A2 Practice Report
Ryan Villopoto was far and away faster than everyone else in 250F practice today. He is jumping a section before the triple in front of us by going 2-3, which no one else has done. His laps are a good second quicker than anyone. Pourcel, I noticed, puts in very few hard laps. He is out there cruising most of the time and then just turns it up when he needs to a few times to make sure he gets a fast lap in for his gate pick. He just dipped under the 50 second mark toward the end of the session, making him second fastest and 1.2 seconds off of RV. Hill was the only other rider under the 50s on a 250F with a 49.4, which is 1.8 seconds off of Villo’s best.
Chris Gosselaar crashed in the first practice in the whoops and looked a little off in the second session here.
James Stewart owned it in the first practice today, as he was 1.5 seconds quicker than Chad Reed, who was second fastest.
On 450s, Reed looks good but Stewart looks even better. James is jumping a triple after the second whoop section that I haven’t seen anyone else do yet. He also uses Villopoto’s line, the 2-3 combo, heading into the first big triple jump. If you see the track map on Supercrossonline.com, these are the jumps heading into and out of turn 4.
Great. Travis Preston just wadded it in that section. He took a ride in the Asterisk Mule, and he’s holding his arm at his chest, making me think either his wrist, arm or shoulder is bad and he’s trying to keep it elevated. We’ll have to check and see if he can still race, but it doesn’t look good at the moment. Is there no justice?
Now it looks like other riders, like Mike Byrne and David Vuillemin, are jumping like Stewart through that section. But no worries for Bubba—he’s still .7 seconds faster than Reed and the rest of the gang.
For even more scoops and info, stay tuned to www.blogandt.com for this author's take on the race (and a few other goofy observations from around the motocross world), and also check out TFS' Weekend Window by clicking http://sxweekendwindow.blogspot.com/
