RK Excel America

It was a pretty good weekend for Jeff Gibson and the TUF Racing team. Jeff started off great on Friday night easily winning his heat race. There was some controversy in the dash for cash as Tyler Bowers intentionally knocked Jeff down on the last lap for 4th place. Since this race only pays the winner, this was totally uncalled for. Jeff retaliated in the main event taking a massive Holeshot and leading every lap winning with a comfortable margin. Bower’s the point’s leader going into this round started around fifth. While passing Skaggs for third Bowers again intentionally took Skaggs out. Since Bowers had bragged about doing just that the week before on the podium the AMA decided to DQ bowers for the night. I have to commend the AMA for finally not tolerating this type of behavior. The riders already put themselves at risk without worrying about another rider using his 200+ lb motorcycle as a weapon.

Saturday night started out as a carbon copy of the first night with Gibson winning his heat easily over Skaggs. Then Jeff also won the dash for cash with all the winnings going to a local teen center. Bowers was not allowed to participate in the dash tonight as a punishment for his actions in Friday’s dash for cash. Jeff got a good jump off the gate in the main, but there was small pileup in the first turn that knocked Jeff back to 7th or 8th. Jeff tried a quick pass on a few riders in the second turn that also didn’t work out and Jeff came around 9th for lap one. Chad Johnson had the lead after lap one and Bowers was in second. Bowers passed Chad around lap three and the order was set for a few laps. Jeff was slowly picking off riders one at a time working his way past both Kelly and Demuth for 4th around the halfway mark. Johnson and Skaggs were having quite a battle for second. Jeff closed right up on the rear wheel of Skaggs going into the whoops looking like he had the pass made for third, but Skaggs lost the front wheel and slid out right in front of Jeff taking them both out. Jeff got up right away, but both Demuth and Kelly had passed him back and he had to settle for a 5th for the night.

That was a little disappointing, but we had made up 16 points on the leader and took over the points lead, so overall it was a pretty good weekend.

I want to thank all of our sponsors for making it possible for us to go this year and we hope to see everyone in Wilkes Barre, PA. next weekend

TUF Honda’s full list of supporters for 2012 are as follows:

FMF Power Beverage, Poynt, American Honda, Thor, Smith, NGK, Wiseco, Renegade, Silkolene, Bazzaz, K&N, KG Clutches, Motion Pro, DP Brakes, Hinson, RK/Excel, UFO, FMF Exhaust, Cernics, Hot Cams/Pivot Works, Wow Tickets, Vortex, Factory Connection, Works Connection, HBD, Motosport Products, Moto Tassanari, Dunlop, Sidi, and TUF performance products.

Baltimore was a two night show making up round 2 & 3 of the series. Friday practice went well with both Jeff and cole qualifying 3rd and fifth. The top 10 times in practice were within ½ a second from first to tenth. The whoops were fairly easy and it looked like a start was going to be everything. This was a much different track than last week.

Cole was in the first heat and was caught up in the first turn and came down the first whoop section in about eighth and slowly picked off riders until he got up to fifth. It was very difficult to pass as everyone could maintain the same speed. Jeff was in the second heat and came out of the gate in about fifth and worked his way up to 3rd by the end. Both riders were in the main so we were already ahead of last week.

In the main Jeff had sixth gate pick and Cole was in the second row. Jeff came out of the first turn in about seventh or eighth. He slowly picked off one rider at a time until he was in fourth around the halfway point. After that point there was not a lot of action and most everyone finished were they were mostly due to the fact the track was just a little too easy and everyone could go about the same speed.

Saturday the track crew made some improvements to the whoop section and that proved to be just what they needed to improve the racing. Now there was a section that separated the riders a little.
We made some gearing changes for Saturday and it seemed to pay off as Gibson Holeshot his heat race and went on to win his first heat race of the year over Bowers. Cole finished 4th in the same heat his best finish also of the year.

In the main Skaggs got the Holeshot followed by Gibson and Bowers. Jeff got by Skaggs after a few laps and Bowers got by Skaggs a few laps later. What followed was a great battle between last year’s top 2 contenders. Lap after lap the two went at it Bowers would get close then Gibson would pull away a little.
This would go on until the end with Jeff pulling off the win by less than a second over Bowers. The win now moves Jeff up to second in the points and we are off to Madison next week to do it again. Hope to see you there.

TUF Honda’s full list of supporters for 2012 are as follows:
FMF Power Beverage, Poynt, American Honda, Thor, Smith, NGK, Wiseco, Renegade, Silkolene, Bazzaz, K&N, KG Clutches, Motion Pro, DP Brakes, Hinson, RK/Excel, UFO, FMF Exhaust, Cernics, Hot Cams/Pivot Works, Wow Tickets, Vortex, Factory Connection, Works Connection, HBD, Motorsports Products, Moto Tassanari, Dunlop, Sidi, and TUF performance products.