Ryan Sipes' ISDE Update: One Day Left, Team USA in Control
Chaos reigned on Day 5 of ISDE 2016, and thankfully (finally!), Team USA was not one of the teams involved.
Coming into the day, we held a one and a half minute lead over Italy. Comfortable, but not a sure thing. It all changed when Italian rider Manuel Monni crashed in the first test of the day, breaking his hand and ending his week. In this year's rules, every rider's score counts, so losing even one guy from your team means your country is out of the running. By day's end, Team USA was almost four minutes ahead of second place in the World Trophy standings. It's a nice margin with only one day left in the event.
This put our guys in a tricky situation. With your closest competitor gone, your first thought may be to play it safe, don't take any chances, and cruise it in. No reason to push, right? The problem is that for dir tbike racers, sometimes being on that edge is what makes us focus! Anything less than going all-out can be boring, and your attention can then drift, potentially leading to costly mistakes. Even with a commanding lead, Team USA couldn't afford any slip-ups. They could back off a little, but they had to stay in the moment and stay focused. Fortunately, our guys rode great and still won the day as a team.
E1 rider Layne Michael was pumped. "Today was really good for me," Layne said. "I felt the best I have all week and finished 14th overall for the day. I might have been able to do even a little better than that, but the last test was pretty sketchy so I backed off a little. We have the team standings to think about and honestly, I was just happy to leave that test healthy."
Layne is doing better every day. I'm really proud and happy for him, knowing how much pressure he must have felt after he was thrown in last-minute as a replacement rider. He's handled it like a seasoned vet.
I'd say there was a whole other thought process going on inside E2 teammate Taylor Robert's helmet. Through the first four days of competition, he has been the outright fastest individual rider, a title that is obviously coveted by every racer there. And to get the 25 second lead he has, he's had to hang it out and push the limits. Trust me, to go that fast on those tracks, you're puckered the whole time. But because the team has a huge lead, now he needs to ride at 95 percent and play it safe. That's tough to swallow for any competitor, but especially for him. He didn't want to lose his lead and a chance at being the Individual Winner for 2016. Good thing Taylor is a pro. He had a small crash in test one but recovered well and rode awesome the rest of the day, only losing a few seconds and holding onto his lead.
Our Junior team had a good day, staying close enough to first-place Sweden that there's still a chance to grab the win. I was told: "We gained time on them until the last test, where they were jumping down this super-sketchy drop off that we wanted no part of. The risk was pretty high if you didn't do it just right. We are still close enough to get the job done tomorrow though. We plan on leaving everything on the track."
Up until now the guys have raced mostly grass fields and fast woods courses, and have spent seven to eight hours per day on the bike. Tomorrow, everything changes. One fifteen minute motocross race is all they'll do. It can be good for guys like myself, where that's my strong point. For some of the guys with woods racing backgrounds, it's more of a challenge. But our guys have the skills they need, no doubt about it. Good luck boys. Bring it on home.
- Ryan Sipes
