WORCS ATV PRO REPORT- Round 7 Straddleline WA

Story by: Justin Waters (WORCS ATV PRO Racer)

In 2008, Josh Frederick was able to clinch the WORCS ATV Pro Championship even after getting a DNF at the final round. In 2009, Beau Baron only needed to finish in the top 10 to win the championship and take the #1 plate away. In 2010, with only two rounds of competition left, Frederick and Baron are separated by only 2 points. The title this year is likely going to come down to who can beat who in the final two rounds! This past weekend in Washington for round number 7, Baron was able to pull away with the win and make the battle that much closer.

This year the WORCS series has been provided with a whole slew of different weather for every round. Rain, wind, snow, dust and heat, the racers have dealt with it all. The trees and grass of Straddeline ORV park provided a much more comfortable environment for this round. The amateur racers spread out all over the park, picking their own section of grass and trees to pit in. But the race course wasn’t quite as relaxing as the pits. Tight trees, mud and slick rocky hills kept the riders on their toes all weekend. Several teams, like Mike Cafro Racing (MCR) and Motoworks Can-Am made special changes to narrow their quads just for this round.

All the preparation and testing paid off for Beau Baron. After winning Friday night on the extremely challenging WORCS-X course and having the fastest lap in qualifying Saturday, he continued his domination. Just barely missing out on the holeshot to Dustin Nelson in Sunday’s final, he took the lead and never looked back, posting the fastest lap of the race by almost 10 seconds on lap number 3 of the 11. Last year Chris Borich made the long trip out to the west coast and dominated the woods of Washington, but this year he faced a few more challenges. After a 6th place start he took over the second position on lap 2, but Baron was already able to open up too large of a lead and Borich had to settle for second.

While Baron and Borich pulled away from the rest of the pack, Frederick was in the third position in an extremely close battle with another Can-Am rider and East coast pro, Adam McGill. McGill took a pretty hard spill on Friday night after hitting neutral over a large double in the WORCS-X main event. The bump on his head didn’t affect him too much though because while Frederick pitted on lap 6, McGill took over third place. Frederick was able to battle back and save some vital points, finishing in third place with McGill taking fourth.

Dustin Nelson, who is currently 4th position in the points chase, pulled off another impressive holeshot on his Yamaha YFZ450R, but wasn’t able to hold off the other hard-charging riders. Nelson held onto the fifth position for the entirety of the race, putting himself 7 points behind MCR racer Josh Row in the points chase. Josh impressed a lot of people in his rookie pro season last year earning the number 5 plate, and he hasn’t let team owner Mike Cafro down this year. Battling the entire race, he was able to hold off Johnny Gallagher for the 5th position. Gallagher made the trip west with Borich, and made it a good weekend taking away a 6th place.

This was the only round that California native Roberto Villalobos has attended this year, but he made it a successful round earning 7th position. Tim Shelman, who couldn’t live much closer to the track than he does, lost a few positions early on but pushed hard all race to take 9th place. Yamaha rider Justin Waters, after having to start from a second row, kept up consistent lap times to move into 10th place on lap 8 where he would finish.

It was a rough day for several of the racers battling for top 10 positions in the points championship. Dillon Zimmerman, Robbie Mitchell, Mike Cafro and Ryan Piplic finished 11th,18th, 19th and a DNF respectively.

Round 8 of the series will be at Glen Helen Raceway but is almost nine weeks away in September, so the riders have a long time to prepare. Beau Baron and I’m sure lots of the other Pros plan on spending lots of practice time on the rough and sandy track. According to Beau, “I have a good chance there to take the points lead, but Josh (Frederick) is a tough competitor and it is gonna take a lot of preparation and a little bit of luck. Whichever way it does end up, it is gonna be close for sure.”

There is no doubt Frederick is doing the same, and neither of them will just give a position up!