The Scoreboard and the Wildcards

Before 2009 Monster Energy/AMA Supercross Championship combatants Chad Reed and James Stewart kicked their 450cc bikes to life and took to Seattle’s 60,000-seat Qwest Field for the15th round of the 17-race series, each rider was all too aware that the first rider to make a mistake in the run to the wire in Las Vegas on May 2 would be the one to “throw it away” (Chad Reed’s words). Having already rapidly developed into an “in our time” classic, factoring another variable into the dramatic calculus for the world’s most prestigious motocross title was the pure arithmetic of it all.

In the 14 races up to and beyond the round in Jacksonville, Florida’s Jacksonville Municipal Stadium, Chad Reed had never finished worse than third. And that lone third place finish came at the season opener at Angel Stadium on January 3, Reed forced to come from way back after a highly publicized collision with Stewart. From that point forward, Reed reeled off seven consecutive runner-up finishes to Stewart, finally winning is first race at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis on February 28. Reed backed the win up with another triumph at Daytona and recorded his third win of 2009 in St. Louis on March 21. All this withstanding, in 14 starts, Reed’s collective total of finishing positions was 24, mathematically working out to an average finishing position of 1.71.

Then there are James Stewart’s numbers. Bouncing back from his nearly season-ending 19th at Anaheim I, James won the next seven races. After a second-place finish to Reed at Indy, Stewart experienced another disastrous result at Daytona when he lost the front end of his San Manuel Yamaha at the end of the grassy start straight. Battered and bruised and his bike bent every which way but straight, Stewart struggled back to seventh at the finish. Three wins in the next four races kept his championship hopes alive. With a combined total of 40 finishing positions, in 14 races, James’ average finish penciled out at 2.85. Yet, as he flew to Seattle for round 15, he was still only five points adrift of Reed in the title hunt.

History has now taught all of us what happened in the Pacific Northwest. With well over 50,000 Seattleites filling the stands, Washington local and Supercross-class rookie Ryan Villopoto passed a holeshotting Mike Alessi right near the halfway mark of the 20-lap main event and rode away to win the first premier-class race of his young career by 7.872 seconds over James Stewart.

“It’s awesome,” beamed Villopoto that night. “I can’t thank my team enough and everybody that put effort into it. It hasn’t been the year we wanted but they never gave up. I could see James and Chad out of the corner of my eye sometimes. I just focused on Mike and he made that mistake. The track was super tricky tonight and there were some slick spots so you really had to ride smart.”

And not only was Villopoto’s victory impressive, it also led to something of a chaos factor in the Reed-versus-Stewart championship dogfight. When the gate hit the Qwest gridiron, while Alessi and Villopoto took off like scalded cats, things all went sideways for both championship contenders. Stewart found himself caught up in the fray that was the first turn, then, seconds later, stalled his Yamaha. One circuit complete, James found himself WAY back in eleventh place. Amazingly — and in a perfect illustration of the effect luck has on any form of racing — Chad Reed was even worse off. Bounced back and forth down the start straight, Reed and his Suzuki hit the dirt. He got up quickly, but seemingly struggled with the track’s soft, rutted surface, only able to get back to seventh at the finish. One could only imagine the anguish he felt in knowing Stewart had roared back to second.

“I don’t know what happened,” remarked a somewhat astonished Stewart after the race. “We all almost went down and we got the short end of the stick. I was so far in the back and saw Ryan and Mike out front and realized how far back I was. It’s all about the championship though and tonight was good for that. The way Chad has been riding all year, it was definitely surprising to see how things played out.”

Stewart’s second combined with Reed’s seventh (far and away his worst finish of the season) mean that James Stewart now has a three point lead in the Monster Energy/AMA Supercross Series.

Now, this Saturday night in Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City, Utah, comes the penultimate round of the 17-race series. With Reed and Stewart, almost exclusively running either first or second throughout the entire ’09 tour — only JGRMX/Toyota/Yamaha’s Josh Grant and Monster Energy/Kawaski Villopoto have won a main event — three points, the difference between a first- and second-place finish separate the two champions.

Now what? If Stewart wins, his lead widens to six points (or more). If Reed wins, and Stewart is second, it’s all tied up going into Sam Boyd Stadium seven days after. But nothing is ever sure in racing and especially in supercross racing as oh so many things can happen in a sport where man and machine push things so very close to the edge. The slightest sneeze can send a rider over it.

And of the wildcards in the pack? Ryan Villopoto and Josh Grant have proven they can win. With a good start and some bad luck experienced by Reed or Stewart, all bets could be off and the chase for the championship could be thrown wide open. And there are others. Mike Alessi has shown great form as of late, and veteran Kevin Windham  — remember he was second in the 2008 championship series — is surely more than capable of pulling off an upset win. Davi Millsaps has won a race and so has Josh Hill. With 40 laps remaining in what has turned into a thrilling fight for the AMA Number One Plate, the math tells us all it’s come down to two riders, but truth be told, it’s really boiled down to a number of riders and just where they end up upon flashing across the finish line in Salt Lake and Las Vegas. It’s a free for all and it’s every man for himself. It’s survival of the fittest time and may the best man win. Now we just have to wait until 7:30 P.M. in Salt Lake City to see what happens next.