Bad Brad Lackey, Husqvarna factory rider in 1976 sits in his plush surroundings in the back of the team box van as the mechanic is looking for answers to the handling woes on his machine. Steve Simons (Long hair, white t-shirt and mustached) who had developed suspension for Fox at the time) watches as Brad’s rear dampers get an oil change. Steve went on to become one of the most important men in motocross as he developed a series of fork technology (anti-cav fork kits, the 44mm fork, bottoming systems and ultimately, the upside down (USD) fork, which he held the patent on) that in the end won Americas its first World motocross championship under the guidance of Brad Lackey in 1982. Steve went on to do pretty well with a little mountain bike company…RockShox which set the standard for MTB suspension in 1989 and held it for many years.
Buttrick Sprints to First Full Gas Victory
Cory Buttrick has raced every KENDA Full Gas Sprint Enduro event since the inception of the series in 2014 and has narrowly missed the podium on several occasions but that all changed at Round 6 of the series in Brazil, IN where the SRT Off-Road-backed racer put his KTM on the top step of the podium after two days of special test racing.
The first test of the weekend was the cross test featuring the motocross track at the Staunton MX facility as well as a rolling grass track section and it was KR4 Performance’s Thad DuVall–who flew to the race directly from the Team USA’s ISDE training camp—who took the test win by 6-seconds ahead of Buttrick with a 5:08.757 test time. MCS Suzuki’s Ricky Russell was 3rd ahead of RPM KTM’s Mike Witkowski with Austin Lee rounding out the top-5.
A rain shower on Friday afternoon made an already technical enduro test more difficult and Ohio-native, Buttrick, who felt right at home on the test took the win by 8-seconds over DuVall with an 8:04.375 test time to DuVall’s 8:12.488. Ricky Russell, who admittedly was struggling early on getting up to speed, again finished 3rd in the test another 12-seconds behind DuVall.
Russell found his groove in the 3rd test of the day, the 2nd time on the cross test, taking the test win with a 5:05.212 ahead of Mike Witkowski and Drew Higgins. Race leaders Buttrick and DuVall both struggled on the test with Buttrick finishing 5th with a 5:11.303 but it was DuVall who faired much worse, having a massive crash over a jump on the motocross track and finishing 50-seconds back of test winner Russell with a 5:55.404 test time.
DuVall would bounce back and take the final three test wins of the day to work his way back into 3rd-place overall. Buttrick would stay consistent finishing 2nd behind DuVall in the final three tests to keep a 34.4-second lead at the end of the first day of racing. Ricky Russell finished the day in 2nd-overall, 7-seconds ahead of DuVall.
Day two started the same as day one, on the cross test, which had dried considerably since the start of the event and dust became an issue for riders on the course, but it didn’t slow down DuVall, who started 3rd, as he took the test win by 3-seconds ahead of Buttrick with Mike Witkowski in 3rd and Russell in 4th.
Another test win for DuVall, this time in the enduro test, cut 6 more seconds into Buttrick’s lead and also moved the KR4 Performance rider into 2nd overall ahead of Ricky Russell.
“After yesterday’s fiasco I knew it would be tough to run Cory down, he rides really well at these. It was a better day today and I was able to get maximum points for the championship which is good,” said DuVall.
