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WESTON PEICK
450 SX / 5TH
IMAGE / KILPATRICK WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> With all the drama happening this season with two early title favorites, Eli Tomac and Marvin Musquin, going down with nagging injuries, no one has really taken notice to the performances that Weston Peick has been churning out. The southern Californian, home- grown product has put together two very impressive fifth place finishes to start the year. Everything he has been doing has been solid. He’s been nailing good starts consistently and his speed has also been consistently on par with the leaders. This year aboard his
JGR Suzuki, he looks maybe the best he has his whole career and he will look to continue that at round one of the Monster Energy Triple Crown and round three of the AMA Monster Energy Supercross series in Anaheim. Peick ended up struggling quite a bit in the morning qualifying practices. He was only able to set the thirteenth fastest lap time, but he would go back and make the proper adjustments, so he would be ready to compete when the first gate drops. Peick got off to a great start in the first main event of the evening. It was just what he needed to shake off that rust he had in practice. He was setting a nice pace after rounding lap one in third position. He had Justin Brayton just ahead of him but could not get close enough to make anything happen. And while he was trying to run down Brayton, Blake Baggett began to make his presence felt. Peick and Baggett would engage in tough battle midway through the race that would ultimately be won by Baggett as he would pass Peick, sending him back to fourth. There was not much left for Peick to do after that, so he’d settle with the fourth-place finish. Main event number two started solid for Peick. He came out of lap one in sixth place right in the thick of all the battling. After a hectic two opening laps, he remained in sixth but on lap three he would be handed fifth place by his rival from the first main event, Baggett, after he crashed. Peick started logging some laps in fifth trying to run down Brayton and Grant but he started to fall victim to some pressure from Anderson. Peick did a great job holding him off for a while until he finally made a mistake and crashing enter- ing a corner. He would remount in a lonely ninth place where he would finish after riding the last several laps there. Peick got another solid start in the third main event rounding lap one in fourth. He started just ahead of Ken Roczen who started applying the heat early on. Peick did a fine job fending him off for several laps but the German rider finally made the pass on lap five. Peick settled into fifth and ended up riding there all the way to the checkered flag. His 4-9-5 main event scores would be good enough to earn him fifth overall for the third time in as many tries this season. Peick’s biggest quirk the past few years has been his lack of consistency but here in 2018, he seems to have figured it out.
20 GRITMOTO • JANUARY 21, 2018