What Really Happened: Unadilla

Story and Photos by: Jeff Kardas

The green rolling hills of upstate New York hold a special place in the history of American motocross. For well over 30 years, national and international-level races have been held at the track which  literally seems to be in the middle of nowhere; this track is the Unadilla Valley Sports Center. Despite the inconvenience of zero cell phone coverage, sketchy internet access, and unpredictable weather; race fans and racers alike gather to witness some of the greatest mud riding of the season.

During lites moto two, Unadilla was ready to get down and dirty– an epic storm had certainly been brewing, and with lightning striking all around, AMA made the call to red flag the moto . This was much to Ryan Villopoto’s dismay, as he had just worked his way into the lead. As the day progressed races were held regardless of the onslaught of storming weather. In fact, it probably provided the best racing of the season. This was especially true in relation to the battle against James Stewart (see race report for details). In other words: Cody Cooper is a mudder. His mother was probably a mudder too, but that’s another story.

In terms of the track itself, Unadilla has long been considered a ‘real’ motocross track, relying on natural terrain to provide the obstacles. The last several years however, have seen a few fairly bizarre attempts to ‘modernize’ the track layout. The supercross-style section was tamed down last year, and this year it was completely gone. This was replaced by a huge step-down tabletop in a newly created infield area.

. The surface itself has always been a problem for the riders, with seemingly unlimited numbers of large rocks mixed into dirt that turns into a slick, painful, dangerous mess. This year, they added quite a bit of sand to the soil mix and clearly put a lot of effort into removing the rocks from the racing surface. The result? It was a lot better, or at the least the number and size of rocks had both gone down. The sand seemed to separate from the native soil and get pushed off to the outside, which resulted in a slippery racing surface that forced riders to drift to the outside fluff berms in order to carry speed. “One-lined” was an often overheard term used to describe the track, but despite this negativity, the reviews from the top riders was much, much better than in years past. Both Stewart and Villopoto remarked in the press conference afterwards that the track was “actually pretty good” and was definitely, “a lot less rocky” than in years past. So, for a track that’s taken a lot of slack in recent years for being a rocky slippery mess, the Unadilla Valley Sports Center is turning it’s image around, and that’s a good thing.

Speaking of track changes, the promoters decided to move the finish line to the exit of the famed “Gravity Cavity”, a huge jump-in/jump-out valley that’s the headline feature of the Unadilla facility. While at first this seemed to be a great idea, motocross moto one proved otherwise. There was some intense racing going on just outside of the top 10 in that first moto, and after Spike/Yamaha/JGR’s Josh Summey jumped out of the cavity and rolled through the flat ‘landing area’, he suffered the consequences. Behind him, Jeff Alessi and Jimmy Albertson were battling fiercely for 12^th spot as they launched out of the cavity and, much to everyone’s horror, Alessi landed square on Summey’s left shoulder bringing them both to the ground in a horrible heap of limp men and broken machines. Though they both writhed in pain, the brunt of the impact seemed to have been dealt to Summey as he was removed from the track on a back-board and neck brace, while Dr. Augustine proceeded to pop Alessi’s discombobulated shoulder back into socket right there in the middle of the track. Long story short, Summey was miraculously declared “OK”, with no broken bones or other significant injuries although neither riders were present participants of moto two.

Speaking of the Alessi’s, Jeff’s older brother Mike’s name came up a few times this weekend even though he’s out with an injury. It popped up during the introduction of TEAM USA for the upcoming Motocross of Nations going down in England later this summer. It’s a Team Monster/Kawasaki endeavor this time around, as James Stewart (MX1), Tim Ferry (MX3) and Ryan Villopoto (MX2) will represent the U.S. in what seems to be a real ‘ringer’ of a team, for sure. Mike Alessi comes up because he was quite clearly the second fastest rider on the track in the Motocross class up to the team selection being announced, yet the chosen rider was none other than Tim Ferry. AMA’s own, Ryan Holliday stated that they’d, “approached Alessi at Red Bud prior to his crash and told him that he was a preliminary choice, and that Mike was thrilled at the opportunity.”  It appears to be just a twist of fate that Alessi didn’t make the team this time around, and that the alternative – Ferry – will be a solid replacement.

Something must be said about the ‘rise of the privateer’ in the Motocross class, there’s no question about it. So many riders have really stepped it up . Just to name a few, (let us know who we miss) Chris Blose, Cody Cooper, Michael Blose, Sean Hamblin (prior to the factory ride of course), Antonio Balbi, Jimmy Albertson, Jeff Alessi, Matt Boni and Jacob Marsack. The facts are this: If it weren’t for these guys fighting tooth and nail with factory or satellite-level riders for top ten or top fifteen spots every weekend, the racing would be boring in the sport’s premier class. Wait a minute, did we just imply that the racing is NOT boring in the class that Stewart’s won every single moto in? YES! That’s what we said, and even though the TV coverage may not show it, there is stellar racing going on all moto long deep within the top 15 at every single round.

The same can’t be said about the Lites class. Only a couple of standouts this season have broken the status factory quo and gained attention by putting in gutsy rides on equipment (namely, motors) that are far inferior to their competition’s. Only Solitaire/Brawndo’s Bobby Kiniry and BBRMX’s Kyle Cunningham have truly had an impact, running at the front and deep within the top ten. Cunningham absolutely pushed Geico Direct/Factory Connection’s Josh Grant for several laps before straight-up beating his teammate Trey Canard and Monster Energy/Pro Circuit’s Brett Metcalfe in the first moto on a bike he bought himself. Needless to say, big props to both Cunningham and Kiniry for keeping it real and busting their butts in the most competitive and money-heavy class in the world.

Along those lines, we spoke with a privateer and his mechanic who recently moved up to the Motocross class. Cycra Racing-backed Michael Willard (a two-time Canadian regional MX champ) had a few decent moto finishes in the lites class this season, including top privateer at High Point, although, he faced great obstacles having blown out 5 motors by Red Bud alone. The reality for privateers in the lites class is that in order to be competitive with the factory bikes, the engines need to be built to the absolute max, which of course results in dramatically reduced reliability. In Willard’s case, it means paying a motor builder used by one of the major teams to ‘go as crazy as possible with the money we have’ yet still maintain some level of reliability. The result: the builder said expect an absolute MAX of three race weekends out of a very expensive engine before a complete rebuild is necessary, and more realistically, expect two out of it. It’s easy to see why the privateer stands a much better chance on a 450, where bone-stock top-ends have proven to be competitive over the duration of a season, not just a couple of races. Why? Because there’s so much power that they’re never pushed to the limits, quite contrary to the 250F’s, which are bouncing off the rev limiter for entire motos. Willard won the RC Hard Charger Award for his ride at Budds Creek and is loving the “bone-stock” top-end and handling of his 08 YZ450F.

That’s about it from Unadilla. The 2008 Toyota AMA Motocross Championship Series resumes this coming weekend at Washougal MX Park in Washougal, Washington. Check back here at motocross.com for race reports, photos and Monday’s What Really Happened for the inside scoop on the weekend’s festivities.

 Don’t forget to check out the:

A wrap up of the on-track racing events, in the Race Report: http://www.motocross.com/articles/article/news/20080721/2008_unadilla_race_report-15414.html     

A gallery of Kardas’ photos taken straight from the track:

http://www.motocross.com/photos/g/15408.html

Racer XMotocross Show on Motocross.com: Don’t miss the popular show on live.motocross.com. If you missed the pre- or the post-show fromUnadilla, go check them out!