What A Difference A Day Makes At Six Days.

Going into Day-four Team USA’s Junior Trophy Team had spent the first three days consistently running in fifth place at the 85th running of the International Six Days Enduro in Morelia, Mexico, where they trailed Spain, Sweden, France and Finland. Yet when all the team scores were tallied at the end of Day-four there sat the US Junior World Team in third place.

Dealt a setback at the end of Day-one after their lone veteran Six Days rider Cory Buttrick, who rode on last year’s third place finishing US Junior Trophy Team, was hurt in a crash and didn’t start Day-two. The remaining team, Nick Fahringer, Ian Blythe and Taylor Robert, all rookie ISDE junior world trophy riders, soldiered on day after day turning in consistent tests times progressively turning in better and better test times as the days wore on.

Buttrick, who has been helping out his teammates working in the checks and giving advice, said of his teammates, “Right now I’m so happy for these guys. As far as this team goes I’d have to say I think we have
more than met everybody’s expectation. At first I’d have to admit that I was a little bummed that we didn’t have the same team that we had in Portugal last year but that just didn’t work out.

“Coming here I knew we had a solid team, but I didn’t know enough about everybody to really know how good we could do. I did know a little about Nick. He’s one of the most consistent riders on most any type of terrain. As far as Ian and Taylor went, all I knew is they had the speed to hold their own in the tests.

“My hats off to all three of these guys. What a team effort. Especially Ian and Taylor, their putting down tests times that are beating some of the US trophy guys. And Nick, he’s riding consistent everywhere. Most importantly none of them are making any costly mistakes, of course anything can still happen, this is still Six
Days.”

One of those “things” that almost “happened” was to Blythe who almost missed his official start time on Day-four when a traffic jam, caused by a car accident all left him stranded 5 kilometers from the start as
his start time neared. Blythe explained, “We left (for the Parc Ferme) at the regular time but we got caught up in a traffic jam. We sat there and we weren’t moving at all, so I finished putting my gear on
and just started walking toward the Parc Ferme.

“Once I got past the (traffic) problem I flagged down some local kid and asked him if he could give me a ride to the start. Luckily he spoke English and he said get in and he just started pinning it. He got me their just in time for me to pick up my bike and I pushed straight through to the start. “When I finally got my bike to the starting ramp I was already like 30 seconds into my start time. Lucky for me I got everything done the night before and the bike started right away. My adrenaline was going that’s for sure and when I got to the first test, (two kilometers down from the start) I had my best test time of the day.”

In the World Trophy Team division Team USA remained in fourth place for the fourth day in a row behind France, Italy and Finland. Team USA started the day 5 minutes and 55 seconds behind Finland, who is in third place, and ended the day just over 9 minutes and 7 seconds behind the Finns and a podium position.

US Trophy Team rider Kurt Caselli said, “Day-four is done and I guess we’re still in fourth place. France and Italy are pulling away and Finland has improved as well. (The US team) had some problems today and lost some momentum. But it is what it is. Tomorrow we all need to get back to work and get some of that time back and make it to Day-six where we can lay down some good motos and see how it goes.”

In the Women’s World Cup division the US team maintained their second place position despite Amanda Mastin dropping 5 points (300 seconds) for being late and losing Kerrie Swartz who “houred out” for the second day forcing her into retirement. Nicole Bradford finished the course on schedule and finished fourth for the day while maintaining her 4th place overall position from Day-three.

The two US three-rider club teams that have been in the top ten all week, Tony Agonis Memorial and GoFasters.com, held their positions in fourth and fifth place respectively.

Thirty-one American riders, of the 34 that started on Monday, are still in the competition going into Day-five.

Story and Photos by: Steve Berkner, gofasters.com