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Mike Alessi has put together a pretty solid season by his standards and was ready to cap it off and
a venue he has always excelled at in Las Vegas. The Californian rider qualified seventeenth but that comes with an asterisk because the 450 guys only got one session in before the remainder of practice
was cancelled due to the torrential rain. It made for an even playing field for the races and Alessi knew he needed one of
his signature holeshots to electrify his night. Alessi timed the gate perfectly and rocketed into turn one. The rain made the track very slick and he slid all the way to the outside losing some positions. He would miss out on the holeshot and emerge from lap one in sixth place. After that first lap, the race would get as sketchy and unpredictable as you’d imagine on such a sloppy track. Alessi would actually fall two spots to eighth by the halfway point but would then bounce between there and seventh for the remaining two laps. He couldn’t hold onto seventh and would finish back in eighth meaning it was time for another semi. Alessi nailed another great jump out of the gate but kept his Motoconcepts machine more to the inside and came out second. Barcia would make a quick move and take the position away sending Mike back to third. Alessi decided he wasn’t going to drop another position so he set up shop in that third position and held it all the way to the finish keeping Barcia honest the whole way. Alessi could not keep his good starts going in the main event and would have problems resulting in him coming around lap one in twenty-first place. It was definitely not the optimal position to be in especially when it comes to
a mud race but he was ready to take the challenge of clawing forward. The track was totally brutal with only one established line around most of the track resulting in riders going down left and right. Alessi was able to stay mostly consistent throughout the race getting into sixteenth halfway after five laps and fourteenth at the halfway point. He seemed to have a good approach keeping it slow and steady and doing his best to avoid falling in the muck. He would eventually end up fifteenth after a few mistakes in the second half of the race. Alessi has to be disappointed he didn’t get a better start there but when he looks back on the season as a whole, he should be happy with the progress he has made in supercross and carry that into 2017.
words/SETHHARNISHFEGER
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