Team USA cleans up the rest of the world -ozzy go- fullnoise.com.au

The powerhouse USA team of Ricky Carmichael, Ryan Villipoto
and Tim Ferry have taken an empathic win at the 2007 Red Bull
Motocross of Nations in front of a massive partisan crowd at
Budds Creek, Maryland.

AMA Motocross Lites champion Villipoto lead the charge with 2
dominant wins, one by over a minute and against bigger
machinery. Ricky Carmichael, who was appearing in his last ever
professional motocross race fought back from a crash in his first
moto to finish third and then went onto dominate the final moto of
his career in the last race of the day. The two champions where
ably supported by Tim Ferry who finished with a fourth in his first
moto, after himself recovering from a crash and then he followed
Carmichael home in second in the final moto.

France just scraped in ahead of Belgium for second. Sebastien
Pourcel's 4th in the opening moto was the best result for France.
With backing from Nicolas Aubin, 10-6 and Pierre Renet 14-5 the
French took the second spot by only 1 points ahead of last years
runner ups Belgium.

The Belgian team members Ken de Dycker and Steve Ramon
rode strong with de Dycker finishing second in one moto. Jeremy
van Horebeek filled the MX2 spot in the absence of Kevin Strijbos
and with big shoes to fill rode well to help his team to the podium.

While America was tearing it up at the pointy end of the field
there was nothing but drama for a lot of the more highly fancied
challengers. The much anticipated showdown between MX2 world
champion Antonio Cairoli and Villipoto never happened. Villipoto
never gave the World champion a chance as he was gone within
the first hundred meters of each race and Cairoli, who last year
won a moto found trouble wherever he could. In his first moto he
had a mechanical DNF after a crash damaged his breaks and in
the second he ripped his spokes out trying to pass Michael Byrne.

MX1 World champion Steve Ramon simply didn't have the speed
of Carmichael when they where pitted against each other in the
final moto. Ramon stayed with Carmichael for a lap to two but
Carmichael was far superior and rode away.

AMA champion Grant Langston looked good in the opening
corners of the first moto but crashed hard in a dangerous part of
the track and although he re-mounted he was never part of the
equation again.

Australia's hopes where dashed within the first 10 meters of the
opening moto (MX2-MX1) when MX2 representative Andrew
McFarlane tangled with eventual winner Ryan Villipoto and came
of second best. As a result McFarlane was taken to hospital with
back injuries, which where later confirmed not to be serious, and
obviously would take no further part in the weekend. With
McFarlane holding 80 points there was no way Australia would be
able to be competitive for the title with one man down. With a
country able to drop their worst result the Australians where still
40 points down before the second corner.

Chad Reed rose to the occasion with a hard earned second and
the first moto (MX1-MX2). He would later have his own bad luck
when he withdrew from the MX1-Open moto after only 2 laps with
bike problems. Michael Byrne's 30th position in the MX2-Open
race looked bad on paper he actually rode very well until a
mechanical DNF on the last lap that resulted in the un-flattering
finishing position. 11th in his second moto was not going to helpt
the Australian casue what so ever. Like their ANZAC neighbours
New Zealand it just wasn't to... click on ozzy go to the full story
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