Round 6 GNCC Nationals
Photos courtesy David
Scearce
Chris Jenks Wins a Mudder at the Grand National Cross Country Series race in Missouri
By Jason Weigandt
May 17, 2006 – You won’t find a more humble pro rider in the Suzuki Grand National Cross Country Series than GT Thunder’s Chris Jenks, but after his win at the first-ever Showtime! Grand National Cross Country Series race in Missouri on May 6, he’ll have a much harder time staying the series’ underdog.
Jenks controlled the race in muddy conditions to collect the victory ahead of East Coast ATV Honda’s Chris Borich and pro rookie Adam McGill.
"I’ve been training and putting in my time," said Jenks. "I thought it could happen, but I didn’t want to be cocky about it. I wanted to get out front because the better you can see the faster you can go in these conditions: second-place and third wasn’t going to cut it."
Jenks made some moves and took the lead from Polaris/Safari Motorsports rider Matt Smiley, who grabbed the ITP Holeshot award.
"I wanted to set a good pace and take advantage and hope to lead everybody," said Jenks. "But it wasn’t a mile into it and I hooked a rut and hit a tree, and Adam went by me. I think I was back to third at one point, I passed Bill (Ballance). I picked a good line through some ruts and got him, and I passed Adam down in the creek.
"Usually when you get the lead you start panicking, but I knew not to panic. When I came to a spot where people were sitting looking at it, I would take my time picking a good line," he said.
While Jenks controlled the race from the front, Borich was putting in a hard charge back to second, helping to preserve his GNCC points lead.
"I was pretty fired up there," said Borich. "I got tangled with Bryan Baker: we were dead last, so I just held it wide open. It was hammer down. The track got really slick so you had to be careful not to give it any gas.
"The track got blown out, but it wasn’t really that bad, there weren’t a whole lot of lines out there where you would just get passed by everybody," he said.
Borich was able to pass McGill after McGill got stuck. But the teenager was still proud to be on the podium.
"I tried something different today," said the fun-loving McGill. "Instead of sitting there by myself all day in the pits, I wanted to get up and move around. It helped keep my mind off of it and made me a little less nervous. Instead of feeling like I had to do well, I just felt like I could go out and play.
"Me and Jenks got hooked up, and he got around me in one of those creeks. Then we came down one of the downhills, and the bike hit a rock and stopped and I flew over, and the bike just rode over me," he said. "Luckily there was someone there to help me. And the third lap was bad, there was a real bad bottleneck. I saw an opening and I hit it and I got stuck in a rut at the top.
"I honestly didn’t think I was going to get third. But I’ll take it. I don’t care a whole lot for the mud. It takes the race factor out of it. You just ride and try not to get stuck. I’ve got a lot more confidence now, but I don’t want to make my head too big," he said.
Ballance held tough for fourth in the rugged conditions, while Brent Sturdivant was fifth. The course was littered with mud, rocks and hills, making it one of the toughest GNCC tracks in some time.
Those conditions favored Utility ATVs with four-wheel drive, and as such Brock Parker took his LTERacing.com Kawasaki Prairie to the overall win in the morning race. Clifton Beasley and Chad Hill, all on Utility ATVs, rounded out the morning podium.
Miller’s Yamaha/K&K’s Angel Atwell took the win in the Women’s Class.