Austin, TX. (June 6th) – The ageless Mike Brown won his third X Games Enduro X Gold medal in Austin, Texas. The Rockstar Husqvarna rider overtook Cody Webb near the midway point of the race and never looked back. FMF KTM’s Taylor Robert had a great first race back after taking five months off recovering from a wrist injury to take the Silver medal with a late race pass on Webb as well. Webb held onto third on his team FMF/RPM/Team Maxxis KTM.
Brown served notice in the afternoon hot laps that he would be tough to beat by setting the fast time. His 58.5 second lap was 1.5 seconds faster than Colton Haaker on the Rockstar/Lucas Oil Husqvarna. Webb was third just a fraction of a second behind Haaker.
During practice it appeared that the track favored the riders with a Motocross background as it featured several large jumps and rhythm sections as well as a Freestyle ramp step-up jump. But the track still included several log obstacles, a tricky rock section, tractor tires, a wood pit and a double water pond that were certainly challenging. Then a quick rain shower less than an hour before the event made the surface extremely slick and arguably turned the favor back to the riders with great technical skills.
Haaker initially took the holeshot but Brown made an aggressive pass going into the rock pile on the first lap only to have Webb immediately pass him to come out with the lead. Webb opened a small gap but then Brown started to close in mostly by jumping a log to tire double that Webb was not able to clear all day. Then just before the halfway point, Webb went down in the rocks, which allowed Brown and Robert to close in and Brown ultimately took the lead. From that point on, Brown slowly pulled away from Webb who was now under heavy pressure from Robert. Robert made a pass for second with just three laps remaining to try to close the gap on Brown. He closed in but Brown was able to hold on to take the Gold.
Haaker took fourth despite getting stuck in the rocks on lap one and crashing twice on lap three. Geoff Aaron rode a great race to take fifth on his Gas Gas. Kyle Redmond finished sixth on his Beta, Nick Thompson was seventh on a KTM, Ty Tremaine, Cory Graffunder and Jamie Lanza finished eighth, ninth and tenth respectively on KTM’s.
The Women’s main event featured thirteen of the best female riders in the world and Spain’s Laia Sanz took the Gold medal after a race long battle with Tarah Geiger. Geiger, a former Women’s Moto X Moto Gold medal winner, was faster in the jump sections and found her way past Sanz briefly but could not make it stick and had to settle for the Silver. Kacy Martinez, the defending gold medalist, took the Bronze.
Maria Forsberg, the multi time Women’s Enduro X gold medal winner returned after taking over a year off to start a family finished sixth. The Women’s class was an International affair with five different countries represented in the top ten.
2015 Austin X Games Enduro X Men’s Main Event Results (Provisional)
1 Mike Brown Husqvarna
2 Taylor Robert KTM
3 Cody Webb KTM
4 Colton Haaker Husqvarna
5 Geoff Aaron Gas Gas
6 Kyle Redmond Beta
7 Nick Thompson KTM
8 Ty Tremaine KTM
9 Cory Graffunder KTM
10 Jamie Lanza KTM
11 Kornel Nemeth Husqvarna
12 Mas Gerston Beta
2015 Austin X Games Enduro X Women’s Main Event Results (Provisional)
1 Laia Sanz KTM
2 Tarah Geiger Honda
3 Kacy Martinez KTM
The X Games counts points towards the 2015 GEICO AMA EnduroCross Championship and Cody Webb and Colton Haaker are again tied with 90 points. Mike Brown is just ten points back. The riders will have a summer break before resuming in Sacramento, California on September 26th.
For more information on EnduroCross, please visit www.EnduroCross.com