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Ballance Wins ITP Power Line Park GNCC in Ohio
Bill Balance |
St. Clairsville, OH – Yamaha’s Bill Ballance
looks to his record-breaking eighth Can-Am Grand
National Cross Country Championship in a row
after winning Saturday’s ITP Power Line Park
GNCC in St. Clairsville, Ohio. Ballance grabbed
the $100 ITP Holeshot award and then held on to
win after a heated battle with East Coast ATV’s
Chris Borich, who actually crossed the finish
first but was later penalized two positions when
video tape proof showed he had ventured off of
the course. This moved LTERacing.com’s Chris
Bithell into second place.
Ballance was leading the race until four miles
from finish, when Borich was directed by
spectators to make a sudden 90-degree turn off
of the race track. He missed 300 yards of the
course and ended up in front of Ballance at the
finish. Borich’s move was captured on tape by a
GNCC official shooting video shooting for the
Racer TV broadcast, who then alerted the rest of
the track crew. Borich was taken back to the
track to see the section he missed and was also
shown the video tape. The video showed Borich
was not riding through a bottle-necked or
traffic jammed section of course, thus he was
required to stay on the race track through that
section, and course arrows clearly showed the
track continued straight. The two-position
penalty is consistent with the same penalty used
by GNCC officials in similar situations in the
past. After being told of the penalty, Borich
didn’t attend the post-race podium and interview
ceremony.
Ballance’s win puts him in prime position to win
the GNCC title at the series finale Klotz
Ironman GNCC in Indiana in two weeks. Although
he didn’t see Borich on the last lap, he was
pretty sure what had happened. “About as quick
as I asked those questions, I figured them out
pretty quick in my head what was going on,”
Ballance said on the podium. “The Yamaha worked
great, and we got a win here today and we’re
that much closer to getting an eighth
championship, so that feels pretty darn good.”
“I didn’t have a terrible start,” second-place
Bithell said. “But I was about tenth or
thirteenth. Through this dust—it was bad today.
It was just powder dust. You just had to slowly
pick people off and slowly take your lines
around them.”
Fourth overall went to Brandon Sommers, the XC2
Champion in his first-ever ride in the premier
XC1 Pro Class. Fifth went to the ever-consistent
Matt Smiley, with motocross champion John
Natalie in sixth in the XC1 class.
Monster Energy/National Guard/Kawasaki’s William
Yokley was off to his best start of the 2007
season , after pulling second place off the line
behind Ballance. Yokley held second behind the
leader for two laps, until a mechanical failure
forced him to pull off. “The start went really
well,” Yokley said. “We’ve been suffering on
starts all year. We almost got the holeshot.
I’ve been practicing at home and I knew I was
getting better. I used to get good starts, and I
knew I was getting it back to normal because I
was there. My start actually made it to where
you could get out there and ride, otherwise I’d
be sitting there cruising around and running
into ponds like other people. That’s where I’ve
been suffering. We’re getting it worked out.
It’s a lot of work to develop a new bike.”
Chris Borich |
Baldwin Motorsports/Wrath Racing Honda rider
Adam McGill ran into trouble during the race. “I
thought it was a little hot today, so I figured
I’d say heck with the race—take a swim,” McGill
joked after taking a dunk in a huge mud hole.
“When I come out of the woods, I seen the
helmets going through in the dust, it opened up.
I pinned it straight and the next thing I knew,
the bike fell out from under me, flipped over
and I was pinned in the water underneath of it.
When I came up out of the water, I looked
around, and I saw there was probably ten of us
stuck in that swamp. It was horrible—chest deep,
it stunk.”
The 20-year-old McGill just signed with KTM for
2008, but don’t look for him to be riding orange
just yet. “I want to be, but I really cant right
now,” McGill said. “I got a lot on the line. I
want to finish out on the Honda, and start
knocking off some wins on the orange. I’m very
excited.”
In XC2 Pro Am, the tables were turned with the
2007 XC2 Champion Brandon Sommers entered in
XC1, and Don Ockerman pulled the ATVriders.com
$100 holeshot award. Anthony Hill took the
overall win, with Mark Notman and Kyle Martin in
third.
Third place’s Martin borrowed his little
brother’s ATV for this race, after tearing his
bike to pieces following the last round in
Yadkinville. “I was able to get a real good
start, and was looking forward to the race
thinking I would get ahead of Don Ockerman, and
put some dust between me and everybody else, but
we ended up blowing some corners, two or three
times and let everybody get around us. I came in
the first lap in thirteenth place and was pretty
discouraged, so I just put my head down and was
able to make up a few positions each lap.”
Mark Notman battled his way into second overall
on one of his favorite tracks in the series,
which is also his hometrack in Ohio. “I didn’t
have too bad a start, I was probably mid pack. I
lost them a little bit in the dust and hooked up
with Ockerman when he blew the corner and just
got going.”
Anthony Hill brought his best start of the year
to the overall first place podium position. “I
was about fifth or sixth into the woods. Right
out here by the front gate, a bunch of the guys
in front of me blew the turn, and I just got
lucky and saw the line into the woods. I came
around the first lap in second, and was just
hoping and praying that I’d stay up there. Adam
Reed was leading it, and he took gas, and I
didn’t take gas for this race, and it turned out
to be a good deal. 2008 is up in the books yet,
I thought about hanging it up this year, but as
of right now, I’m starting to change my ideas. I
knew I could hang with these guys, I just never
had good starts and always had trouble getting
this bike off the line. Today it paid off.”
The LTERacing.com ride of Angel Atwell found her
way to first overall for the ATV morning race,
beating out Yamaha’s Traci Cecco for her
fourth-straight win in the Women’s class. Cecco
pulled the holeshot, but Atwell made a break for
the lead.
Chris Bithel |
“As soon as you broke out into the long fields,
if you were any more than five feet off the
person in front of you, you couldn’t see
anything,” Atwell said. “I just kept working and
pushing, came out into the field and she went
one way and I went the other, and she kind of
let out of it a little bit in the dust, and I
stayed in it, and got around her and never
looked back. I’m very excited. I can’t talk
highly enough about the sponsors this year that
have helped me get to this point, because I’ve
never even won two in a row, so four is way past
my expectations.”
With the 2007 GNCC Women’s championship wrapped,
Traci Cecco held her Yamaha to second place
overall, with a smile on her face. “When you’re
up here, you just love to be up here,” she said.
“The beginning of the season, I was just working
really hard and working really good, pulling out
those wins, and that’s what you need to do. Come
out strong in the beginning and wrap up the
championship out early so you can sit back and
relax a little.”
Warnert Racing Can-Am’s Rick Cecco won the Open
4x4 class in a close race with Bryan Buckhannon,
giving Cecco the 2007 Open 4x4 Championship. His
Can-Am teammates Cliff Beasley and Michael Swift
won the 4x4 Lites and 4x4 Limited Class,
respectively. Joshua Ribley won the U2 class,
and Ohio’s own Seth Mumford won the Youth ATV
Overall.
The 2007 Can-Am Grand National Cross Country
Series concludes with the Klotz Ironman GNCC in
Crawfordsville, Indiana on October 27-28.
Photos by Jason Hooper
jasonh@racerxill.com
Overall Results
ITP Power Line Park GNCC
St. Clairsville, OH
October 13, 2007
1. Bill Ballance
Smith Grove, KY
YAM
2. Chris Bithell
Irwin, PA
HON
3. Chris Borich
Sunbury, PA
HON
4. Brandon Sommers Millersburg, OH
YAM
5. Matt Smiley
Kunkletown, PA
HON
6. Johnny Gallagher Aurora, OH
SUZ
7. Brent Sturdivant
Montrose, WV
HON
8. Duane Johnson
Trenton, MO
HON
9. Brandon Ballance Oakland, KY
YAM
10. Shawn Hess
Muenster, TX
HON
11. Jarrod McClure Kaska,
PA
HON
12. Michael Houston Hickory, NC
YAM
13. Craig Reed
Crawford, TN
HON
14. John Natalie
Moutzdale, PA
HON
15. Taylor Kiser
Alva, FL
YAM
16. Anthony Hill
Culter, OH
HON
17. Mark Notman
Hubbard, OH
HON
18. Kyle Martin
Winona, MO
HON
19. Donald Ockerman Marshall, IL
HON
20. Ryan Lane
Bicknell, IN
HON
Can-Am Grand National Cross Country Series
Standings
(After 11 of 13 rounds)
1. Bill Ballance 317/5 wins
2. Chris Borich 295/6 wins
3. Chris Bithell 237/1 win
4. Matt Smiley 182
5. Adam McGill 160
6. Brandon Sommers 157
7. Taylor Kiser 154
8. Bryan Cook 119
9. Duane Johnson 11710. Chris Jenks 110
About GNCC Racing:
The AMA/ATVA-sanctioned Can-Am Grand National
Cross Country series is America’s premier
off-road racing series. The 13-round series is
produced exclusively by Racer Productions.
Cross-country racing is one of the most
physically demanding sports in the world. The
nearly three-hour long GNCC races lead as many
as 1,800 riders through tracks ranging from
eight to twelve miles in length. GNCC Racing
airs weekly television shows on Versus (formerly
Outdoor Life Network) every Saturday at 3 p.m.
and Thursday at 4 p.m. beginning on April 14.
With varied terrain including hills, woods, mud,
dirt, rocks and motocross sections, GNCC events
are tests of both survival and speed. GNCC
featured sponsors include BRP Can-Am, Parts
Unlimited, Moose, Maxxis, Pirelli, Wiseco,
Acerbis, Elka, Geico, Klotz, FMF, ITP and
Weekend Warrior, and riders compete for over $3
million in series prizes and contingency money.
Associate sponsors include Alpinestars, Cometic,
EK Chain, HiPer Technology, Laegers, Moose
Utility Division, The National Guard, Powersport
Grafx, Race Tools, REM, Scott, Thor, Tire Balls,
Twin Air, and MotoTee’s. Media Sponsors include
Racer X Illustrated, ATV Rider, ATV Sport,
ATVRiders.com, Quadzone.com, Dirt Rider and ATV
Insider. For more information log on to
www.gnccracing.com.
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