Rain, rain go away…Or not.In this day and age, mud races are sparse, with the only full-on mud race in recent memory being last year’s Anaheim opener. But the average just went up, as for the second year in a row, it rained on a supercross in “sunny” California in San Francisco’s SBC Park.We sat down with AMA Pro Racing MX/SX Manager Steve Whitelock early in the afternoon before the races to find out what he was doing to accommodate the riders in lieu of daytime qualifiers. “Our first problem was our dirt’s been in the hole for two weeks, and it’s been raining like hell for two weeks,” Whitelock said.”We were scared to death when we came up because we saw the weather coming. The weather hasn’t been as bad as we anticipated, but in order to end up with a good racetrack for tonight—which is all we can hope for the television show and everything else—I had to do some small modifications to the program. Instead of having a lottery or selecting [like Anaheim I last year], we waited until we saw how many were here, and we found we could run less races by putting in a second row. It will probably be four or five riders on the second row of each heat race. We’re going to let everybody have a chance to race. I wanted to be as fair as I could to the paddock. They’re my guys. We only have a second row in the heat races, I think, and in the 125 class, we’re only going to take 22 to the LCQ, so there might be a couple guys that go home after the heat races. But hey, this is motorcycle racing. That’s where we are. I just had a long, heavy discussion with Live Nation about it all, and they wanted me to be a little bit more weird, but I’m not going to do that.”Whitelock’s boss Scott Hollingsworth left the AMA under uncertain circumstances this past week. He was the CEO of AMA Pro Racing. “My boss has left the company,” Whitelock said. “Our company policy doesn’t allow us to comment on personnel matters, so I can’t tell you what I know, or why he left, or what happened. I can’t comment on that. They keep saying that we’re going to have a clearer picture within the next 10 days.”Whitelock also talked about how they are handling the pre-entries in the future. This year, it was limited to 80 riders per class per race. Next year, they hoped to have the limit down to 40 per class, but that plan has changed somewhat. “It’s probably closer to like 44 and 60 entries—44 for Supercross, and 60 for the Lites,” Whitelock said. “This way we have some cushion and some places to put guys. We can start with a 22-man gate, can’t we? So, if I went to 44, then we can run some 22-man starts.” This way, if a rider gets hurt, there will already be a replacement signed up and ready to race.Knowing it was going to be raining, we stopped by the BooKoo Honda pits to talk to resident Frenchie David Vuillemin, who has been known in the past for his mud-riding prowess. “It was true in the past, but the Americans know how to ride now,” DV said. “It was good 5 or 6 years ago, we took a lot of people by surprise, but now it’s different. Ricky was pretty bad 5 years ago, but now he’s a good mud rider, so now it’s not really true anymore.” When we asked him what special preparation he makes to race in the mud, he responded, “No, just take it like it’s a dry race. That’s the way to do it. I think people get too ready for a mud race. It’s just another race. It’s muddy, so yeah, you’re going to get dirty, but the goal is to have fun.”Team Solitaire star/boss Ryan Clark wasn’t hoping for mud, but if it was inevitable… “I’m not so convinced that it’s going to be muddy, really,” Clark tried to convince himself. “If it just drizzles like it has been all day, I think it’ll be all right. But if it’s muddy, it’s the same for everyone. I’m not a super big fan of mud riding. I mean, I enjoy practicing in it, but I know that my mechanic has to clean my bike and I feel sorry for him because I used to be my mechanic and I know it sucks. Everybody says it’s a great equalizer, but there’s lot of people who grew up on the east coast who are better mud riders than us guys from New Mexico, but they could fall down. Their engine could seize. Anything can happen. I’m just keeping positive and trying to have fun.”SoBe/Samsung Mobile Honda’s Mike LaRocco has been strong in the mud in the past, but he says he doesn’t like mud indoors. “I don’t particularly like mud races in supercross because most of the fun of supercross is the obstacles and stuff,” LaRocco said. “It makes it real difficult. I’m fine with it either way. I mean, it’s the same for everybody, but I just don’t prefer it.”SoBe/Samsung Mobile Honda’s Mike Tomlin—Jake Weimer’s mechanic—had some advice for mud prep. “Here we are at the San Francisco Supercross, and we’re predicting some rain here, so probably the most important thing to do in preparation for the rain is to foam it out wherever there is potential for mud or dirt or rocks to get wedged in there and make the bike heavier or make it not work properly,” Schnikey said. “That’s the big thing to do.” He added, “Always wear gloves!”We sat down with Star Racing/Big Gun Yamaha’s Sean Collier, who has turned a few heads the past couple of weeks. He says the big change in him lies in his preparation. “I’ve been training really hard, and the bike’s working really well,” Collier said. “I’ve got a good team behind me, and it’s just a joint effort, and it’s come together really good. It’s a combination of a lot of things. The bike, and the training, it’s all come together for me. My starts have really improved, too, so that helps a lot, too.”At Phoenix, Collier hung right on Nathan Ramsey for most of the race. “For a while, I was right there,” Collier said. “I only dropped about a second or two, something like that. I was just trying to run a good, consistent race and hit that rhythm section every lap. I thought I had a podium for sure, and I kind of relaxed too much and those guys snuck up on me the last two laps. My preparation was a lot better this year, and I was a lot more confident coming into it, so I expected to be not quite up in the top 3, but in the top five, and that’s where I want to be. The training, the team, my bike’s really good—a combination of all of those things has made me a lot faster. I have the same exact track as Dallas ’04 that I train on, and I looked at what the top guys were doing, and what I was doing there, and I knew I had to cut my times down four seconds a lap, and that’s what I’ve done—I’ve actually dropped below that. I was doing 1:02, 1:03, and 1:04s, and now I’ve got it down to :58s and :57s pretty consistently. It took a lot of hard work. At first it wasn’t really happening, and then it started to click.”His goal before the end of the season is to be on the podium. “I’d definitely like to get up on the podium. That would be really nice,” Collier said. “If I’m put in the situation I was in last time, I won’t make the same mistake again. I’m going to push a little harder. But for now, I’m going to aim for top 5, right around there. Podiums are a little bit out of my reach. I need to learn how to get the tracks down quicker for the races, but I’m doing a lot better. I’m excited.”We paid a visit to the Caterpillar Honda semi to talk with the team’s two riders, Erick Vallejo and Jacob Saylor. “Since ’03, I’ve been on Yamahas, and I talked to Kevin from Tamer Motorsports after the US Open and it all came together in the beginning of December,” the Mexi-King said. “I got my practice bike then, then got knee surgery in December, and then I was out that whole month and didn’t get to ride until two days before Anaheim I. I’m pretty pumped. The whole team’s great. I have nothing to complain about. I get to pick what I want on the bike, and what I don’t want. It works out for me. This is my first year on a 450. It’s a lot different. My problem is that I stall the bike a lot. That’s what has happened the last couple weekends. At Phoenix and Anaheim I, I stalled the bike both weekends in the first lap, and at Phoenix, they lapped me by the time I restarted my bike. So it’s a problem I’m having. Both times, I bumped somebody and didn’t grab the clutch in time. The bike starts fine, but I get all scared and panic. It’s great, though. I like the Honda a lot. It’s actually a really easy bike to ride. I rode a Yamaha 450 in ’03, and it was a monster to ride. This thing’s easy to ride, it’s light, and it handles really good. We have JM Racing doing our suspension and motors, and it’s working really good.”Vallejo may or may not race the entire outdoor season on the Caterpillar Hondas. “The plan is that I will do the first four Nationals with these guys, and if I get a deal to go to Canada, I will, and if not, I’ll stay,” he said. “Most likely, I’ll probably stay, but I’m still looking for a ride in Canada. I like it. It’s fun. I’d like to finish in the top 5 in the 250 class up there, so we’ll see what happens.”Saylor got into his first main event at Anaheim II, and he grabbed a strong 12th place out of the deal. “It was my first 250 main, and man, things went good from the beginning of the day,” Saylor said. “I won my day qualifier, and I had a solid 7th in the first heat. And in the main, I got a great start, and that was half the battle. I was happy with my fitness, and I held on for 20 solid laps and finished 12th. After the Four-Stroke Nationals last year, I won that championship, and I was riding the 450 all fall and winter and I was comfortable on it. It just fits me and my size and my riding style better, and I think I’m proving it.”At the end of the day, though, it was none other than James Stewart who sat at the top of the heap in San Francisco, keeping alive his streak in the 250cc class of winning every single main event he didn’t crash in. “I never lost my confidence,” Stewart said. “Two weeks in a row, I felt like I never really gave myself a chance. Last week, leading 18 laps and then falling over in a corner, that’s not fun—especially when I felt like it could go down just like tonight, to the last lap. And in Phoenix, I went down in the first corner and never gave myself a shot, so I never lost confidence. I felt like I always had the speed and stuff, but it helps confidence, especially winning in the mud. I’m just real happy to get through it.”Not that Stewart is going to be praying for rain from here on out. “I think we both prefer dry races—especially in supercross,” Stewart said of he and Ricky Carmichael. “Outdoors is a different story. But it’s the same two guys up here every weekend. If I don’t fall over, I think from the last few weeks, I’ll be in second or battling with Ricky. I think it’s going to be that way until Chad gets ready to step it up. I think toward the end of the season, he always goes good.”Carmichael agreed with Stewart on that point. “I don’t really enjoy mud races. I don’t know who does,” RC said. “I think we would’ve rather been cutting it up on a dry track, for sure. The bummer part was that track looked so good. We would’ve been flying out there, there’s no doubt about it. It would’ve been awesome. It had some 180s, so we could’ve got creative, instead of the 90s. It looked like a really great, safe racetrack, but unfortunately, it didn’t pan out. I just wanted to make it through the day. I had a goal, and I told the guys before I went out that my goal was to stay on two wheels. That’s what I didn’t do at Anaheim a year ago, and it cost me the race. I’m still in the points lead in the AMA series, and he’s won twice, and I’ve won twice, so we’re 50/50. I’m happy.”After Stewart went by Carmichael for the lead late in the race, he got a little ragged for a couple of straightaways. “Actually, when he got around me, we hit the finish line with, I think, two laps left, and I kind of got back up on them in a rhythm section and he went wide before that first triple,” Stewart said. “I tried to go to the inside and still jump it, and I just spun all the way up the face. I really came up short on that triple. It was tough weaving through the lappers and seeing that he wasn’t that far ahead of me. I figured if I could get close enough, I could make another run. It was just tough to follow.”It seems like Stewart and Carmichael can’t be separated lately. “It was an exciting race tonight, that’s for sure,” Carmichael said. “We both rode our hardest, and James beat me tonight. I was happy to be on the podium, to be honest. I accomplished my goal for the main event, and that was to not crash, so I was happy for that.”Carmichael said the 12 laps in the mud was tougher than 20 laps in the dry. “I would say this was tougher, for sure,” Carmichael said. “I don’t think that we were tired from breathing so heavy, I just think you have to muscle the bike around a lot more, so it was a bit tougher in that aspect.”RC was conflicted about racing for the lead in those conditions. “That’s a great way of looking at it, and it’s exactly the way I felt,” RC said. “Yeah, maybe I could’ve went out and tried to catch him, and obviously I think I probably could’ve done a fast lap, and so could he. But I felt that I was riding in control. The way I rode tonight, it’s the most chances I wanted to take. I’ll take a second. I felt comfortable, and I didn’t feel like lying on the mat. I would rather back it down and take a close second rather than maybe not even be up here and being in Reed’s spot.”There was a bit of a scare in the heat race, as Carmichael and Gibson tangled for the lead, both going down in a heap after RC landed on Gibson. “Yeah, you know, I felt bad doing it to the poor guy,” RC said. “Luckily, he still transferred—we both did, actually. On that on/off there, I was going on and off, and he was curving left there, so I was like, `Sweet, I’m just going to go off to the side there, and carry on.’ When he rolled down the backside of that, I don’t know, he caught a rut or something and swerved back right, and I got really lucky. I’m just glad we both survived it and transferred.”It didn’t get past Stewart, though. After what he went through with fans last year regarding his landing on Carmichael at Unadilla, he was quick to throw a couple jabs at Carmichael’s error. “I don’t think I landed on anybody,” Stewart said. “I think I was close a few times. I was actually watching the heat race, and when Ricky landed on Jeff Gibson, I was like, `Now he knows how I feel like.’ (laughs) I was just happy that he got up and stuff like that, and I think the lappers were pretty hectic tonight.”MDK/Motosport.com/MSR Honda’s Nick Wey grabbed his first podium of the year—actually, the first rider on the podium at all this season besides Stewart, Carmichael and Chad Reed. “I’m really stoked,” Nyk said. “I’ve been riding the 250 class for a few years now, and I hadn’t been able to get on the podium, and, shoot, I got a good start in a mud race, so I guess that’s what it took. I think the last time I got a podium was at a mud race in the 125 class, but I’m just excited to be up here with these guys. They’re the best in the world, and the riders out here are the best of the best, so even at a mud race, being third, I’m stoked on that. I’m just trying to get some momentum for the dry races and put myself up into a position for a top-five placing in the overall standings.”With Jeremy McGrath dropping out of the races after the heat race, Nick is now the top Honda in the series, sitting fourth in points. However, before the main event, he was having trouble even qualifying. “You said it. I was sweatin’ it,” Wey said. “Shoot, I crashed like four times, I think, earlier, and got stuck in the gate once, but I pulled it together and got out of here with third, and I’m pretty happy with that.”When asked if he made any changes to his bike for the mud, Wey responded: “Oh yeah. MJ made me this sick bump seat. I don’t know if anybody got a picture of it, but it was really keeping me on the bike. It was pristine-looking.”Wey said the more rain, the better the track was, but late in the night, after it quit raining, the track became much more difficult. “The more we rode, the worse it got, for sure,” Wey said. “And it seemed like the less it rained, the worse it got because it was getting more tacky—and actually, in the main, it was kind of getting pushed off to the side and drying in a couple of spots. But it seemed like once it stopped raining, it was getting worse there.”Wey credited his mud experience on minis back in Michigan. “When I rode in mud on 50s and 60s, the way to do it was just both feet down,” Wey said. “I didn’t catch much air out there today, but I definitely had the Gaernes skidding.”Nathan Ramsey has now established himself as the king of the mud in the 125cc class, as he swept Anaheim I in 2005 and San Francisco this year. In winning the event, he went from a few points down to Grant Langston and Andrew Short, to 5 points up on everyone, leading the championship. “You want to be smart, but there’s nothing like winning, and there’s nothing like trying to get some momentum going,” Ramsey said. “You win a couple, and weeks get better, and everybody is real enthusiastic. It’s one of those things you can’t really explain, but it just starts to happen—the snowball gets rolling, and everything just starts to go your way. That happened to me in ’99, and I’ve been waiting for it to happen again since then. I’m going to go back every week and keep fighting and keep trying to learn. All the guys at KTM, they won’t give up either, so I’m not going to think like that. Obviously, after the first round, getting 12th, that was a bummer, and then things tightened back up last week. I got a third last week, and I felt like I rode good, but those guys were just a notch above me last weekend. I’m going to come out every weekend swinging like I’m planning on winning.”Ramsey, who raced the 250cc class for a season, even winning a race on a factory CRF450R, says he was surprised at the speed of the youngsters when he stepped back down to do battle in a regional series. “The levels definitely came up in the Lites class,” Ramsey said. “Every year there’s always someone new, or someone’s stepping up and bringing the pace up, and there’s a lot of young riders that change the riding style and change the aggression level and all of that good stuff. I believe that every year it steps up and becomes more and more intense, and when you throw 15 laps instead of 20 laps, then people can kind of sprint that out. It’s pretty gnarly. I raced a year in the 250 class too. It was really a surprise to me when I got back into the Lites class how intense it was. Everybody’s scrappy out there, and they’re racing like they don’t have another race tomorrow. For me, being a little bit older, I try to keep up with them on one hand, and then on the other side, I just try to use my experience and maybe try and make the smart decisions.”Near the end of the main event, Ramsey caught series rival Langston. “I’m definitely not thinking about points, but on that last lap, one of the guys that was so difficult for me was Langston,” Ramsey said. “I saw the back of his jersey, and I was like, `Whoa! This is bigger than just a win.’ He was there in the points lead, and I saw that and I was like, `I’ve got to take advantage of it.’ I had no idea where Shorty was, and I knew Villopoto fell over, so it’s just one of those things. A mud race can go either way. That very well could have been me that Langston was seeing the back of my jersey, but fortunately for me, I got a good start and just tried to ride as hard as I could.”Boost Mobile/Yamaha of Troy’s likeable Aussie Brett Metcalfe achieved his first 125cc podium, and he was noticeably emotional about it in the press conference. “I got a good start—actually, both these guys had good starts,” Metcalfe said. “The first corner, they were banzai-ing, and I was like, `Damn, these guys are getting it on!’ Villopoto, I think, holeshotted, and then crashed, which was unfortunate. I led `til probably halfway, and then Nathan passed me, and I stayed in second. He was riding good. The last lap, I didn’t even know, I was kind of gaining, and then the second-to-last straight, I saw 25, and I was like, `Dang, I caught him up a little bit.’ Then I thought, in the last corner, I was coming down the inside, and he heard me coming down the inside, but he was smart and I had to go to the outside. It was close, but it was fun. I think the whole team really, really deserves it, more than anyone. I’m happy to do it for myself and my team. They worked their butts off. It’s good to turn things around. I expect that from myself. I’m here to make a change, and this weekend, I improved, and the rest of the season, I want to finish strong.”Another rider with his first AMA Supercross podium was Ramsey’s Red Bull KTM teammate Mike Alessi, who has never shied away from riding in the mud. “Any mud experience helps out in the long run,” Mikey said. “Definitely, tonight was muddy, and I couldn’t believe that start. Going into that first turn, all I saw was just splashes of water coming at me. It was a good night for me, and it feels good to be back on a podium.”But he’s not going to get over-confident regarding his podium performance. “I mean, at this point, I’m not here to take leaps and bounds to win, I’m here to take baby steps and gradually get myself up there,” Alessi said. “I make realistic goals for myself every single week, and even if it were dry this week, my goal was to get top-five. Then, maybe next week, fourth, and then maybe third in a couple weeks when we get back on the west coast in Dallas. Tonight was a bonus getting third, but the goal was to get fifth.”Mikey knows he has some things to improve upon indoors. “The things I need to improve are obviously the whoops, but the whoops weren’t bad for me, even though they were muddy,” he said. “They weren’t going to be that bad if the track was dry. Just the little things, the little 10ths I give up on the corners and on the straightaways, scrubbing speed off the jumps, but as you can see, I can get the start, and even if I do get a bad jump, I can probably get myself out of it and get the holeshot. The hardest part for me is the whoops, and figuring that out. But I’m slowly but surely getting better in the whoops, and Nate has been teaching me, and our test rider Casey Lytle has been helping me in the whoops, and I think next week the whoops should be good for me. My goal next week is still to be top five.”Alessi has been sick the last few weeks. “I had bronchitis the last five weeks,” Alessi said. “We didn’t really tell a lot of people, but I had bronchitis the last five weeks, and I went to the doctor, and I’ve been taking pills for it, and 100,000 kids have got it up in Hesperia. It’s just going around everywhere. I’ve been taking pills for it. I feel like I’m starting to get over it, but I still cough when I’m riding. It’s getting better every single week.”
