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VINCE FRIESE
450 SX / 9TH
IMAGE / LANNAN WORDS / ARMSTRONG DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Although Vince has struggled to get his SmartTop BullFrog Spas Honda in the top ten this season it really hasn’t been a terrible year for him. Last year the #55 was only able to capture 84 points nishing 16th in the series, and he was lucky enough to only miss one race. This year Vince has made it to each round healthy and with one race remaining he nearly has doubled his point total with 155 and only 8 points behind a top ten in the championship standings. Vince has also nished inside of the top 15 thirteen times this year compared to a total of 6 in 2017. Oddly enough Friese hasn’t had nearly as many holeshots in 2018 and his season is doing much better then in years past.
This weekend In Salt Lake, Friese seemed to be able to bring his start game
to track. In his heat race Vince got out front early and actually lead the opening two laps before making a mistake in a rhythm section that allowed Peick to get by with ease. Soon after Vince lost another position to red plate holder Jason Anderson. From then on the #55 was getting dropping like ies as he fell all the way back to 8th. Vince nearly got the holeshot once again in the main event but came around turn one in 2nd behind Blake Baggett. Vince lost two posi- tions right away putting him in 4th. The Honda mounted rider stayed inside of the top 5 for a few laps before being pushed to 8th. Vince stayed here for the majority of the race until the hard charging Benny Bloss took the position with just laps left. This 9th place nish is @vincefriese second top ten of the year, his last being ten rounds ago at round 6 in San Diego. That weekend Friese only got 10th so this weekend in Salt Lake one upped his best nish this year and is currently his best in his 450 career.
60 GRITMOTO • APRIL 29, 2018