Reed To Ride The Outdoor Nationals

Kit Palmer | May 19, 2009

We spoke with Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s team manager Roger DeCoster this morning, and he confirmed that Chad Reed will indeed compete in the 2009 Lucas Oil Pro Motocross Championship, which gets underway this weekend at Glen Helen Raceway in California.”Nothing is signed yet but we’ve agreed; pretty much everything is done,” DeCoster said of getting Reed committed to race. “He has worked out things with his sponsors [bonuses] and we [Suzuki] have come up with some stuff, too, championship bonus and win bonuses.”We really wanted to do it,” DeCoster added, “and we’re happy to do it. We think it will be good for us, for the outdoor series and the fans.”DeCoster said that the late commitment made things a little difficult when it comes to preparing for the series, having little time to prepare.”After he got back from Australia [after the Las Vegas Supercross], we did some testing last Thursday at Glen Helen, and we’re testing with him today at Competitive Edge [Victorville, California]. It’s made things a little difficult as far as testing, but I think we’ll be all right.”As far as the recently crowned Supercross Champion James Stewart’s plans, he is still going to sit out the outdoor series. We spoke with his team manager Larry Brooks this morning, and he confirmed that Stewart will not defend his number-one plate in the outdoors.”No change in plans,” Brooks said. “We did do a little testing, but it would change too many of our plans – we’re going to stick to them.”Our original plan was to be Supercross only, and that’s how we’re going to be,” Brooks said. “He’ll still be around during the year, maybe do a National here and there, but nothing is set in stone. We’ll probably do at least one GP and for sure the X Games.”