Page 42 - GRIT-80

KEN ROCZEN
450 MX / 4TH
IMAGE / LANG WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Ken Roczen has slowly worked himself into shape here during the rst three rounds of the outdoor series. The German product, who has missed so much time over the past year and a half with a pair of separate arm injuries, struggled mightily late in the day at round one but since then, he has looked signi cantly better. He’d go 6-16 at that round one at Hangtown but he bounced right back at round two at Glen Helen. He led some laps and showed glimpses of his old self en route to a fth overall. Then at round three in Colorado, he led even more laps and came close to winning some motos. There he’d go 2-2 for second overall and after the steady improvement and the week off before High Point, all signs pointed to Roczen progressing yet again at round four. Roczen rode solid but not extraordinary in the morning qualifying practice sessions. He quali ed with the fth fastest lap time but was four seconds off the fastest lap
time which was set by Blake Baggett. The track was going to be rough and gnarly, so it was going to be a true test in the motos to see how his surgically repaired arm could stand up to
the task. Moto one started off just as bad as Roczen could have imagined. He went down in a heap in the rst turn along with a plethora of other riders. Everyone that saw it was frightened that he may have reinjured something, but he immediately bounced back up and remounted his Factory HRC Honda. He had some serious ground to make up starting that far back but he had plenty of time to do it. He methodically made moves on the rest of the eld using the various lines scattered around the race track. By the midway point, he had somehow worked all the way up to eighth place. His charge stalled at that point as fatigue and more spaced out riders took their toll. He managed to get around Cody Cooper for seventh a couple laps after that,
but he would then struggle to battle with Benny Bloss for sixth. At one point, Roczen was right with Bloss but lost touch with him late in the moto and would settle with seventh. A nice ride from Roczen after such a terrible scenario at the start so he was looking for a much smoother performance in moto two. Roczen made sure he wouldn’t suffer the same fate he did in moto as he ripped the holeshot in moto number two. A slight bobble in the rollers cost him that lead to Eli Tomac, but he fought right back and regained the lead two turns later. He looked strong up front but not for long because on lap two, he would get off center and slide off the track. It was just enough for Tomac to sneak back by. Roczen settled into second place but after a few laps, suc- cumbed to the pressure being applied by Marvin Musquin and he slid back to third. After that, Roczen lost sight of the leaders as he just did not have the same pace as them. He was dealing with tendonitis in his arm and that surely played a factor. He would nish a distant third. His 7-3 scores earned him fourth overall on the day and his comeback tour continues despite the minor setback.
42 GRITMOTO • JUNE 17, 2018