Rockstar Makita Suzuki's Ryan Dungey Triumphs in St. Louis
April 19, 2010 11:54am
St. Louis, Missouri – St. Louis always has good dirt and Saturday night’s race was no exception. That dirt gave excellent traction to the RM-Z450 of Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s Ryan Dungey, enough to grab the win and extend his points lead in the AMA Supercross class.
Dungey started the evening well, notching the second-fastest time in practice on the technical track and also grabbing the second spot in his heat race. In the main event, Dungey had enough of second and was determined to get a good jump out of the gate. He came out of the first turn in third, but in lap two Dungey passed the first- and second-place riders and started burning a pace into the soft St. Louis dirt on his RM-Z450. He managed to drop almost two seconds off of his heat race pace.
Midway through the race, Dungey and his RM-Z450 were being challenged for the lead spot as they carved their way through the track. “I knew at that point it would become a fitness issue, and I felt I had an advantage,” Dungey said after the race. He and another racer tangled in the heat of battle. “After we fell, when I got my bike back up it was like I had just done an interval. I knew I had to get busy and keep pushing. The track was really technical and rough and we were running like 50.3s; it was intense. But once we both got going I could see it affecting how he was riding, running a little ragged, and I started closing pretty quickly.”
Sure enough, Dungey’s RM-Z450 was hooking up and getting huge drives coming off the corners, which allowed him to take and keep the lead. Dungey spent the next several laps building up a gap over the rest of the pack and cruised home with a huge win. The point gap, which was down to 12 points at the start of the race in St. Louis, has now ballooned up to 36 with only three rounds left in the series. Suzuki is also in first place in the Manufacturer Point Standings with 324 points over second place’s 308.
Team Manager Roger DeCoster was justifiably proud of Dungey after the race. “I told Ryan that tonight was a big race for him and that he needed not to hold anything back,” DeCoster said. “He rode very hard and up to his true potential. He was very fast, and very aggressive and the results followed. It was a good night for Ryan and the team.”
Dungey started the evening well, notching the second-fastest time in practice on the technical track and also grabbing the second spot in his heat race. In the main event, Dungey had enough of second and was determined to get a good jump out of the gate. He came out of the first turn in third, but in lap two Dungey passed the first- and second-place riders and started burning a pace into the soft St. Louis dirt on his RM-Z450. He managed to drop almost two seconds off of his heat race pace.
Midway through the race, Dungey and his RM-Z450 were being challenged for the lead spot as they carved their way through the track. “I knew at that point it would become a fitness issue, and I felt I had an advantage,” Dungey said after the race. He and another racer tangled in the heat of battle. “After we fell, when I got my bike back up it was like I had just done an interval. I knew I had to get busy and keep pushing. The track was really technical and rough and we were running like 50.3s; it was intense. But once we both got going I could see it affecting how he was riding, running a little ragged, and I started closing pretty quickly.”
Sure enough, Dungey’s RM-Z450 was hooking up and getting huge drives coming off the corners, which allowed him to take and keep the lead. Dungey spent the next several laps building up a gap over the rest of the pack and cruised home with a huge win. The point gap, which was down to 12 points at the start of the race in St. Louis, has now ballooned up to 36 with only three rounds left in the series. Suzuki is also in first place in the Manufacturer Point Standings with 324 points over second place’s 308.
Team Manager Roger DeCoster was justifiably proud of Dungey after the race. “I told Ryan that tonight was a big race for him and that he needed not to hold anything back,” DeCoster said. “He rode very hard and up to his true potential. He was very fast, and very aggressive and the results followed. It was a good night for Ryan and the team.”
