Story and Photos by Steve Berkner
Day-two of the International Six Days Enduro in Figueira do Foz, Portugal, saw all of the primary U.S. ISDE teams drop in their standings, with the U.S. World Trophy, Junior Trophy and Women’s Cup teams each dropping one place respectively.
The U.S. Trophy Team dropped from fifth overall to sixth, where it leads Sweden by just 13.46 seconds. Much of the slip was due to a nasty crash by Destry Abbott, who “hit the ground hard” and lost more than 1 minute when he swapped out at the end of a straightway in a cross test.
Prior to Abbott’s crash, he had been averaging 10th place in class over Day 1 and Day 2. After the crash, where his test time was the slowest in class for the day. That score dropped Abbott from 10th to 15th place in the E2 class.
“Today I had one of the worst crashes I’ve had in probably five years," Abbott said. "I really rung my bell. At first I had a hard time just getting up. Then, when I finally got up I didn’t know what direction I needed to go. People started running over to help me and it was all I could do to just get on the bike.
“The crash was bad enough that back home I would’ve called it quits for sure, but here, at Six Days, I thought I better at least finish (the test) for the team. I did (finish the test) and then I thought I should ride a little more and see how it goes. I’m glad I did because after awhile I started to feel better.”
The U.S. Junior Trophy Team kept its pace close to the second-place French team, which was in first place compared to the U.S.’s second place finish yesterday. First-place Spain moved up by 37 seconds, overtaking both France and the United States. The three teams are separated by less than 15 seconds after more than 3 hours, 35 minutes of racing.
Like the U.S. Trophy team, which lost Ricky Dietrich yesterday, the U.S. Junior team also lost a rider to mechanical problems when David Kamo went out with electrical issues. All of the World, Junior and Women’s Cup teams are allowed one of their rider’s scores thrown out each day.
Kamo said, “The bike just quit on one of the tests. Earlier (on one of the trail sections) the bike started running bad and making funny sounds. I stopped to check it over and couldn’t find anything wrong. I mean I checked to oil level, the coolant level, everything I could think of. Then in the next test it just died. When I looked down at the wiring I could see that it was all melted.”
The U.S. Women’s World Cup team also dropped one position from third to fourth overall after Australia moved ahead of the American women by nearly 30 seconds, eclipsing the 30-second deficit the Australians found themselves behind the U.S. women after when they were in fourth after Day 1.
The U.S. Women’s Cup team’s top rider for Day 1 and Day 2 Maria Forsberg said, “I’m riding up front with girls from all of those countries and nobody is making any mistakes. I had one crash (in a test) but that’s it. I don’t think I lost much time even but it seems like they're all staying out of trouble. I’m really looking forward to moving on to new trail tomorrow as I’ve seen enough of these trails.”
The U.S. club team of Ryan Powell, Jordan Brandt and Brian Sperle, GoFasters.com, gave up their third overall Day 1 position when Powell’s bike blew up, effectively eliminating them as the top U.S. club team. (Club teams are not allowed one rider’s score to be thrown out each day.)
The U.S. club team Team Carter Engineering is now the top finishing three-rider club team, in 13th overall. The team is made up of Rory Sullivan, Troy Swettenam and Zach Lipana. Sullivan is also the top finishing U.S. Club team rider where he is in 94th overall and 3rd in the C3 class.
Ben Smith was the other U.S. rider who was out the race at the end of the day along with Kamo and Powell. Smith, who suffered a concussion in a crash, went on to finish the day but was missing an “exit time” from the test he crashed in when attending emergency personnel removed his bike from the test.
Smith said, “I was pretty out of it after the crash. I don’t really remember much about the test until all of a sudden I’m laying on a gurney being carried out of the test. I got up and walked over to my bike and kept riding. It wasn’t until later, after impound that I found out that I was missing a score.”