Tough night for Red Bull KTM team at Daytona Supercross
By TMX Archives on 12th Mar 17
It was a tough night of racing for the Red Bull KTM Factory Racing Team as Round 10 of the AMA Supercross Championship presented a host of challenges in Daytona.
Infamous for its sandy motocross-style track, the Daytona Supercross was a change of pace for riders and fans alike. Red Bull KTM Factory Racing's Ryan Dungey came away with a 17-point lead in the 450SX Championship standings after salvaging a fourth place finish in the Main Event.
Ryan Dungey had a great start to the day as he claimed the fastest lap time of the timed qualifying sessions. With that, the reigning champion headed into the evening with the top gate pick for the heat races. Both Dungey and Marvin Musquin were seeded into 450SX Heat 2, where they both shot off the line aboard their KTM 450 SX-F FACTORY EDITION machines to fall inside the top three on the opening lap. Dungey tucked in behind his Red Bull KTM Factory Racing teammate Musquin, as the duo continued to charge ahead. After six laps of racing, Musquin was able to capture the second place position with Dungey close behind in 3rd.
Main Event
As the gate dropped for the 450SX Main Event, both Red Bull KTM Factory Racing Team riders ran into timing issues off the start. Both Dungey and Musquin got a late jump off the start, where they entered the first turn in the back of the pack. As they were rounding the corner, another rider went down, which caused both riders to come to a stop and lose substantial time right away.
Musquin rounded the opening lap in the 13th place position, while Dungey came through in 17th on lap one. Dungey charged his way up to his teammate Musquin by lap two and the duo fought for a top ten position. Musquin attempted to make the pass on Dungey but unfortunately went down and as a result fell back to the 18th place position, while Dungey continued to push ahead.
Throughout the 20-lap race, Dungey was able to continue climbing – where he sat in the 6th place position with two laps to go. Dungey made the pass on Chad Reed with two laps to go, as he set his sights on Cole Seely for 4th. On the final lap of racing, Dungey dug deep to make an incredible pass on Seely to overtake the 4th place position. From there, the reigning champion held on to salvage 4th place after a bad start held him outside the top 15 on lap one.
Dungey: "Obviously the start wasn't what we were looking for but we did our best to climb through the pack. The track was actually really difficult to make a pass on, which ended up costing us time in the beginning. Making passes was a lot easier in the second half of the race because we had some more space to work with. Next week is a new week and we're looking forward to protecting the points lead and changing up the strategy moving forward.”
