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SEAN CANTRELL
250 SX / 9TH
IMAGE / REEVES WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Sean Cantrell has had a stereotypical rookie supercross season. The hotshot out of Southern Cali- fornia has had his fair share of highs and lows already throughout the first four rounds of the series. He has gotten holeshots and been up front several times in main events and heat races but big mistakes including some hard crashes have considerably hindered him in the results. He kicked off the year with
a solid eighth place finish, but the woes began at Tampa and Atlanta where he finished twenty-first and fourteenth respectively. He rebounded last weekend at Daytona with an impressive performance resulting in a career best seventh place finish. He looked more at home on the outdoor style track and maybe that good result would be the catalyst he needed to start producing some consistent results starting this week in St. Louis.
Cantrell was flowing through the Missouri soil in qualifying practice en route to securing the twelfth fastest lap time in his class on the day. He looked at ease and wasn’t appearing to struggle with the course, so he was more than ready for the gate to drop and the racing to begin.
Cantrell kicked off the first heat race of the night with a decent start. He rounded the opening lap in sixth place right behind Brandon Hartranft. He tried locking in behind him in order to move forward. He was able to pass Zack Williams for fifth on lap two but got sent right back to sixth on lap three by Anthony Ro- driguez. However, Cantrell stayed right with him and then an all-out battle ensued when Luke Renzland joined the fray. The three riders dueled all while chasing Hartranft but unfortunately when the dust settled, Cantrell was still at the end of the train in sixth. Nonetheless, he was moving on cleanly to the main event.
Cantrell’s main event could not have started any worse. He got all tangled up on the opening lap and did cross the finish line on the opening lap until nineteen other riders had gone through before him. He spent the rest of the race fighting his way towards the lead pack. At the halfway point, he had managed to claw his way all the way to eleventh position. His charge so far was a success and he still had plenty of time
to continue it. The riders were more spread out the closer to the front, so he had to dig deeper for every spot he picked up. In that second half of the race, he managed to pick off two more spots to finish in ninth place. Not the ideal way to finish in the top ten but it was a stellar ride climbing through the field. Back to back top tens for Cantrell and his consistency might be starting to improve.
50 GRITMOTO • MARCH 18, 2018