supposed to be bombarded with rain. Luckily the severe weather steered around Buchanan. It was wet but not what the weatherman warned. The track turned into what was said to be the roughest it’s ever been, but Spader seemed to smooth it all out by winning both motos and boosting his points lead to a whopping 32 points.

Moto One
Spader somehow pulled the holeshot from a rotten pick on the starting gate. He shot out from the second inside position on the gate, (somehow Burgard Cycle’s ace, John Natalie managed a good start from the extreme inside spot as well). Team PRC/Nac’s Keith Little tucked in behind Spader and rode on to his best ever motocross ride. North Canton, Ohio’s Tim Farr on his thumpin’ Yamaha four-stroker followed in third. “We were flat out flying right off the bat”, said Little after moto one. He added, “I kept pace with Spader out of the left hand turn before the huge ski jump, whatever he was going to do — I was doing the same. We shifted up and hit that jump without letting up at all. We flat out flew off it farther and higher than I’ve ever gone. I thought for sure we would both break something on the landing, it was a hard landing way at the bottom of the hill, surprisingly neither of us broke anything.” As laps progressed Spader and Little (both on Roll Design Custom Axis set-ups) continued to distance themselves from the pack. All the while Farr had his hands full with keeping Legacy ATV’s Jeremiah Jones, Trinity Racing’s Kory Ellis (on his version of the strong running YZ powered ATV) and Burgard Cycle’s John Natalie at bay. As the race entered the white flag lap, Jones and Natalie turned up the heat on Farr, who is only recently riding painless from a streak of injuries that he sustained earlier in the year. At the end, Spader won easily with Little taking second followed by Farr, Jones, Natalie, Ellis and “Digger” Doug Gust, who spent the moto passing the majority of the field after getting locked up in a collision on lap one.

Moto two
Moto two saw West Virginia’s Shane “Dog” Hitt (Spark’s Racing) pull the holeshot followed by Jones, Spader, Ellis, Ben Jackson (TC) and Little. Farr spun off the line and found himself in 9th place off the gate. By turn two, Farr somehow maneuvered himself into 6th place. Spader didn’t take too kindly to riding in the three spot for very long. He somehow combined his adrenaline with his tuner, and right hand man, Paul Turner’s, (you wont find two guys more jacked up on excitement and adrenaline than the totally whacked duo of Spader and Turner). With a shout out from Turner and a locked right wrist on the bars, Spader sprinted out into the lead and never looked back. Jeremiah “The Primetime Kid” rose to the occasion of getting a good start and proved to be able to ride at Spader’s pace by staying within 10 quad lengths of Spader the whole race. Behind Jones, Gust worked his way through a few riders and kept the same ground on Jones. The three distanced themselves from the field and rode this way to the checkers.

The hard packed soil, and big air at Red Bud seems to take a toll on equipment that is a bit short of being up to par. Unfortunately for Keith Little his DuraBlue axle didn’t stand up to the abuse he put it through on a big air landing. It snapped in two–as many have been doing–and ruined Little’s hopes of a much needed top five overall. Look for Team PRC’s “K-Man” Little to get things straightened up and out front again real soon.

Pro Class Results
1. Travis Spader (Duncan/Roll)
2. Jeremiah Jones (Legacy ATV)
3. Tim Farr (Baldwin/Ferrell/White Bros.)
4. Doug Gust (Nac’s/TC)
5. Ben Jackson (TC/Legacy)
6. Kory Ellis (Trinity)
7. John Natalie (Burgard)
8. Shane Hitt (Sparks)
9. Joe Byrd (East Coast ATV)
10. Jimmy Elza (Nac’s/LRD)

Seen here is Jasmine Plante. Plante won the Open Pro Am class by out lasting Mark Burns in both motos, while his Canadian buddy, Jean-Francois took third. In the Pro Am thumpers Jason Luburgh won moto two and the overall followed by David Diver and Kory Ellis. In 250 Pro Am action Harold “The Bee” Goodman came out of temporary retirement and won with a 1-2 score. Tavis Cain once again made the long trip from McKinleyville, CA worth while by taking home the runner up spot. Jason Luburgh continued to shine by scoring a 3-5 finish for third overall.

For full amateur class results just click here:
http://www.amadirectlink.com/amrace/00atv/00atv.html
It’s the ATV GNC results page found on the AMA website.

Making the Scene

Travis Spader and Paul Turner
These guys seem to make the scene a lot lately, and rightfully so. It’s no wonder Travis is all fired up and chargin’ so hard this year, his mechanic has him riled up like Chris Speilman used to get at an Ohio State vs Michigan Big Ten football game. Truner is something else — I was cracking up with how wild he gets when his rider comes flying by the mechanic’s area. Somehow he even had me all fired up and I was only taking pictures. He’s got a talent for squeezing that little extra something out of Spader – One pass by in particular comes to mind. Turner chucked the pitboard over his shoulder and just leaned out in front of Spader hooting and hollering wildly. Somehow, Spader, who I’m pretty sure was already going mach 5 on a rutted-out straightaway, was inspired by his lunatic buddy, and wicked it up yet a notch higher. I think this was the exact time that he proceeded to walk away from the rest of the field. I think the duo works better together than just about anyone I’ve ever seen in ATV racing. They’re proving that you don’t have to be calm and quiet to win a national championship — I think they’re the much needed spice to the scene right at the time that this ATV racing thing is catching the eye of the general public. Finally someone willing to let loose, celebrate a little and let the good times “Roll”– Rock on Team Duncan/Roll Design/Golden West Cycle!

John Natalie
Burgard Cycle has an ace rider in John Natalie. It looks like Natalie has been getting some seat time and eating his Wheaties too. Natalie rode to a 7th place finish at Red Bud (5-8 scores) and wasn’t the slightest bit tired or winded. Look for Natalie to finish with a single digit this year. He’s equally talented in Motocross and TT.

Kory Ellis
Kory just missed taking his fourth win in the Pro-Am Four-stroke class. He won the first moto but had trouble with his seat coming off with a lap and a half to go in the second moto. Ellis makes the scene for also finishing 6th in the pro class–his best pro class finish in the GNCs. He earned 6-7 scores for his 6-spot.

Yamaha engineers
Guess what I saw at Red Bud?–Four Japanese engineers with notebooks and cameras. I got the scoop on what they were up to. It seems they were engineering technicians for Yamaha. (or maybe they were Honda guys calling themselves Yamaha dudes – could be..) Man – I wish I knew the Japanese language. It would be great to pretend that I didn’t know what they are saying – all the while get a ton of inside info. on what’s up their sleeve. I can tell you they were at the gate looking close at some of the one of a kind quads. The new Yamaha 660 is done, so if they were indeed Yama-guys, we know they weren’t their to perfect that. Maybe they were collecting data for what us sport performance guys are really wanting, a 400cc YZ-based thumper or a 250cc two stroke racer. Regardless, it was a pleasure seeing them excitedly communicate with each other about sport performance quads.

Jeremiah Jones
“The Primetime Kid” gets even more of my respect for not pulling any cheap shot on Tim Farr in moto one at Red Bud. It seems that these two guys are battling it out a lot lately. This time it was no different. Farr was in front with Jones trying everything in the book to cleanly pass. With a face full of thumper roost and a front end caked with heavy mud, Jones didn’t do anything stupid and surrendered to the fact that it’s a twelve race series by remembering what he’s learned from Farr himself – consistency wins championships. The wise decision to not get too impatient was instrumental in his second place overall finish. (Jones scored a 4-2 score to collect the two spot).

Mark Burns
Burns amazes me. This former Four-Stroke Pro-Am champ randomly shows up at a national after taking over a year off from any kind of racing or even riding–other than his work quad on the farm–and takes home second place honors in the Pro Am class. All the while he’s running stock A-arms!

Jasmine Plamte and Jean-Francois
These Canada dudes showed up and dominated the Open Pro Am and the Open A class, Jasmine took 1st in both classes and Jean finished third in both classes. Way to motor – Aye?

Harold Goodman
“The Bee” makes the scene for showing up on his hometown soil and winning the 250 Pro Am class at Red Bud. Goodman says he still is going to hang low for a while and concentrate on school and healing up his hernia. We have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of this extremely talented and long-time devoted quad racer.

Tim Farr
The master of consistency, well close – maybe Denton has those honors, anyway – he makes the scene for taking third place overall by avoiding collisions, smartly picking and choosing lines and holding off charges from Jones. If there is an art to getting the most out of each round of the nationals, Farr is the master of it.

Keith Little
Props to K-Man for his best ever motocross ride. Little was in the zone and flat-out flying. It’s a shame his Dura Blue axle broke in moto two and ruined what would have been a fantastic finish to back up his third place TT finish at Danville a few weeks back. We have to wonder if Little will choose a different brand in the future.

Heather Rose
This is not how we want Heather to make the scene, but unfortunately this is the news. Rose wicked up her brand new Yamaha YZ and tried to double the big canyon double in moto one of the Women’s class at Red Bud. Her hopes of distancing herself from the extremely close Leslie Wells, ended in a horrible crash. She cased the jump and went over the bars and her quad landed on top of her. The quad bit her pretty bad. She has a broken rib, punctured lung and a bunch of lacerations and bruises all over her lower body. All this might sound horrible, but actually it could have been much worse – this was a nasty looking get-off. Hopefully Heather will get well soon and be back at the sport she loves so much. As for now, the three girl (Leslie Wells, Angela Moore and Rose) battle for the championship will have to go on without her for a few events. (Moore and Wells traded wins, with Wells taking the second moto and overall.)

Jimmy “Superfly” Elza
Collected his first top ten in his GNC pro class debut. Elza battled it out with another former 250A champ Justin Gandy in moto two.

Doug Gust
“Digger” Doug makes the scene for his determination alone at Red Bud. Not too many riders have the ability to come from the back like Gust can. He’s done this time and time again–his last outing at Muddy Creek he came from 12th in both motos to finish to a fourth place overall. Just when I figured he would have a bad outing because he was cruising around in last, he once again surprised me and slowly picked of riders and ended up with yet another fourth overall and collected another 18 points at RedBud. You can’t do that and not make the scene.

ATVs on MTV!
We’ve all seen the two-wheel guys kickin’ it in the music videos lately, but now the quads are finally getting into the action. OK, so it’s not in a killer Kid Rock track, but kudos to the boy band Hanson for including some ATV clips in their latest video.

Sam Gammons
Props to the promoter at Victory Sports for raising the bar and spending the bucks for an actual advertisement in the printed ATV mags. Look for the GNC final in Greenville, Tennessee on Sept 2-3 to be a winner. For more info on this event click here: http://www.victory-sports.com

Websites to check out
Wes Miller of Heuvos Grandes and Quatros Locos fame just posted the first update of his website. We checked it out and have to say it’s way cool. It will take a few short minutes to load but is definitely worth the wait.
www.hbombfilms.com

Another must see is Mom’s Race Column located at Dana Creech’s web site. Mom does a great job reporting all the cool inside news and happenings in the sport along with well written mention on all the lowdowns with Dana’s and Tavis Cain’s first time on the GNC tour.
www.danacreechracing.com

Both these sites are more than worthy of earning a link on your favorites listings, so get to clickin’!

GNCC news—Hawk livin’ large at High Point
No GNCC race action to report this issue, the GNCC superstar tour hits Boyers, PA this weekend (June 3rd) for round 8 where Team Green’s William Yokley and Team Maxxis’ Bill Ballance will continue their battle for the #1 plate. Although there wasn’t any woods racing action to report, the greatest quad woods racer ever was kickin’ some two-wheel butt at the AMA Pro Outdoor National at Mt. Morris Memorial Day weekend. Hawk qualified for the 250 Pro National and banged bars with the likes of Mike Loracco and Ricky Carmichael.

Shinnston, WV GNC TT News
Click over to www.racerxill.com for all the race times and details for the June 10-11 event. Due to Friday night stock car racing action, the Racer Productions crew is forced to run the full GNC TT and Short Track National program in two days. The Pro class action will heat up on Saturday night when Shane Hitt goes for the win in front of the hometown crowd while Spader, Farr, Jones and Little try to break up his victory plans.

More Former ATV Racers in the News
Former GNC Amateur national champions PJ and Jamie Chesson are livin’ large lately on TNN’s live World of Outlaw sprint car coverage. The brothers from New Jersey left ATV racing a couple of seasons ago to pursue careers in sprint cars. I recently saw PJ win a heat and battle with the likes of Kinser, Swindell and Blaney. I couldn’t help but grin when during the post-heat race interview you could see his dad furiously wrenching in the background. Some things never change.

Buckeye National Pre-Sale Tickets Now Available
Spectator Admission tickets are now available for both Friday night’s ATV Freestyle & Short Track National program and Saturday night’s $10,000 TT race & Kangaroo Kid world record jump. Admission is just $10 per day. Send you check or money order to: Fast-Trak Promotions, 6532 Highland Road, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 or click over to www.atvscene.com/fast-trakpromotionseventnews.htm call 440-461-4858 for more information. This is one race weekend no ATVer will want to miss.

ATV Legends Race 2000 Update
We love reporting about this happening. Word is getting out to the heavy hitters in the ATV racing aftermarket community to get behind this event with their sponsorship investments. Major thanks are in order to the following companies for putting up the purse money for the legends to race for — (100% of their sponsorship dollars will go toward the Legends 2000 purse)

Nac’s Racing, Maxima Lubricants, Works Performance, Hollywood Racing, PEP, Pro Design and Hinson Racing

With their commitment, Legends 2000 now has a purse of almost $2000. If you would like to help the cause with a $250 sponsorship package contact Fast-Trak Promotions at (440) 461-4858.

We have word that former Team Honda ace, Marty Hart is doing some training to get in shape for the big race, while his long time sponsor, Loren Duncan is busy prepping his Duncan Racing TT quad.

Team Kawasaki legend, and Hart’s long time rival — Jimmy White, has also been getting ready. JW happened to be in Ohio a few weeks back, (he’s the sales manager at Kenda Tires, which is based out of Columbus, Ohio). A go around at Deerfield Speedway on Farr’s quad happened into his schedule. White said it’s been many many years since he got out and actually raced, but he says it’s slowly coming back to him and he can’t wait for the fun event in Ashtabula. JW’s ride will be a custom Team Green quad that’s being built by Doug Roll of Roll Design. The quad has a super fast Kawasaki KX 250 motor and Roll’s proven race winning chassis and fine tuning development – only the best for J-dub!

The race will be awesome, but so will the Hall of ATV Racing Fame. Look for White’s former Kawasaki Tecate three-wheeler to be on display at the event. The big story behind this legendary three-wheeler is that it was recently stolen and now recovered. It’s currently being totally restored by another former legend, who will be on hand and suited up for Legends 2000 — Ron Baker of PEP in Montclair, CA. A Team Honda display is also in the works, but no news to report on just yet.

This legends race and reunion officially called “Legends 2000” will be a once and a lifetime happening — and a must see! Be sure to check it out, and bring your camera.

Return of the Flat River Grand Prix
Racers for Research are bringing back the Flat River Grand Prix. The Flat River Grand Prix has been a favorite of many riders over its 20-year history. All of the proceeds from the race and the poker run will be given to the March of Dimes. For the past 3 years, approximately $28,000 per year was donated by the riders to the March of Dimes! The winner of the ATV and the Motorcycle race will be awarded the Governor’s Cup. The ATV race will be held on Saturday June 24th and the Motorcycle race will be on Sunday June 25th.

At 10:30 AM the Missouri Hare Scrambles Points race for the Governor’s Cup will take place. This race will again, like last year, start on Main Street in Downtown Park Hills, Mo. The ATV race will be 100 KM (about 62 miles) long; each lap will be approximately 10.5 miles in length.

Starting positions in your class will be determined by the amount of pledge money raised. Racers will also receive incentives depending on the amount of money raised. Minimum entry fee/donation is $20. AMA card is required for all racers.

On Saturday, June 24th, 4:00 PM a poker run will be held for ATV’s, motorcycles. There will be two separate courses, an advanced woods, and a beginners course. All are welcome to ride and have fun. There will be attendance prizes. Entry fee is only $10 for the 1st hand of cards and $5 for each additional hand. (No AMA card is required for the poker run.)

All of the above events are being held in St. Joe State Park near Park Hills, Missouri, which is approximately 75 miles south of St. Louis, Mo. For more information call Greg at 636-398-4468 or the March of Dimes and ask for Julie at 314-646-8601.

Thursday night chat room news
The chat room scene is kicking along just great. A thanks is in order to K&K ATV for providing the prizes for the weekly trivia winners. The weekly prizes have ranged from a CT aluminum work stand to K&K clothing. A special thanks is in order to Nac’s Racing who is giving away the overall monthly prize to the trivia winner with the most points collected at month’s end. Also sponsoring the trivia night once a month is LRD Performance, Cal-ATV, Alba Racing and 4 Wheel Thunder. Thanks to all of our sponsors for supporting the ATV Source/ATV Scene Chatroom.

Here’s the low down on how the weekly trivia contest works. Weekly trivia winners are determined by a points system. 1st correct answer receives 5 points down to the 5th correct answer receiving 1 point. 3 questions are asked throughout the night and at the end of the night the person with the most points wins. We keep track of the weekly totals then at the end of the month we add up the points and again the person with the most points wins an additional “bigger” prize.

Even if you do not feel like participating in the Trivia night, the chatroom is open 24hrs day 7 days a week. Just click on te chat button on the left, enter a screen name and your in.

Quotes of the week:
“I would have caught up to Luburgh but I was covered in hot antifreeze overflow from Ellis” – David Diver’s response after earning a respectable second place overall in the Pro Am Four-stoke class.

“An idea is just an idea. It’s nothing until people work together and put it into action” – Marie Osmond on her idea of airing The Children’s Miracle Network to help children’s hospitals throughout the country.

Tags:

Comments

comments