Up and Down, That’s Just How Supercross Goes

It would be difficult to find two more contrasting seasons than Ricky Carmichael and James “Bubba” Stewart had on their motorcycles last year.

Both started the 2005 supercross season with high expectations -- and trepidation.

Carmichael, the champion in 2001, ’02 and ‘03, had missed the 2004 season with injuries and had switched manufacturers, from Honda to Suzuki.

Stewart had never raced a 250cc SX bike before, but had broken all of Carmichael’s records in the smaller 125cc class and as an amateur.

After surviving the Anaheim mud-bath opener with a third-place finish, Carmichael won the next five races and went on to win both the world and AMA national SX championships. He followed that by winning all 12 rounds of the AMA outdoor motocross schedule, the U.S. Open of Supercross and leading the USA team to victory in the Motocross des Nations -- a dream season.

“I had been gone for an entire season and then I returned and had not only the best season of my life but the best season of all-time,” said an exuberant Carmichael, who also was named AMA pro athlete of the year for the fourth time.

Stewart was credited with fifth at Anaheim in a race during which every rider, bike and course marker was obliterated by mud. The next week, at Phoenix, he broke his left forearm during practice and missed nine races, including all of the West Coast tour.

After returning to the series, Stewart won three of his first four races, then missed the final race at Las Vegas with an injured thumb. The outdoor season was no better. He missed five of the last six races and after hoping to recoup his year at the postseason U.S. Open, he was hospitalized because of a stomach virus.

“It was just not my year,” Stewart said from his home in Haines City, Fla. “It was one bad thing after another. If I wasn’t hurt, I was sick. My ribs were sore all year and when I did feel good, something bad seemed to happen. It was discouraging, but I never lost confidence.”

So what happened when the 2006 world SX championship series started prematurely a month early in Canada?

Stewart, riding a four-stroke Kawasaki for the first time in competition, ran away from Carmichael and the rest of the supercross field, winning in Toronto and Vancouver.

“Was I surprised?” asked Stewart. “For sure. I had been training hard back in Florida and I came to race, but I’ll admit I was a little surprised I won so quickly. It was a great feeling, definitely.”

Saturday night, the focus will be on Angel Stadium where an anticipated capacity crowd will be on hand for the opening event of the Amp’d Mobile AMA supercross series. It will also serve as the third round of the world championship.

About 500 truckloads of dirt have been hauled in to cover the baseball field with a series of towering double and triple jumps, turns, stutter-bumps and switchbacks designed to challenge the world’s finest stadium motorcycle riders. The program consists of heats and a 15-lap main event for smaller SX Lites and 20 laps for the main event.

“I’m really excited about getting back to Anaheim,” Stewart said. “It seems like it’s been forever since last year’s first race. Then I missed the next two there. I’m looking forward to racing Ricky again. He always rides good clean races.”

Carmichael, of Tallahassee, Fla., is eager to redeem himself too.

He has lost his last nine supercross races, the final seven of last year -- four to Chad Reed and three to Stewart -- and the first two this year.

“We have some work to do and our goals are obtainable,” Carmichael said after his loss in Vancouver. “I definitely think I will be better at Anaheim. Along with everyone, of course.

“My goal is to do the best I can. And with 13 straight races, the main thing is to stay healthy. That’s really my main goal, to stay healthy all year and do the best I can, within reason.”

Avoiding injuries also is Stewart’s concern. He rides so fast in practice, as well as when he’s racing -- and seemingly so recklessly -- that when he crashes, it can be serious.

He gave his team a scare between the Canadian races when he crashed on the track he and his father built on their farm property outside Haines City, a central Florida town near Orlando.

“It looked worse than it was,” Stewart said. “I went off and hit my head and ended up with a busted lip and a sore wrist. It didn’t bother me in the next race.”

Stewart, who celebrated his 20th birthday Dec. 21, was so intent on changing things that he abandoned his familiar No. 259 for No. 7 this year. He had always had 259 on his green Kawasaki as a tribute to his friend Tony Haynes, a former motocross rider who was paralyzed in an accident and always wore 259.

“It seemed like the thing to do and when I heard that No. 7 was available, I took it,” Stewart said. “I was 7 when I won my first championship and now I’ve won my first two races with No. 7, so maybe it’ll be my lucky 7. Hopefully.”

Stewart was dominant in both Canadian races but won in different fashions.

“In Toronto, I got the hole-shot but washed out the front end on the second lap and fell back to about third,” he said. “Ricky was six or seven seconds ahead, but I ran him down about halfway, followed him for a while and then passed him on the 17th lap. I won by about four seconds.”

Carmichael’s version: “When James fell, I tried to put my head down and race my own race. James was a lot faster than me.”

After Vancouver, Stewart said: “I was second off the line back of Kyle Lewis. Ricky was fourth. I got the lead right away and when Ricky got up to second, I pulled away and was almost 14 seconds ahead at one point. I won by seven seconds.”

Carmichael: “No excuses, I got beat. I did what I wanted, but I didn’t start where I wanted to start. The first turn was kind of tricky, a 90-degree turn with a jump, and everybody got all balled up. It was crazy back there, not a place that I wanted to be.”

Both Stewart and Carmichael are riding the tight stadium races on four-stroke bikes, more powerful and more difficult to handle than the two-strokes they previously rode in supercross.

“The four-stroke is harder to handle on tight turns, but it has so much more power, it is better for passing,” Stewart said. “On the jumps, they’re about the same.”

Said Carmichael: “The four-stroke is a different bike to ride, and it’s a different style of riding. A lot of people say negative things about the four-strokes, but this is a better bike. The speeds are faster, but the riding style is slower, so it looks slower. It has more options and you can do more with and to it.

“All the factories are putting their budgets into four-strokes. It’s the future. If you’re riding a two-stroke, you’re going backwards.”