Muc-Off/FXR/ClubMX Yamaha’s Enzo Lopes capped off another great race with a fifth-place result in East Rutherford over the weekend, but it wasn’t easy. With the rain falling and Lopes not starting at the sharp end of the field, he had his work cut out to stay with the front group as the field spread out. Lopes hung right on to the Lawrence brothers ahead of them and benefitted as RJ Hampshire fell in the last turn trying to pass Jett Lawrence for second place. Now Lopes sits third in 250SX West standings in what has already been a career year for the Brazilian.
Afterwards, I spoke to him about the challenges of waiting to race following the lightning delay and then hitting a soaked track right away.
Racer X: Talk us through what you were doing during the break and everything with the rain delay? Were you trying to stay warm? Were you just chilling out? What was that like for you? That’s obviously something you’ve probably never experienced before. Walk us through that process. How’d you stay ready to race with everything that was going on?
Enzo Lopes: I never experienced that because in Brazil no matter what, we race. Lighting, tornadoes, thunderstorms… [Laughs] They don’t care at all. So, I was definitely not used to it. I was telling the other guys; the vibe was definitely down. Everyone was so warmed up and pumped to go racing, and we had to go back and wait for two hours. Then when we come back, the track is completely different. It’s raining, but I grew up in Brazil. I like the mud. So for me, today was a good day.
Obviously pretty pumped with your riding. You have mentioned wanting to get the starts. You got a pretty decent start up there. But to be able to do it against the whole 250cc class, is that extra confidence knowing that you rode really well, and it was against everybody?
Yeah. My start was really good, but Coty Schock was on my left and then I think he couldn’t stop the bike, so he wouldn’t turn. Otherwise we would have been I think second and third on the start, but I was like seventh because of that. To be fifth in the showdown is super good. I’m third in points now, which is awesome for me.
Obviously, you guys didn’t do a sight lap, so when you’re going out for the first lap, is it just trying to hit the higher sides of the track?
Yeah, the higher the berm the better because of the mud. But you don’t know what to expect, especially on the triples and the finish line. You just follow the leader, I guess. To be honest, I don't know who was in the lead and how he did hit it, because he didn’t know how it was. But then I saw the guys in front of me doing the finish line. I’m like, "Okay, I have to hit this." Then the triple, same thing. But then once we started doing a few more laps, we created some lines, and it was not too bad.
Mike just said you guys did a little bit of bike prep knowing it was going to be muddy and stuff. What was your approach with the goggles situation? Any bike changes with prepping for the mud?
Yeah. Cam [Callaghan, mechanic], Tyler [Morgan, mechanic], and the boys did really good work with the bike and preparing for the mud, as well as my helmet with the lenses here up top, the visor. I went from seven tear-offs to a roll-off. So that changed a lot. But we put some stuff on the tire to go to the line so we could keep the tires clean. Some bike work with some tape for the water I guess and the mud.
Same tire you had been on all day and everything?
Yeah. A lot of work went on and I couldn’t thank the boys enough for it.
Just looking to finish up the season, like you said third in points. What’s your goal here moving forward? One more showdown, a couple more rounds here. What’s your thoughts?
Two more rounds. We’ve got Denver and then Salt Lake, so one more normal race. I would like to get a good start and do my best. I still want to get on the box. I felt like today if I was a little bit better in the whoops, and if my roll-offs didn’t run out, I think I could have passed Hunter [Lawrence] and [Max] Vohland in front of me because we were really close. I’m still happy, but the goal is to do good at Denver and Salt Lake and hopefully end up P3 in points, because that would be a big thing for me.
Do you get any kind of bonus from the team or anything extra like that? Or this will be more of a personal accomplishment?
More of a personal. Not from the team, more like a personal thing for me. Everything that I’m doing here is like a dream since I’ve been growing up in Brazil. So everything is on my personal side.
You mentioned the goggles. I couldn’t tell from the press box. Did you keep your goggles on the whole race or did you throw them at some point?
No, with like two minutes to go, it went out. I couldn’t be close enough to Hunter because every time I would get roosted with mud, and then I wouldn’t be close enough on the other turn because I couldn’t see. But other than that, it was perfect.
How was it learning from the guys ahead of you? Like you said, you don’t want to be too close to get blasted, but you’ve got to see the lines they’re taking, so you know they’re either working or not working.
It’s a tough balance, because even when you have your goggles and to be too close, you would get splashed. Then obviously you run out at some time with the roll-offs. So, it’s a balance. We have to know where you’re going to make the pass pretty much, so you can attack that part and then be close enough to make the pass. Not like RJ [Hampshire] did. He came in hot. [Laughs] I kind of had a spot that I wanted to try and pass Hunter but like I said, I wasn’t close enough because I couldn’t see. Good day for me.
