JDR Motorex KTM's PJ Larsen has reclaimed the Lites class series lead in the 2010 Super X, Australasian Supercross Championship, capturing his second overall victory of the season in Auckland, New Zealand, on Saturday night.
Larsen won the opening final of the Triple Challenge main event by an impressive 4.169 seconds and then finished third in final number two, before his race three victory by 3.940 seconds gave him a superb round win overall.
The round victory means Larsen now leads the series again by nine points over arch-rival Matt Moss with three rounds remaining, the 20-year-old American stoked with his debut performance across the Tasman in NZ.
"It was a good night tonight and I'm really happy with the way it turned out," Larsen, originally from South Carolina, commented. "To win two of the three finals was awesome and I'm really happy to take over the points lead ‰ÛÒ I'm pumped to keep improving on areas of my riding."
Teammate Ryan Marmont made it an incredible 1-2 finish for the JDR Motorex KTM team in the Lites, slotting into second overall after positing 4-2-4 results in the three main events to make it a pair of 2011 model KTM 250SX-Fs atop the podium.
Marmont's result maintains third in the series, sitting 34 points behind leader Larsen, and he's confident that he can post his first victory of the season in the coming rounds in a bid to stay in the hunt for the title.
"I had a great night and the track was really technical," Wollongong resident Marmont said. "We just had to do the simple things right tonight ‰ÛÒ get good starts and stay consistent ‰ÛÒ and I was able to do that to take second place. There are still a lot of points up for grabs, so we'll chip away and keep working week in, week out."
In the Open class, 18-year-old Tye Simmonds sealed a strong fourth place overall, marking the JDR team's best ever Open class main event result aboard the revolutionary 2011 model KTM 350SX-F.
Simmonds finished with 4-4-5-6 results in the Quad Challenge that consisted of four six-lap finals for the main event, a consistent night that boosted him up to fourth in the series point standings - just three points out of the top three.
"The first and second finals were good and I was able to get good starts in those," Simmonds said. "In the third one I was sitting strong in third or fourth and then made a mistake that dropped me back to fifth, and then in the last one I had a really bad start. I'm happy with the fourth overall, but I'm still determined to keep improving and get on that podium."
Californian Mike Alessi raced through the pain of a rib injury sustained early in the round, completing the event with 5-9-6-16 results to move into the top 10 overall in the championship chase.
Team manager Jay Rynenberg was proud of the team's performance, marking a night of firsts in the team's most successful Super X event yet.
"The Lites class results were excellent tonight and the boys rode really well," Rynenberg explained. "PJ rode his own race and I think he proved that he's the top guy in the championship, while Ryan rode really consistently as well. We're walking out of here with the championship lead for PJ and Ryan is a strong third, so it's great.
"Fourth overall in the Open class for Tye is possibly the best result ever for the new 350 in Supercross and it's a best result for JDR ‰ÛÒ our previous best was with Andrew McFarlane in 2008 when he took a fifth. Tye's really progressing and is getting to where he should be at, so hopefully we'll have a podium in Dunedin. Mike crashed in practice and cracked one of his ribs, so he was strapped up and finding it difficult to breath. But it was a performance with a lot of heart and one to be proud of."
The series will now remain in New Zealand next weekend when the series moves to the South Island in Dunedin for round five of the seven-round 2010 championship.
