Shan Moore | January 15, 2018
Cody Webb put on a riding clinic at the Kenda RevLimiter Extreme Enduro near Decatur, Texas this weekend, the opening round of the AMA Extreme Off-road State Championship Series. Riders from all over the country, Canada, Mexico and even David Knight from the Isle of Man showed up to take on Mother Nature at her best—er… worst.
In the end, Webb turned in a perfect moto score, the FMF KTM Off-road rider going 1-1-1 on his all-new KTM 250 XC-W TPI (fuel-injected two-stroke), to claim the overall win over SRT Racing Husqvarna’s Cory Graffunder and last year’s winner, Beta USA’s Jordan Ashburn. Despite knocking a hole in his clutch case, GasGas factory rider David Knight finished fourth.
No two extreme enduros are exactly alike, and the RevLimiter sets itself apart by running a qualifying Hot Lap on Saturday and then three motos on Sunday. The first two motos trim down the field to 25 riders for the final moto. The three motos are scored equally like the old motocross scoring, where the winner gets one point, second gets two points and so on, with the lowest overall score taking the win. The course got tougher with each race, with extreme section being added that had names like Root Canal, Screw U and Jarvis Falls.
Webb dominated each race after brief battles with Knight during the early going. After defeating Graham Jarvis in last year’s Tennessee Knockout, Webb has distinguished himself as one of the top extreme racers in the world. Adding the RevLimiter to his resume simply reinforced the distinction.
“I definitely enjoyed myself,” said Webb. “Saturday was really fun. I had a lot of scary moments during the qualifying; it was just flat out. But I think the racing today was a lot safer because you could get in a pace and get comfortable. When the track was kind of wide-open fast with sketchy rocks and you can’t see the drop offs; that was my favorite part. The final race was really good and there was a nice spot along the bottom to recover, so it wasn’t a relentless beating.”
Graffunder went 2-3-3 for second overall, including a fierce battle with Ashburn in the first moto.
“A lot of ups and downs this weekend; that’s how extreme enduros go,” said Graffunder. “I had some clean hills and some not-so-clean hills, but all in all it was good. I had a great battle with Jordan Ashburn in the final lap of the first race. We were going at it hard and it was really fun. The format was cool and it was a really fun day and a really fun course.”
Ashburn’s 3-2-4 landed the Tennessee rider on the final step of the podium.
“I had a pretty solid day,” said Ashburn. “The last moto was pretty tough and I just got behind at the start and ended up fourth in that race. The track was really tough and it was a blast. The first race was really tight between me and Cory. He beat me off the start but he fell in the woods and then we ended up getting stuck on a hill together and he got away before me and put about 30 seconds on me before I could get going. I reeled him in on the last lap and passed him, but then I made a mistake and he beat me. If I could have beat him in that race I think I could have finished second overall.”
Knight was fourth with a 4-4-2 despite having clutch problems in the second race after he hit a rock and knocked a hole in his clutch case. Mitch Carvolth rounded out the top-five with a 6-5-5 finish on his Sherco.
RESULTS
- Cody Webb (KTM) 1-1-1
- Cory Graffunder (Hsq) 2-3-3
- Jordan Ashburn (Bet) 3-2-4
- David Knight (Gas) 4-4-2
- Mitch Carvolth (Shr) 6-5-5
- Evan Ask (Hus) 5-6-6
- Nick Fahringer (Shr) 9-7-7
- Grayson Consalves (KTM) 10-8-8
- Wally Palmer (Hus) 8-9-13
- Josh Rookensmith (KTM) 11-15-9