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JORDON SMITH
250 SX / 2ND
IMAGE / LANNAN WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Jordon Smith, before Joey Savatgy, had the 250SX East Coast championship in his hands at last year’s season nale in Las Vegas but it was ripped from his hands in a terrifying high-speed crash halfway through the main event. Of course, that was quickly forgotten because of the highly dramatic outcome of the race and the series and that left a bad taste in his mouth. He felt that he easily could have won that title if he had just stayed on two wheels. It ate him all the way until the start of this 2018 season. He came into this year ready to show everyone that it was no uke he was in title contention last season but ultimately struggled at the rst two rounds. He nished both of those races in sixth place before he nally snapped out of it with a podium at round three. He’d go on to win a race at Day- tona and he would nish off the podium all but one time the rest of the series and that one non-podium race was a fourth. He did all he could to inch to within fteen points of reigning champion and points leader, Zach Osborne, heading into Las Vegas.
Smith looked pretty solid on the hot, sun baked Las Vegas course in the morning qualifying sessions. He would come out of them with the third fastest lap time of the 250SX East coast group and fth over- all between both the East and West coasts. He always seems to excel on this slicker, harder surfaces and he was hoping it would help him in the results column once the gates dropped for the evening. Smith started his heat race with a nice start in third right behind his rookie teammate Sean Cantrell. He made quick work of his teammate but would also get passed by Osborne in the process keeping him
in third after lap two. That is when things got interesting. Smith made the pass by Osborne and then
for the lead, passing leader Michael Mosiman, only to get confused as to whether or not there was a red cross ag out over a triple or not. He would look back and checkup which allowed them right back by. Smith recovered by getting back by Mosiman and then putting on a charge towards Osborne. He hounded the points leader the remainder of the heat race and nearly made the pass on several occa- sions, including the nal corner on the nal lap, but he would not prevail. However, he did make a state- ment to Osborne that he was right there and was going to ght for the championship until the very end. Smith nailed another good start in the nal main event of the year, this time rounding the opening lap in fourth place. He hung out their hounding Joey Savatgy for a few laps before getting shuf ed backwards by a determined Adam Cianciarulo. He did not last too long in fth as he was still able to pressure Savatgy even after getting passed by Cianciarulo and would end up making the move on Savatgy to slide back into fourth just a few laps later. He would then set his sights on the duo of Jeremy Martin and Shane McElrath for the remainder of the race. He slowly inched up and them and snuck by Martin on lap twelve followed up by a pass on McElrath on lap fourteen. This moved him all the way up to second but by this time the leader, Adam Cianciarulo, was long gone. Smith would nish both the race and the championship in second place. Those rst two rounds certainly came back to haunt him as he would complete the championship just eight points behind Osborne.
32 GRITMOTO • MAY 6, 2018