RC fails to burst Stewart's bubble
By TMX Archives on 2nd Mar 07
RICKY Carmichael returned to the fray at round eight of the AMA Supercross Series in Atlanta last Saturday night, but not even the legendary Suzuki rider could stop James Stewart from taking another win on his seemingly unstoppable march towards the 2007 crown as the Kawasaki rider held off the race-long challenge from Carmichael to take the victory while his closest championship rival, Chad Reed, was forced to fight back to a distant third place after falling out of the lead battle early in the race.
Some 70,000 fans packed out the Georgia Dome as the championship moved onto the east coast for the first time this year, welcoming the opening round of the east coast Lites championship too, and the fans were treated to one of the most intriguing races of the year so far in the Lites class as factory Suzuki rookie, Ryan Dungey, eventually took a convincing win in his first ever pro-supercross race over Arenacross hero, Darcy Lange, and Yamaha of Troy teamster Matt Goerke after former MX2 World Champion and supercross rookie Ben Townley dropped out of contention for the win after his Pro-Circuit Kawasaki suffered mechanical problems and KTM favourite Mike Alessi crashed out.
AMP'D MOBILE AMA SUPERCROSS SERIES
Rd 8 - Georgia Dome, Atlanta, GA
SUPERCROSS: 1 James Stewart (Kaw), 2 Ricky Carmichael (Suz), 3 Chad Reed (Yam), 4 Ivan Tedesco (Suz), 5 Kevin Windham (Hon), 6 Tim Ferry (Kaw), 7 Bryan Johnson (Hon), 8 David Vuillemin (Hon), 9 Heath Voss (Hon), 10 Jeff Gibson (Kaw), 11 Tyler Evans (Suz), 12 Travis Preston (Hon), 13 Jason Thomas (Hon), 14 Michael Byrne (Suz), 15 Brock Sellards (Hon).
SERIES STANDINGS after 8 (of 16) rounds: 1 Stewart 188 points, 2 Reed 171, 3 Ferry 145, 4 Windham 119, 5 Byrne 108, 6 Tedesco 101, 7 Preston 96, 8 Voss 94, 9 Carmichael 91, 10 Vuillemin 86.
SUPERCROSS LITES: 1 Ryan Dungey (Suz), 2 Darcy Lange (Kaw), 3 Matt Goerke (Yam), 4 Ryan Morais (Yam), 5 Branden Jesseman (Yam), 6 Justin Brayton (Yam), 7 Zach Osborne (KTM), 8 Matt Boni (Kaw), 9 Ryan Sipes (Hon), 10 Kelly Smith (Suz), 11 Sean Collier (Yam), 12 Billy Laninovich (Hon), 13 Jeff Alessi (KTM), 14 Robert Kiniry (Kaw), 15 Ricky Renner (Hon).
SERIES STANDINGS after 1 (of 7) rounds: 1 Dungey 25 points, 2 Lange 22, 3 Goerke 20, 4 Morais 18, 5 Jesseman 16, 6 Brayton 15, 7 Osborne 14, 8 Boni 13, 9 Sipes 12, 10 Smith 11.
Next Round: March 3 - Edward Jones Domes, St Louis, MI.
For full report, results and pictures see T+MX NEWS, Friday, March 2, 2007.