JG Off Road / GEICO Powersports Yadkinville Report

After a race weekend of being split up, the GNCC side of the JG Off Road / GEICO Powersports / Monster Energy Kawasaki team was back together in Yadkinville, NC.  Chilly temperatures and light rain all day Saturday made the track tricky for the ATV riders, but lead to ideal track conditions for Sunday’s bike race.  Although the track was a bit soupy in the morning, it tacked up nicely for the boys in the afternoon with temperatures back up in the upper 70’s.

Jennifer Albright headed out to the track Saturday morning in the misty rain and jumped off to a good start.  Settling into a comfortable pace and a 4th place position, Jennifer held her ground all day, despite a gas line leak, which left her with a gnarly burn by the end of the race.  Jennifer locked in a 4th place finish for the day, holding on to her 4th place points standing with 2 races to go.  Stay posted for Jen’s take on the race.

Jennifer would like to thank of her sponsors: GEICO, MSR, Lojak Yamaha, MAXXIS, HMF, HiPer Technology, Rekluse, GT Thunder, Spider Grips, Precision, XFR, Cycle Gear, Scott, Flexx, CV4, IMS, ProGraph-X, Triple X Motorsports, PowerMadd, Moto Pro Training, and DP Brakes.

The misty rain during the day on Saturday turned into some heavier rain over night – you know what this means… team manager JT Bennett’s eyes lit up and he got his bike ready to race.  Just a few weeks ago, JT injured his finger and had pins put in, and although the pins are still in, he didn’t let that hinder his decision to take on the mud.  JT’s wife, Gretchen cut the finger out of his glove, and taped up the finger the best she could to keep his protective brace in place and away JT went.  He got a good jump off the start, but was pinched into a hay bale on the first turn when another rider went down in front of him.  Going into the woods, JT was almost dead last, but worked his way up through the pack and was up to 5th by the end of the first lap.  Having fun and continuing his push, he was up to 2nd place, just 25 seconds out of first going into the last lap.  Unfortunately a slight bobble pulled his tape and cover off his finger and bent up one of the pins, slowing JT down slightly.  Bennett ended up with a 6th place finish (9th O/A) for the day.

The afternoon race started out with Whibley shooting off the line and grabbing the $250 MotorcycleUSA.com Holeshot Award, but had Glenn Kearny close behind and grabbing the lead for a short time.  By the end of lap 1, Whibley had regained the lead and put a 50 second lead on the rest of the pack.  Not far behind, Jarrett was following in 4th place.  Scotty Watkins had jumped to a mid-pack start and came around in 4th place.  Whibley was able to hold onto the lead the entire race, but had Josh Strang chasing him down, on a mission to take the win away from him, however he fell short by about 20 seconds. "I set my own pace and came into the lead," Whibley said. "I was pushing hard at the end. There were so many lines down there it was hard to tell which were the fastest ones. I really want to win this year. It would be nice to win it."  Whibley currently has a 32 point lead going into the last 2 rounds. Ignoring the pain from a hit to the shoulder on the first lap, Watkins was able to battle his way up to 3rd by the 4th lap and held on strong to it – taking a podium finish and 9th overall.  Jarrett, still on the rebound from a broken wrist fell back to a 7th place XC-1 finish and 11th overall. 

XC-1:

Whibley – 1st
Strang – 2nd
Mullins – 3rd

XC-2:

Russell – 1st
Buttrick – 2nd
Watkins – 3rd

The team would like to extend a special thanks to all of their sponsors: GEICO, Monster Energy Kawasaki, Moose, Pirelli, Tsubaki, IMS, Works Connection, EBC Brakes, Silkolene, Renthal, Pro Moto Billet, Enduro Engineer, PowersportGrafx, and Acerbis.

In addition, the guys would like to thank the following sponsors:

Paul Whibley – Leo Vince, Shoei, Smith, G-2, Vortex Ignitions, WER, and CTI

Jimmy Jarrett – FMF, Arai, Motion Pro, Cytomax, Applied, UFO, Twin Air, and BRP

Scotty Watkins -  FMF and Shoei

JT Bennett – MSR and Lojaks Yamaha

And of course a huge thank you to our fans.

The GNCC series will continue on October 3rd & 4th for the ITP Powerline Park GNCC in St. Clairsville, OH. The Moose Yadkin Valley Stomp GNCC will air on the VS network October 17th at 4:00 PM (ATV) and October 24th at 4:00 PM (Bikes).  For a full listing of the TV schedule, visit: https://gnccracing.com/pages/gncc-television.