In the first Lites moto, Josh Grant started at the tail end of the top five, and over the next few laps, worked his way past Martin Davalos and into third. After battling it out with a couple of other riders for the rest of the race,
he fought them off to finish a strong third in the moto.Unfortunately for Grant, and a lot of other riders, the second moto was red-flagged for lightning at just short of 10 minutes into the moto as a storm rolled in, which meant the entire race would have to start over. On the restart, Grant found himself well back around midpack and had a hard time going forward, as the track had become one-lined and he lost his goggles early on in the muddy conditions.
"After they red-flagged it, I went back to the truck and we changed the tire thinking that if it rained or if it was muddy that it would clear out the mud a little better, but it didn't help that much," Grant said. "Also, it didn't help losing my goggles on the second lap, either. With how gnarly and rocky Unadilla is, you can't get behind someone and get roosted. You ruin your eyes. I couldn't really move forward or backward because it was one-lined and I'd get roosted and couldn't see. I'd just follow the guy in front of me from a distance, basically."
Still, Grant's 3-12 score was good for fifth overall on the day and he moved up to 15th in the points standings with four rounds left to run after missing most of the first half of the championship with a concussion.
Trey Canard had never been to Unadilla before, but he didn't think it was as bad as what he had heard.
"I heard quite a few negative things about Unadilla, like that it's rocky and things like that, but I thought the place was sweet," Canard said. "It had a really cool layout and the dirt wasn't actually too bad."
Canard started near the tail end of the top 20 in the first moto and fought throughout the moto, eventually landing in a very worthy fifth place by the finish. In the second moto, Canard started even more poorly than the first moto, and with the track in the condition it was in with the mud and rain, he was unable to move up very far, eventually finishing just behind teammate Grant in 13th. Canard's 5-13 was good enough for eighth on the day.
Jake Weimer had a tough day at Unadilla. In the first moto, he started near the tail end of the top 15 and then fought his way up to ninth, and things could've been even better than that if not for a few key mistakes. However, in moto two, Weimer fell victim to the conditions and rounded the first lap in 34th place due in part to a goggle malfunction, then had to stop for goggles, falling even further back. He eventually got up to 25th in the moto, but that wasn't far enough to get any points for the effort. Weimer still sits fourth in the points standings with four rounds left to run.The AMSOIL team is now headed for Washougal MX Park, all the way across the continent in Washington state, this weekend for round nine of the 12-round AMA National Motocross Championship.
Until then, we'll see you at the races.
