Friday Night Race Results from Grand Rapids Michigan

Team Flirts with Victory but is Undone by Crashes

Grand Rapids, Michigan; January 3, 2008

Friday night at the Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids Michigan was every bit as exciting as anticipated. The depth of talent in Arenacross this year has never been seen before. While the Foremost Team is clearly one of the top competitors, the results for Friday night would not show it.

Jim Neese did not need to qualify for the Arenacross class as he was seeded from his finish last year. According to the Arenacross officials neither Mike McDade or Josh Thomas qualified for the AX class, however we remain suspect given that the timing system experienced technical difficulties on Friday. Hopefully the system is fixed today.

Jim was sidelined three weeks ago with a lower back injury which impeded his ability to continue his rigorous training program. Despite the lack of practice, Jim showed his incredible speed in practice and pulled the holeshot in the Arenacross Main Event. He fell back to third for most of the race and then clutch problems and a few mistakes dropped him back to tenth place where he finished the race.

Only Mike McDade qualified for the Lites class with a respectable seventh place in the timed qualifiers. Mike led his Heat Race by a wide margin when he lost his footing on his left peg and crashed in the whoop section. He quickly remounted and finished in third place overall.

Mike was running in the top three in the Main Event and looking to take over second place when he missed a shift in the same spot in the whoop section. He was taken out by another rider in the next turn and was not able to finish the race.

While the first night got off to a rocky start the team is looking forward to better results tonight in Grand Rapids.