High Point National

By Jason Weigandt

The annual AMA/Toyota Motocross pilgrimage to High Point Raceway is rarely a smooth one. High Point represents the first march east for the tour, and perhaps as a reminder, rain always seems to be a factor. And even when the inevitable storms break long enough to lead to a sunny day, the track is tough, anyway, with deeper ruts and more off-cambers than anything you’ll see in California or Texas.

High Point is not always smooth for the riders, either. Monster/Kawasaki’s James Stewart came into the event riding a six-moto win streak, but he knew High Point had finished him before. In 2006 he went over the bars on a step-down double jump and ended up in the hospital, and in 2007 he nearly crashed in that spot again, ultimately handing over the win to Ricky Carmichael both times. Dig further back and you’ll find his 2002 run in the record books, when Stewart twisted his knee in practice and then fought through the pain in the motos—only to have his KX125’s engine grenade and leave him well off the podium, anyway.

For Stewart, things are much smoother now. He’s winning his outdoor races with the same ease he used to win in the 125 class (save for that bad day in 2002), and he’s enjoying himself at the races more than ever. Plus, Stewart and the rest of the field found this year’s High Point track radically redesigned. The event promoters at Racer Productions brought in famed track builder Marc Peters to give the track a makeover. Plus, this year’s date was changed from the traditional Memorial Day Weekend spot to Father’s Day Weekend. That should have meant less of a threat of rain.

Of course it couldn’t quite go that well. Rain indeed showed up anyway, washing out most of Saturday’s practice. In rained hard Sunday morning, too. The RP crew fired up the dozers and pushed mud off the track, leaving several feet of mud off to the side of the track and perfect dirt underneath.

The result? The new track layout and all that mud management drew raves from the racers, who all said the track was “racier” than before. With a better flow and more lines to choose from, everyone seemed impressed. Digging down to use all of that hard dirt made the track smoother, too.

So under perfect weather on Sunday, Stewart improved his smooth quotient as well, taking the measure of Mike “Automatic Holeshot” Alessi early in both motos to notch victories seven and eight on the season. Stewart had taken the Kawasaki/Monster Energy High Point National presented by Centra Bank with ease. Alessi, on the Rockstar/Makita Suzuki, continued his strong season with a pair of seconds (and $1000 from BTOSports.com for his two holeshot awards). Davi Millsaps took a pair of thirds on his Red Bull Racing Honda.

In the Lites class, Monster Energy/Pro Circuit/Kawasaki’s Ryan Villopoto is running nearly the same table as Stewart. Since taking fifth at the opening moto of the tour, RV1 has won every race since. It took him a lap to jump past Jake Weimer and Nico Izzi in the first High Point moto, and a little less time to take the measure of Andrew McFarlane in moto two (Weimer and McFarlane snagged the holeshot awards). Ryan Dungey continued to give chase to RV, with other title favorites Austin Stroupe (crashes) and Jason Lawrence (bike problems) running into plenty of bad luck.
Stewart finally escaped Pennsylvania with a win, but as usual, High Point wasn’t smooth for everyone.