St. Louis, Missouri (March 28, 2014) – James Stewart ran down and passed a hard-charging Ryan Villopoto to claim his third-straight win of the year, and the 50th of his career, in front of a record crowd in the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, Missouri, round 13 of the Monster Energy AMA Supercross Series.
Villopoto took the early lead, passing MotoConcept’s Mike Alessi on lap one of the 20-lap main event. Once in the lead, the Monster Energy Kawasaki rider set a fast pace on the loamy but very technical St. Louis course while pulling away to a small gap over the rest of the pack.
In the meantime, Stewart was fourth after lap one, but he put his Yoshimura Suzuki around Muscle Milk Honda’s Justin Barcia on lap two to move into third. A lap later, Stewart passed Alessi to move into second and started reeling in Villopoto.
On lap 10, Stewart took a line underneath Villopoto in the turn before the whoops section. The move surprised Villopoto, causing the Kawasaki rider to pull up just enough for Stewart to make the pass. Once in the lead, Stewart never wavered and came home with a well deserved win.
“This is a special night for me,” said Stewart. “This year I have been having a lot of fun winning races. Tonight was a great race for me; I was able to make the pass and ride to my 50th win. That is huge for me. I never thought I would win 50 of these races.”
Villopoto held onto second, and extended his lead in the series standings over Ryan Dungey.
“It’s all about the big picture and the championship for me,” said Villopoto. “I can’t afford to make any big mistakes. I was able to get a good start and put in some good laps early on.”
Team Honda/Muscle Milk Honda’s Justin Barcia earned his third podium of the season with a third-place finish, beating out Red Bull KTM’s Ken Roczen by almost a second.
Team Honda/Muscle Milk Honda’s Trey Canard finished fifth in his first race back after breaking his arm during the off-season.
Dungey ran in fifth for much of the race, but fell on the final lap and eventually finished ninth after JGR/Toyota Yamaha’s Justin Brayton ran over his bike.
With just three rounds remaining on the schedule, Villopoto holds a 35-point lead over Dungey in the series standings, with Stewart one point behind Dungey in third.
450SX Class
1. James Stewart (Suz)
2. Ryan Villopoto (Kaw)
3. Justin Barcia (Hon)
4. Ken Roczen (KTM)
5. Trey Canard (Hon)
6. Eli Tomac (Hon)
7. Josh Hill (Suz)
8. Andrew Short (KTM)
9. Ryan Dungey (KTM)
10. Nick Wey (Kaw)
