Racer X Holeshot Award

From a racer’s aspect, Steel City USA boasts one of the fairest and safest starts on the AMA Toyota Motocross Circuit. After the gate drops, riders are faced with a fairly long uphill climb to a left-hand sweeping turn, enabling riders to have their right foot safely on the brake when they back off the throttle. The dirt was moist and tacky on Sunday, which sapped a bit more power from the bikes. Nonetheless, our man Carl Stone was perched to the inside of turn one to see who would cash in on the Racer X Holeshot Award.

The first 250F class holeshots were a repeat of last weekend at Broome-Tioga, as Red Bull KTM’s Mike Alessi snagged the start in Moto 1, and Makita Suzuki’s Broc Hepler took the honors in Moto 2. After running away with the win in the first moto, Hepler had the first gate pick for Moto 2, and much to the chagrin of his mother, Hepler lined up on the far inside gate. He had nearly pulled the start on Alessi from the middle gate in the first moto, but now Broc was going to change his game plan and move inside. But he got a perfect jump with his Makita Suzuki RM-Z250 and stuck a wheel in under everyone and snapped off the second moto holeshot. Ironically, Kevin Windham lined up at the same gate for the second 450 moto and, as you can see by the pic, he almost nailed the holeshot, too.
 Following the second consecutive two-moto sweep of the Steel City National, Broc was standing on the podium and said, "I don't know where these holeshots are coming from, I just wish I had found some sooner."

In the first 450 moto, it was Makita Suzuki’s Ricky Carmichael grabbing the holeshot and running off with another moto win. But the big surprise of the moto was Rockstar Suzuki’s Ryan Mills, who started second behind RC and finished a season-best third in the moto. It was a great result for the Rockstar squad, but unfortunately Mills would DNF the second moto.

The second 450 moto saw Team Kawasaki’s James Stewart get the Racer X Holeshot, narrowly squeezing out Windham. Stewart would lead a few laps before tipping over in one of Steel City’s numerous ruts, handing the lead and the overall win to Carmichael.