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KEN ROCZEN
450 MX / 2ND
IMAGE / LANNAN WORDS / HARNISHFEGER DESIGN / MOTOPLAYGROUND
>> Ken Roczen has been chugging along all season long. The German rider who has overcame so much adversity has come so far since the season began at Hangtown. He has gone from fading to sixteenth place in the second moto at round one, to a winning a moto at Red Bud and leading a countless number of laps this season. His starts have almost always been perfect and he keeps positioning himself correctly to go after overall wins, but he keeps falling just barely short. Mainly due to the outright insanity of Eli Tomac’s, our current points leader, late race charges. Nonetheless, the progress Roczen has made after all of his injuries is remarkable and after struggling in the mud last weekend at Unadil- la, Roczen was ready to return to form and ght for more wins at Budds Creek. Roczen struggled slightly in the morning qualifying practice sessions. He still made out with the fth fastest lap time, but he did say he was feeling a bit under the weather with a sore throat and a cold all week and that could have played a factor. That clearly would not stop him from lining up on the gate and doing battle with the best riders in the business. When the gate dropped for moto one,
it saw Roczen work the inside of the rst corner and nesse a second place holeshot. He did not have the greatest jump in the world, but he made it happen. He was right behind Marvin Musquin and sensed an early opportunity for a pass and made it happen. Just a few turns into the race, Roczen had assumed the lead and he looked to pull away.
He built just a big enough cushion over Musquin in the opening laps that he did not have immediate pressure. He held it steady for most of the race but as the moto wore on, Musquin got closer. With a handful of laps remaining, Musquin threw everything he had at Roczen. Roczen played excellent defense and thwarted every attempt. He did not panic and continued to ride smooth and smart and ultimately broke free of Musquin’s clutches over the last two laps. He ended up winning the race by thirteen seconds. It was a great performance from Roczen and a hard-earned moto win. On a hot, humid day, he would have to quickly refuel and return for moto two. Moto two started off similarly for Roczen. He got a bad jump out of the gate and was buried heading into the rst turn, but he worked the inside and kept working it through the rst set of sweeping rollers to set himself up in third. There he found himself behind Justin Barcia and Musquin. Roczen would immediately start going to work on Barcia but would also have slight pressure from behind being applied by Phil Nicoletti. He had to deal with riders on both sides of him but Roczen managed to hammer around the outside of Barcia after the nish line on lap four to take over second. Now with Barcia cleared, Roczen only had one man to beat for the overall victory and that was Musquin. There was a slight gap there and Roczen methodically worked it down.
On lap six, Roczen was right there and made the pass happen. He immediately started stretching his lead. He held a comfortable gap of over eleven seconds into the second half of the moto and it appeared he would bring home his rst overall in nearly two years in style with a 1-1. However, Eli Tomac had other plans. Tomac made up large amounts of ground in a short period of time and almost as if in a blink of an eye, Tomac had passed Roczen for the lead. This hap- pened on lap twelve and wasn’t that bad for Roczen because he still had the overall in hand but the following lap he hit the proverbial wall. His body language showed he was physically wearing down and this allowed Blake Baggett to play spoiler and he passed Roczen with two laps to go. Roczen would nish the race in third. That last pass from Baggett pushed Roczen to a tie with Tomac in the overall points but Tomac, winning moto two, would also win the tiebreaker.
A heartbreak for Roczen as his 1-3 moto scores would get him second overall and fail to get him the victory. Still, a big step in the right direction and he will have one more round to nd that rst overall victory of his big comeback season.
36 GRITMOTO • AUGUST 19, 2018