Posted by Jason Weigandt on Saturday, April 18, 2009
At least this time we know how good it is. Monster Energy Supercross is about to return for a three-week stretch run, with titles hanging in the balance for both the Monster Energy Supercross Championship and the Western Region SX Lites crown. These next three races will mark the closest spot our sport has to playoffs, and not Chase for the Nextel Cup playoffs, but real best-of-seven win-or-go home playoffs. Two races for the West Region Lites Championship, a crown that could define the career of the three riders in contention for it. And three races for the Supercross Championship, a two-horse race with enough drama ad back story to remind me of the Yankees-Red Sox playoffs battles of a few years ago. And when I think of that, I weep uncontrollably.
So it’s pretty clear where the buzz is coming from this week. This week’s Blogandt Noun of the Week is
The Championship.
We’ve been down this road before, but not everyone seems to remember. Supercross actually does deliver close title fights quite often, but for whatever reason, we seem to expect that it won’t, and hence we’re surprised when it does.
It usually goes like this: the winter months give us time to hype of the perfect storm, and we all dream of close races and exciting battles and say “it’s what the sport needs.” I’m right there with you, hoping and dreaming we’ll have knock-down drag outs every week, and if you hear me getting hyped up on the air before the gate drops in the main, it’s not Monster Energy, it’s genuine hope that we’re in for a good show.
But when you’re such a big fan, it’s hard for the real deal to live up to the hype. And as such, we’ve been treated to some amazing championship fights for the last few years, but no one seems to remember them being as good as they actually were. When I come home from a race on Monday, I usually end up talking to some friends who weren’t at the event and bench-racing with them. For the last few weeks, I’ve heard it “this year is actually a good one, huh.”
Well it is damned good. But just one year ago at this time, Kevin Windham was closing the points gap on an ailing Chad Reed. In an epic Seattle Supercross, Reed mounted a last-to-second come-from-behind charge while riding with an a broken shoulder blade, and then engaged in a last-lap ram fest with Andrew Short, with accusations of Honda team tactics flying everywhere. Also during that race, Windham got a tuff block cover wrapped in his wheel but managed to stop, back up, remove the cover and get back into the race and get the win—had all of this happened in Supercross: The Movie, we would have all left the theater screaming “like that would ever happen!”
(And as an aside, I still ask: how come no one could come up with a better title for that movie than Supercross: The Movie? How many sports and films have lamed out enough to go with that? Imagine Football: The Movie or Romance: The Movie. Come on, people, there are plenty of go-to phrases out there, like Wide Open, Full Throttle or anything with Extreme or at least just the letter X in it).
Anyway, last year’s title fight was awesome. But Reed and Windham doesn’t bring the same hype—you always wondered where Reed’s mind was after Stewart, the defending champ, went out with an injury. Similarly, Reed and Windham engaged in a great fight in 2004, too, but the biggest names in the sport, Ricky Carmichael, James Stewart and Travis Pastrana were not participating in 250 Supercross that year, and as such even a few great Reed/Windham battles that year didn’t seem to register. Back in ’04, the AMA even threw fuel-gate part 1 into the blender (DQing Reed for lead in his gas) for added drama and controversy. And yet, we were all just waiting for ’05, really, when Carmichael and Stewart would join the fold. Heck, on this blog, I started a daily countdown about five months before A1’05.
That 2005 battle turned into a dud almost immediately when RC came out like a house of fire, Reed took 16th in the Anaheim mud and looked a little out of sorts through the first few races, and Stewart broke his arm in practice at Phoenix. From there, Carmichael just close the door with as little drama as possible.
But there was one year, and this was just three years ago, where we had it all. Reed, Carmichael and Stewart battling. And battling close. The year was 2006 and as the tour marched into Seattle’s Qwest Field, yes, two titles were hanging in the balance. Andrew Short was trying to hold up under the pressure of one of the best clutch performers in the history of this game, Grant Langston, in the battle for Lites West. Meanwhile, in the big class, everyone was still talking about the previous week’s race in in Dallas, where Carmichael “hit the boat” and Chad Reed won after James Stewart crashed (yep).
Coming into Seattle in 2006, RC led the series by just two points over Reed, and Stewart sat just ten points further back. Seattle was the next-to-last round of the series in 2006, and yes, just 12 points separated the top three in the series. Seattle was muddy (yep), and Stewart won with Reed finishing second, while Carmichael nearly threw it all away again en route to third. That race set up a scenario for the Vegas finale that actually managed to out do our wildest hyped up pre-season perfect storm dreams.
Reed and Carmichael entered the final race tied on points, with Stewart down by just five. I thought that week between races would go down in history as the greatest week in supercross history:
The Week We Were Tied: 3:16
Here’s a little Blogandt snipped that I wrote back then:
Tied 3:16
Oh brother it’s on now. Super on. Crazy on. Super Bowl World Series Game Seven on now. We finally have our “it” event. A final playoff game. One race for all of the marbles – one night, one race, one event, and it’s on live TV.
This has never happened before. Ever. Ricky Carmichael and Chad Reed are tied! They have 316 points apiece, but that might as well mean they’ve each won three heading into game seven. There isn’t a “if this guy does this they other guy has to do this” scenario. Nope. Whoever finishes in front will win the title. And James Stewart isn’t even out of it, since he’s just five points back, and if you’re looking for a wildcard in a racing scenario, does it get any wilder than James?
Anyway, I was all pumped up for that one. I wanted to remember that moment, that week were anything could happen and everything was on the line between some of the best riders who had ever raced, all at their peak. This was the dream scenario we all wanted, and you never know when you’re going to get it again, if ever.
Well, we might have it again now. But, I’m not convinced everyone really remembers 2006 for what it was. I haven’t heard it referenced much, I haven’t heard it compared to this year. I don’t want to say the same thing about 2009 three years from now, so, I’m giving you advanced warning:
Remember every second of these last three rounds. You’ll be glad you did the next time it’s not close.
Posted by Jason Weigandt on Saturday, April 18th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
