Race Report August 24th, 2008

Week 17

Seventeen weeks of racing in the bank and its just amazing how fast the summer has gone by. With only one week left in the season, the crowd was surprisingly decent in size with 156 riders in the amateur classes, 4 riders in the Elite class and another 8 in the Open Wheels division for an impressive 168 riders and 45 motos. In the opening ceremonies, 8 yr old Brandon Jasensky was named the rider of the week.
Our life’s-blood is the Rookie classes so let’s start off with these kids this week.
Only two riders in the 5 & under class today but it was amazing. Not so much that 5 yr old Riley Tweedie earned the win, but that his fellow competitor was 3 yr old Azra Milton. Azra is only the fourth 3 yr old that I can remember seeing in my 26 yrs of BMX involvement. AMAZING.
In the 6 rookie class there were 9 riders registered and split into tow motos, all vying for the 8 starting positions in the main event. Dustin Souza, Yanci Ross, Randy Donaghy (Torrington Fire Fighters) and Casey Navin all had moto wins. In the main event it was Donaghy first holding off a hard charge from Casey Navin while Dustin Souza was third with Yanci Ross Fourth.
Lucus Petosa, on the day his mom raced in her first race (Other then the wreck in the Mother’s Day race) won the 7 rookie class with the second and third spots going to Jacob Bacis and Zack Ferris (Tactical Arms).
Brandon Galeski, Sean Graveline (Dutchman Lawn and Garden Design) and William Guido all had wins in the two gates of 8 yr old rookies with the main event win going to Galeski. Graveline finshed in the second spot with Dustin Petosa salvaging a third place finish.
Justin Fracasso beat Malik Tutein for the 9 rookie win. In the 10 rookie class, there was a full gate and Pete Franolich (The Pines-Waterbury) enjoyed a “perfect” with the second spot earned by Jeff Vadney while the third went to Mike Wasilonsky (Zeller Tire) was third.
In the 11 rookie class it appeared that Wes Reel would be perfect as he won the first two rounds. In the third round, while enjoying a comfortable lead, he would self destruct on the jump coming out of turn two and Taylor Yurgalevicz (Rich Carlson Heating and Cooling) was in the right place at the right time and would win the round. Combined with his second and third place finishes in the first two round he would be tied for finishing points with Reel with 6 each. (Reel was 1-1-4) (Taylor was 2-3-1). The NBL rules state that the third round is the tie-breaker so Taylor would go home with the first place trophy. Reel second and Ty Hesterberg third.
Nick Hull was the 12 rookie winner as he managed to keep second place finisher Dylan Vadney behind him. Brett Bosek was third.
Devone Thomas won the 13 rookie class with Matt Clark second. Brenden Aleia was third. Chad Daigle, the last one to register for today’s race would fall pretty hard in the second round and left the facility to go and get checked out. X-rays on his elbow and shoulder were negative and he is just a little sore.
The 14 yr old rookies were combined with the 15 yr old rookies due to Zack Watkins being the only 14 r in the house. It was a full gate and Alek Smith, riding a vintage 1985 Hutch Pre-Racer, was the dominate rider acing a perfect. The second spot went to Nick Landi while third went to the 14 yr old Zack Watkins.
Benny Ayala (In a green OFR shirt that said “MAHER” on the back, won the 16 Rookie Class, The second spot went to Angelo Uriotequi and third was Rob Magi. This was a clean sweep for team CJR.
Brandon Miville went back to his winning ways by sweeping the 17 & over class. His nemesis, Dan Sears was second with Kevin Beichner third.
In Novice racing the usual combining with experts happened.
Dan Gruber, the only 9 nov in the house was combined with 8 ex Nick Cote’ and 9 ex Dave Moody. Moody would prevail with Gruber second and Cote’ third.
10 yr old novices R.J. Miville (Jack’s Autobody” and Larry Coderre (Pin Shop Hobbies) were combined with the four 10 yr old experts. Miville would edge out Coderre as the first two novices crossing the stripe; both were behind the 4 experts.
Gabe Cruz was unbeatable in the 12 novice gang of four riders, Jash Rivera was second with Mike Rossi third.
Tim Osborne won the 12 novice class with Alec Norkowski a close second. The third place finish went to Brett Wojtkowski.
The 15 novice class top three finishers were James Oslander (Waterbury Tire and Auto), Mason Johnson (Esquire cleaners) and Halton McCready.
Devin Kelly got it done in the 17-18 nov group with Jeramey Bakunis second.
John Ross was the first nov across the stripe in 35-40 action with Matt Holderman second.
In the expert classes the D-man (Dave Moody) won the 8-9 ex combined class.
With four riders in the 10 expert class Todd Maniscalshi, in a rare 2008 Foothills appearance, won with Chris Therriault second and Jon Zeiner (Zeiner Tile and Flooring) third.
Dan Delisle, Chris Pannullo (Fusco’s Used Auto Parts) and Nick Killmer would do their usual battle of three pretty evenly matched riders in the 11 ex class. After some very tight racing, the finishing order would be the same all day. Delisle, Pannullo and Killmer.
Shawn McAuley won the 12 expert class but sure had to work hard to stay in front of a much improved Ryan McCoy. Chris Pfeffer (George’s Music Center) was right in the mix and would finish third.
After missing his first moto, 13 ex Austin Cyr would come back and win the next two for the overall win. Stephen Kallas was second with Austin Vaillancourt (The Weight Room) third.
In 14 expert racing Dylan Perez would be the only 14 ex here and he was “perfect” as he was uncatchable but the 15 yr old novices he was combined with.
Probably the wildest class with the most potential for exciting racing was the 15-16 expert clan. Unfortunately these hot-rods decided to not race 100% every time out there and the excitement just wasn’t there. Pauly Maher would be the winner, Josh Wedge second and Mike Campbell third.
In 19-25 expert action Justin Coelho easily won, the second spot went to Zack McCready was second and the third spot went to Hector Gozelez.
Tony Kumiega won the 26-34, Mike Seigrist was second and John Ross third.
Tony’s sister, Amber. Was the winner in 17 & over women. She stayed in front of Nicole Milton who finished second. Jen Petosa, in her first race was third with Tammy King fourth.
Christine Gryzbek and Amy Block continued their battle for supremacy in 16 girls action with Cristine winning today.
Ali Thimmish, won the 14 girls class by beating Angela Therriault.
Amanda Wedge was top gun in the 12 yr old girls class. Katie Moody, in her first race since the Pottstown injury a few weeks ago was secnd and reported her wrist felt pretty good. The third spot went to Jayna Roy.
T & M Builder’s Jess Maher won 11 girls with Chealsee Kalivis second and Alyssa Perkins third.
Jen Rossi won 9-10 girls with Emily Daigle second.
Kyly Milton was the fastest in 5-7 / 8 girls with Dixie Damelio second and Katrina Campbell third.
The Cruiser classes, obviously not as popular as they once were, still had some good action today.
Chris Therriault put his 24” machine in the winners circle for the 8 & under / 9-10 division. Second went to Nick Cote’ with third going to Josh Walsh.
In 11-12 action it was Dan Delisle and Chris Pannullo trading wins in the first two rounds. Delisle would win the deciding third round. Chris settled for two with Chris Pfeffer third.
Angela Therriault won the combined class of 13-14 girl cruiser / 45 & over with Therese Campbell finishing behind her.
Alex Rivera go the best of Greg Sloan in 30-34 “Big-Wheel” action.
Garrick Yanosky was fast enough to win 35-39 with Erik Maher second and “El_Presidente” William Clinton third. Garrick had a folder full of old school BMX pictures from the 80’s and was fun to look at. He definitely was a good looking kid. One can only wonder what happened?
Tom Johnson won 40-44 cruiser with that pesky Flyin Ferret, Fred Roy right on him. Bob Delamare (Moose) was third. Delamare would probably win a few of these if the track stopped just short of the Biker’s Edge Step-Down.
“Bare-Foot” Stuart McCready won the 45-49 / 5- & over cruiser class as he edged out Len Ferris by about half a track.
8 riders were entered into the 16 & over open wheels class and it would be a six rider main event. When the dust settled The “Pistol” Pete Lorenzo, who was off into the poison ivy last week was really “inching” for the win and he got it. It was impressive as Allen Currier had to settle into the second spot.

Don’t forget next week is the last week of local racing at Foothills and the last chance to register for the State Race. Registrations must be in by September 1st. You must have ten races in at any combination of tracks to enter.

Also for a Foothills year end award, you need ten races at Foothills to qualify and the State Race does not count as one of them. Once the points get posted later this week, you can tell how many races you have going into the last week.

I will be at the Grands next week and will be back for the State Championship Race. Good Luck to all.