Although the 2009 AMA EnduroCross Championship is shaping up to be the wildest year of indoor off-road racing ever, the new season certainly has some awfully large shoes to fill. The six-round 2008 season was filled with upset wins, nasty crashes, countless lead changes and a close point battle all the way to the final main event of the year. In case you missed the events or didn't catch the Versus TV coverage on the "Lucas Oil Motorsports Hour," here is a look back at some of the highlights of the 2008 AMA/Maxxis EnduroCross season.
Round 1: Las Vegas, Nevada
The first round of the '08 EX tour took place on a tight, super-technical course at the Orleans Arena, and each and every one of the riders came out of the gate charging. Nick Brozovich, Jamie Lanza, Damon Huffman, Colton Haaker and Canadian logger Bobby Prochnau all put in solid qualifying efforts to earn spots in the main event. The highlight of qualifying came in Semi #3 when desert hero Destry Abbott and Baja 1000 champ Kendall Norman tangled on the last lap just before the finish line, at which point both riders attempted to run their machines across the checkers (actually, Abbott pretty much just launched his factory Kawasaki over the line!). In the main event, 10-time AMA trials champion Geoff Aaron and WORCS front-runner Ricky Dietrich both rode exceptionally well, but neither could hang with eventual winner Taddy Blazusiak. Ironically, Taddy had to qualify into the main event through the last-chance qualifier, proving that anything can happen in EnduroCross. Armed with his trusty KTM two-stroke and an above-average supply of natural talent, Taddy looked smooth and pulled out a clean win to take home the first victory of the season, as well as to establish himself as the man to beat in the series. However, the week after his win in Las Vegas, Taddy sustained major injuries to his face in a huge crash at a WORCS event and was forced to undergo surgery, thus leaving the point lead wide open coming into round two.
Round 2: Guthrie, Oklahoma
Round two of the EnduroCross series brought a special surprise for the riders, as Guthrie's extra-large Lazy E Arena offered more than twice the floor space than the opening round at the Orleans Arena. As a result, the track was massive! A long start straight and several big log sections provided some good passing opportunities, but the section that had most of the riders worried was the massive rock pile before the finish line. The racing was close all night long. A host of Support class riders showed up to try their hand at EX, with Phil Smage bagging his second TrialCross class win of the season, and Eric Rhoten and Kyle Calderini taking the Open Two-Stroke and Open Four-Stroke class wins, respectively. Qualifying was tight with Geoff Aaron missing out on the main due to a few mistakes and local heroes Guy Cooper and Kenny Bartram making the cut into the night show. Still, all eyes were on the top 10 pros as they lined up for the second main event of the year. With Blazusiak on the mend from his still-healing facial surgery, it was anyone's ballgame. When the gate dropped before the MX-style first turn, it was Damon Huffman with a massive holeshot and the initial lead, which he kept to within sight of the white flag. A motivated Ricky Dietrich was riding like a banshee in second place, and when Huffman got stuck on a log with one lap to go Dietrich was there to take advantage. Huffman got going again and put in a solid charge to the finish, but it wasn't quite enough to stop his teammate Ricky from getting his first-ever EnduroCross main event win, which also happened to be the first round of the Geico Triple Crown that pledged $50,000 to the rider who could win the Guthrie, Columbus and Las Vegas main events.
Round 3: Florence, South Carolina
Following Guthrie, it was no secret that Ricky Dietrich was going to be a major threat in the EX championship race. When the riders arrived in Florence, the track that greeted them made one thing crystal clear: It wasn't going to be an easy weekend. New for this round was an innovative "firewood" section that had riders plowing across approximately 20 yards of freshly cut pieces of firewood, each about a foot long. This made for an unpredictably slippery obstacle that literally changed shape each time a rider went through it. A tight first turn, an off-camber rock garden and some deep sand rounded out the technical track.
Marking the first time that the EnduroCross season had visited the East Coast, the Florence round did not disappoint in terms of excitement. The night began with a series of tight Support class main events that saw two new winners in Steve Leivan (Vet class), Eric Rodgers (Two-Stroke) and Chris Denison (Four-Stroke), with Phil Smage nailing down another TrialCross victory. Qualifying for the Expert division was likewise a battle with enduro champion Mike Lafferty, Joe Gibbs Racing's Josh Summey and arenacross specialist Kyle Calderini all failing to make the main. When the Expert feature came around, Team Monster Energy Kawasaki's Huffman did something extremely uncommon in EnduroCross: He rode a perfect race. Even with the likes of Bobby Prochnau, Dietrich, Colton Haaker and Mike Brown on his heels, Huffman's charge couldn't be stopped, and he left the stadium parking lot doing burnouts in his rental car with his first EnduroCross main event first-place trophy in the seat next to him.