There were thrills and spills at The City of Industry for the ninth annual Connor Penhall Memorial Cup, March 1, where Max Ruml emerged from the smoke and rubble as the night’s winner.
Story and Photos by Richard Haight
The Memorial Cup honors the late Connor Penhall, son of two-time World Champion Bruce Penhall, and it is considered one of the premier events of the Speedway season.
Speedway is as exciting and fast as any form of motorcycle racing, but one slight slip as the night progresses and your night may be over, and surprises were the order of the night. One of those surprises involved 2024 AMA National champ Broc Nicol, who scored a perfect 15 points yet did not make the main. But more on that later.
However, one thing in speedway that isn’t surprising is crashes. Oftentimes, the fallen rider, injured or not, jumps up and asks, “How’s the bike?” Unfortunately, Brad Sauer’s bike wasn’t all right after taking a brief excursion through the wall, which effectively ended his night. This brought out Eloy Medellin Jr. as the reserve. Eloy was recuperating from a pretty hard flip from last Saturday’s season opener and was just a little subdued.
Multi-time champion Ruml is pretty much as consistent as they come, and Saturday night was no surprise, as Ruml marched through his heats with three-point wins in all of them—until he faced Nicol. In a thrilling side-by-side battle, Nicol beat Ruml to maintain a perfect score for the night. Nicol won all his heat races, giving him a 15-point score, which earned him a place in one of the two semi-mains.
The semis take the top eight points scorers to two four-rider semi-finals. But only two advance from each semi, and in his only loss of the night, the surprising outcome was that both Slater Lightcap and the “Wild Man,” previous Penhall Memorial winner Austin Novratil managed to hold off Nicol to advance to the main event.
After the usual scuffing in at the starting line area to ensure the best traction, the gate went up, and Ruml was on fire, with Novratil in pursuit. But Ruml was not to be denied and won his second Penhall Cup—taking the beautiful Troy Lee Designs helmet that is awarded to the champ each year.
2025 Connor Penhall Memorial Speedway Cup Results
FINAL (Top 3)
- Max Ruml
- Austin Novratil
- Slater Lightcap
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