Home boy Sammy Halbert won last night’s Castle Rock TT, the Graham, Washington, resident winning in front of a packed house of home state supporters for a second time and also becoming the first two-time winner in 2012 AMA Grand National Championship.
“This is awesome, I have to give it up to the local crowd for coming out, you guys fired me up and helped me get the win.” Halbert said. “I just got a good start and stayed focused the whole time. It feels great. We’ve got to keep this thing rolling; I’m fired up and want to carry this momentum to next race.”
Coming off a solid restart after Brandon Robinson bit the dust, Halbert took the lead and never looked back as he was the clear-cut winner and was barely contested the entire way. With five laps remaining, Rogers Racing/Montgomeryville Honda’s Jared Mees was the only rider with Halbert in sight, but he was never really a threat as Halbert continued his dominance at Castle Rock Race Park. Halbert took the win by just over a second
Mees and Zanotti Racing’s Jake Johnson joined Halbert on the podium. Johnson was 6.8 seconds behind Halbert at the finish.
Jethro Halbert, Sammy’s brother, ended up fourth with flat tracker/road racer J.D. Beach rounding out the top five – just .080 of a second behind Halbert.
Stevie Bonsey rode his Honda to sixth with Joe Kopp coming out of retirement to finish seventh on his Latus Motors Honda.
Jeffrey Carver Jr., Brad Baker and Briar Bauman rounded out the top 10 finishers.
With the season hitting its halfway mark, Mees continues to lead the series with 162 points – 15 more than Johnson and 25 more than Sammy Halbert. Sacramento Mile winner Bryan Smith is fourth, but he only managed to finish 17th in the Castle Rock TT.
Spy Optics-backed Jacob Lehmann won his first career Pro Singles race last night, the Honda-mounted rider beating 831 Pinnit’s Rodney Spencer Jr. by half a second in the red flag interrupted final.
The battle for third also proved to be an intense race as Dominic edged Jake Shoemaker and Garret Callies to close out the podium.
“I just came out hoping that I can at least come in the top 10 and make the main event.” Lehmann said. “I got lucky on the restart and I was just thinking, ‘please don’t red flag it again.’ I was just trying to get a gap on the last few laps so I could have room to breathe, but Spencer just kept creeping up on me.”
Callies continues to lead the championship over Ryan Wells, sixth in the TT, 107-95. Shoemaker is third.
Castle Rock TT
1. Sammy Halbert (Yamaha)
2. Jared Mees (Honda)
3. Jake Johnson (Honda)
4. Jethro Halbert (Yamaha)
5. JD Beach (Kawasaki)
6 Stevie Bonsey (Honda)
7. Joe Kopp (Honda)
8. Jeffrey Carver Jr. (Yamaha)
9. Brad Baker (Honda)
10. Briar Bauman (Kawasaki)
