The Monster Energy AMA Supercross, an FIM World Championship, headed to St. Louis, Missouri for round nine of the Supercross Class series and round three of the Eastern Regional Lites Championship. In both the Lites and the Supercross Class, it was all about the men with the red background and #1’s on their number plates. Both GEICO Powersports/Honda’s Justin Barcia and Monster Energy/Kawasaki’s Ryan Villopoto had the fastest laps in their Main Events, and both took home the W. Check out the lap time comparison graphs below to see just how they got it done.
On the left of each graph, you will notice the lap times and the numbers on the bottom signifying each lap. Below that, we have the top five riders in the order they finished and each lap time from the Main Event after their name. Also, note that each rider’s fastest lap is shaded in blue.
Click on graphs to enlarge and view as slideshow.
In the Supercross Class, Ryan Villopoto did what he does best: get to the front quickly, build an early lead with blazing fast laps—like the fastest lap of the Main Event 50.5—and then control the race from the lead. While RV was up front laying down the fastest laps of the Main Event, Red Bull/KTM’s Ryan Dungey was involved in a long battle with Muscle Milk/Honda’s Justin Brayton that left him with a six-second gap up to RV. In the end, Dungey was able to cut the gap to two seconds, but as you can see, that was mainly due to RV backing it way down. The second fastest lap of the Main Event was turned in by the fifth place rider, JGR/Yamaha James Stewart. What was incredible was that James ran his 50.7 while in traffic. Hopefully, James can get the mistakes figured out so we can see some heads up battles between himself and the Ryans soon.
In the Lites Class, Justin Barcia grabbed the holeshot with Red Bull/KTM’s Ken Roczen and GEICO Powersports/Honda’s Justin Bogle right there in second and third. Some thought that if Roczen and Barcia started together, it would be a fifteen lap fight, but the graph clearly illustrates that Barcia’s early sprint speed combined with consistency could not be matched by the German. The #1 stayed in the 51’s for the first eight laps and simply checked out. In those first eight laps, Barcia set the fastest lap of the night with a 51.3 with the third place finisher Rockstar/Suzuki’s Blake Wharton setting the second fastest lap of 51.6.
Here is our weekly duel between the Supercross Class podium finishers and the Lites podium finishers. In this week’s graph, Justin Barcia gives the 450’s a run. In the ten laps we graphed Justin definitely keeps the big boys honest.
