Eli Tomac wins Denver Supercross, Cooper Webb slices through field

By Apr 13, 2019, 10:33 PM EDT
0 Comments

Even if the picture went black on the television set, one would have known the moment Eli Tomac took the lead in Round 15 of the 2019 Supercross season at Denver. On Lap 7, Colorado native Tomac blazed past Marvin Musquin and rode off into the sunset with his fifth win of the year and second consecutive.

Once he snatched the lead from Musquin, Tomac steadily improved his lead – doing all in his power to turn the 450SX championship into a battle.

“That’s like what I dreamed of,” Tomac told NBCSN after the race. “That was by far the coolest crowd. The best atmosphere. They were so loud. … Coming over the triple there, battling for the lead, it was the loudest I’ve ever heard. I was so special. Frickin’ cool.”

But once again, Cooper Webb showed the composure that championships require, as he has all year long.

With less than five minutes remaining in the race, he chased down Musquin and earned his 10th podium finish of the season. Musquin was forced to settle for third and lost two more points to Webb.

Webb entered Denver with a 21-point advantage over Tomac and his teammate Musquin. On Lap 1, Webb was outside the top five. Panic could have caused him to make a mistake, but he set his sights on the top five while his two principal challengers settled into the top two spots.

Webb passed Justin Bogle for fourth on Lap 6, then had to show some patience when he caught Joey Savatgy on Lap 12. He challenged hard but smartly and climbed to the final step of the podium on Lap 13.

Bogle held on to finish fourth with Savatgy rounding out the top five.

Dean Wilson crashed on Lap 10 to bring out the red cross flag. He walked to the Medical Mule under his own power.

Complete Results
Points Standings

In 250SX, the athletes from the West had their last chance to battle without the East riders potentially clogging up their standings in the season finale East/West Showdown at Las Vegas.

The points battle is down to a two-man show between Adam Cianciarulo and Dylan Ferrandis, but Michael Mosiman did not let that keep him from grabbing the holeshot or riding Cianciarulo hard over the first seven laps.

On the seventh circuit around the track, the two swapped the lead several times before Cianciarulo was finally able to get the point with nine minutes remaining in the feature. He watched Mosiman make life difficult for the second-place rider, as Cianciarulo scored his fifth win of the year and heads to Nevada with a lead of eight points.

“The first obstacle was to get the start out of the way,” Cianciarulo told NBCSN after the win. “Michael Mosiman was rim riding so good the last couple of weeks. Shout out to him. Man, he really battle me for that win – a little bit more than I wanted him to, but it was great to see him not scared and not backing down.

“I’m always at my best when my back is to the wall.”

That allowed Dylan Ferrandis to make up ground lost on Lap 1. On the first lap around the Denver track, Ferrandis fell to fifth. By the time Cianciarulo settled his difference with Mosiman, the Frenchman had climbed to third and had his sights set on the runner-up position.

But Mosiman was an equal opportunity beast – challenging Ferrandis just as hard as he had the points leader.

By the time Ferrandis got around, he was nearly seven seconds behind the leader with five minutes on the clock and no chance of making up the ground. The pair were three seconds behind Cianciarulo when they began their battle; Ferrandis lost four seconds making the difficult pass.

Mosiman laid his bike down as the clock ran out and the final lap began. Colt Nichols took advantage of the fall to climb to third.

RJ Hampshire slipped past on the white flag lap with Mosiman rounding out the top five.

After fighting so hard to get into the Main with his LCQ win, Garrett Marchbanks went down hard on Lap 1 to finish 22nd.

Complete Results
Points Standings

450 Heat 1: Justin Bogle jumped out from the fifth spot on the gate to take the early lead. … Blake Baggett stayed within two seconds, but never seriously challenged and was passed for second by Zach Osborne as time was running off the clock. … Baggett held on for third. … The biggest battle of the heat was deeper in the field as Ken Roczen and Marvin Musquin battled for fourth and fifth with Roczen getting the advantage at the end,

450 Heat 2: Cole Seely rode to an easy win as the battle for supremacy heated up behind him. … Eli Tomac and Cooper Webb went handlebar to handlebar early in the heat as Tomac pushed Webb a little wide. Webb survived in third, but as he caught Joey Savatgy, he bobbled on a triple jump and made the race for second into a three-man show. … When the dust settled, Tomac grabbed second, Webb was third and Savatgy settled for fourth.

450 Last Chance Qualifier: Alex Ray got the holeshot and held the advantage throughout the LCQ. … He beat Carlen Gardner to the line by a little under two seconds. … John Short slipped around Charles Lefrancois on as time was running off the clock with a short battle. … Adam Enticknap was 2.765 seconds behind the final transfer.

250 Heat 1: Colt Nichols grabbed the lead at the start and ran away with the win. … James Decotis finished nearly four seconds behind. … Chris Blose ran into the back of Cameron McAdoo, but McAdoo got back up quickly and recovered to finish third. … Blose finished 10th and failed to transfer. … Derek Kelley was in a transfer position until he crashed in the rhythm section with time running off the clock. He finished 17th.

250 Heat 2: Points leader Adam Cianciarulo snatched the lead from RJ Hampshire on Lap 4 and stretched his lead to more than three seconds at the end. … Hampshire grabbed the holeshot over the two title contenders with Cianciarulo and Dylan Ferrandis falling into second and third on Lap 1; he held on for second. … Ferrandis was able to close the gap on Hampshire in the final laps, but settled for third. … Logan Karnow took ninth and the final transfer spot. 

250 Last Chance Qualifier: Garrett Marchbanks rode to an uneventful win over Chris Blose. … Third-place Enzo Lopes was a distant 7.65 seconds behind with Blaine Silveira nearly nine second behind Lopes (20.4 behind Marchbanks)

Points Leaders

450SX
Cooper Webb (332) (6 wins)
Eli Tomac (314) (5 wins)
Marvin Musquin (309) (2 wins)
Ken Roczen (283)
Blake Baggett (255) (1 win)

250SX West
Adam Cianciarulo (208 points) (5 wins)
Dylan Ferrandis (200) (2 wins)
Colt Nichols (163) (1 win)
RJ Hampshire (145)
James Decotis (128)

250SX East
Austin Forkner (151 points) (5 wins)
Chase Sexton (148)
Justin Cooper (144)
Martin Davalos (115) (1 win)
Mitchell Oldenburg (105)

Top 5s

450SX
Cooper Webb: 12
Marvin Musquin: 11
Eli Tomac: 11
Ken Roczen: 9
Blake Baggett: 8
Dean Wilson: 4
Joey Savatgy: 4
Chad Reed: 2
Justin Barcia: 2
Justin Bogle: 2
Jason Anderson: 1
Justin Brayton: 1
Aaron Plessinger: 1
Cole Seeley: 1
Zach Osborne: 1

250SX West
Adam Cianciarulo: 9
Dylan Ferrandis: 7
Shane McElrath: 5
Colt Nichols: 6
RJ Hampshire: 5
James Decotis: 4
Jacob Hayes: 1
Garrett Marchbanks: 1
Jess Pettis: 1
Michael Mosiman: 1
Chris Blose: 1
Michael Mosiman: 1

250SX East
Austin Forkner: 6
Justin Cooper: 7
Chase Sexton: 7
Jordon Smith: 3
Martin Davalos: 4
Alex Martin: 2
Mitchell Oldenburg: 2
Kyle Peters: 1
Brandon Hartranft: 1

Next race: April 27, MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford, NJ.

Season passes can be purchased at NBC Sports Gold.

Follow Dan Beaver on Twitter

Roger Penske vows new downtown Detroit GP will be bigger than the Super Bowl for city

By Jun 1, 2023, 2:00 PM EDT
0 Comments

DETROIT – He helped spearhead bringing the town a Super Bowl 17 years ago, but Roger Penske believes the reimagined Chevrolet Detroit GP is his greatest gift to the Motor City.

“It’s bigger than the Super Bowl from an impact within the city,” Penske told NBC Sports. “Maybe not with the sponsors and TV, but for the city of Detroit, it’s bigger than the Super Bowl.

“We’ve got to give back individually and collectively, and I think we as a company in Michigan and in Detroit, it’s something we know how to do. It shows we’re committed. Someone needs to take that flag and run it down through town. And that’s what we’re trying to do as a company. We’re trying to give back to the city.”

After 30 years of being run on Belle Isle, the race course has been moved to a new nine-turn, 1.7-mile downtown layout that will be the centerpiece of an event weekend that is designed to promote a festival and community atmosphere.

There will be concerts in the adjacent Hart Plaza. Local businesses from Detroit’s seven districts have been invited to hawk their wares to new clientele. Boys and Girls Clubs from the city have designed murals that will line the track’s walls with images of diversity, inclusion and what Detroit means through the eyes of youth.

And in the biggest show of altruism, more than half the circuit will be open for free admission. The track is building 4-foot viewing platforms that can hold 150 people for watching the long Jefferson Avenue straightaway and other sections of the track.

Detroit GP chairman Bud Denker, a longtime key lieutenant across Penske’s various companies, has overseen more than $20 million invested in infrastructure.

The race is essentially Penske’s love letter to the city where he made much of his fame as one of Detroit’s most famous automotive icons, both as a captain of industry with a global dealership network and as a racing magnate (who just won his record 19th Indy 500 with Josef Newgarden breaking through for his first victory on the Brickyard oval).

During six decades in racing, Penske, 86, also has run many racetracks (most notably Indianapolis Motor Speedway but also speedways in Michigan, California and Pennsylvania), and much of that expertise has been applied in Detroit.

“And then the ability for us to reach out to our sponsor base, and then the business community, which Bud is tied in with the key executives in the city of Detroit, bringing them all together,” Penske said. “It makes a big difference.

“The Super Bowl is really about the people that fly in for the Super Bowl. It’s a big corporate event, and the tickets are expensive. And the TV is obviously the best in the world. What we’ve done is taken that same playbook but made it important to everyone in Detroit. Anyone that wants to can come to the race for free, can stand on a platform or they can buy a ticket and sit in the grandstands or be in a suite. It’s really multiple choice, but it is giving it to the city of Detroit. I think it’s important when you think of these big cities across the country today that are having a lot of these issues.”

Denker said the Detroit Grand Prix is hoping for “an amazingly attended event” but is unsure of crowd estimates with much of the track offering free viewing. The race easily could handle a crowd of at least 50,000 daily (which is what the Movement Music Festival draws in Hart Plaza) and probably tens of thousands more in a sprawling track footprint along the city’s riverwalk.

Penske is hoping for a larger crowd than Belle Isle, which was limited to about 30,000 fans daily because of off-site parking and restricted fan access at a track that was located in a public park.

The downtown course will have some unique features, including a “split” pit lane on an all-new concrete (part of $15 million spent on resurfaced roads, new barriers and catchfencing … as well as 252 manhole covers that were welded down).

A $5 million, 80,000-square-foot hospitality chalet will be located adjacent to the paddock and pit area. The two-story structure, which was imported from the 16th hole of the Waste Management Open in Phoenix, will offer 70 chalets (up from 23 suites at Belle Isle last year). It was built by InProduction, the same company that installed the popular HyVee-branded grandstands and suites at Iowa Speedway last year.

Penske said the state, city, county and General Motors each owned parts of the track, and their cooperation was needed to move streetlights and in changing apexes of corners. Denker has spent the past 18 months meeting with city council members who represent Detroit’s seven districts, along with Mayor Mike Duggan. Penske said the local support could include an appearance by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Witmer.

Denker and Detroit GP  president Michael Montri were inspired to move the Detroit course downtown after attending the inaugural Music City Grand Prix in Nashville, Tennessee.

“We saw what an impact it made on that city in August of 2021 and we came back from there and said boy could it ever work to bring it downtown in Detroit again,” Denker said. “We’ve really involved the whole community of Detroit, and the idea of bringing our city together is what the mayor and city council and our governor are so excited about. The dream we have is now coming to fruition.

“When you see the infrastructure downtown and the bridges over the roads we’ve built and the graphics, and everything is centered around the Renaissance Center as your backdrop, it’s just amazing.”