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BRADLEY TAFT
450 MX / 10TH
IMAGE / KILPATRICK WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Bradley Taft’s 2018 began with some promise at the start of the 250SX West Coast Cham- pionship. Taft, aboard his Cycletrader.com/Rock River Yamaha, scored three top tens at the rst six rounds including a career best sixth place nish at Glendale. He really seemed to be getting comfortable on his machine and more comfortable competing with the top riders at front of the eld but then he got bit by the injury bug. Injuries kept him out of the remainder of Supercross except for a one race return at Daytona in the 450 class where he nished eighteenth. He was left without a ride after Supercross, so he made the jump full time to the 450 on a full privateer effort. He could not wait for Hangtown to come around, so he could nally get a clean slate and begin the season one-hundred percent and prove the doubters wrong.
Coming out of the B session of qualifying practice, Taft managed to throw down the twelfth fastest lap time of the class aboard his privateer Husqvarna machine. He showed right away that he meant business and clearly deserved to be in the A session of practice with the rest of the top riders. The gate could not drop fast enough for moto one as he wanted to get out there and really prove his worth.
When the gate nally did drop for moto one, it saw Taft get out to a quality start in ninth position.
He surrendered one spot to Blake Baggett on the opening lap but that is the only position he would give up the rest of the race. He settled nicely into tenth place and built a nice gap behind him and rode the entire race in his own little bubble with the exception of Benny Bloss sneaking his way by during the second half of the race. It was a smooth, consistent ride from the rider who has struggled with consistency his whole racing career even dating back to amateurs. It was good to see him have such a solid opening moto in the 450 class and he’d gear up to try and beat that eleventh- place nish in moto two.
Taft started this race much worse back in twenty- rst position. De nitely not the ideal starting posi- tion but he moved up quickly. He was in fteenth just three laps into the race. He was locked up there for a handful of laps before he got moving again. He inched up into fourteenth about halfway and then entered a battle with a handful of riders including Dylan Merriam, Jake Masterpool, Cody Cooper, and Kyle Chisholm. All of those riders traded positions over the course of the last few laps and it would be Taft who would emerge from the wide scale battle victorious. He passed all of the riders to get into tenth place at the checkered ag. He would go 11-10 on the day for tenth overall. Taft could not have asked for a much better start to the season and he will look to build on it next weekend at Glen Helen.
56 GRITMOTO • MAY 21, 2018