RCH Soaring Eagle/Jimmy John’s/Suzuki Factory Racing riders Ken Roczen raced to fourth in Saturday’s Lucas Oil Pro Motocross FMF Glen Helen National at Glen Helen Raceway.
Roczen’s solid outing propelled the German rider from 12th to sixth in the Pro Motocross Championship standings. After fighting his way through last week’s outdoor season opener with an ailing back, Roczen rebounded by posting the fastest lap of Saturday morning’s qualifying session and looked to be in winning form before the gate dropped on the first 450 moto of the day.
Bad luck in the form of contact with another rider left Roczen hung up shortly after the gate dropped and ultimately deep in the field when he pointed his Suzuki RM-Z450 in the right direction. Despite the early-race incident, the defending Pro Motocross Champion charged back to finish eighth. Roczen stepped it up in the second moto and bettered his first showing by a handsome five positions to record his first podium finish of the 2015 outdoor campaign.
“It seems like the luck wasn’t really on our side during that first moto,” Roczen explained. “I got tangled up with someone and got stuck really long and started dead last, basically and made my way up to eighth, which was ok. In the second moto, I got a little bit better of a start and fought my way up to third right away. I was behind (Ryan) Dungey and tried to hang on but I tipped over and that’s what cost me big time. After that, I just tried to be somewhat consistent. The track was really gnarly. I made a bunch of mistakes. If I could have cleaned up some places, it would have made my lap times quite a bit better. We’ll build from here. I’m ok with third place in the second moto. We’ll work hard this week and try to get back up top.”
