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Motocross ace Josh Coppins has wrapped up his American supercross campaign with another plucky showing, at Phoenix, Arizona.
A fighting 19th place gave the Honda star a second straight top-20 showing in the ultra-competitive US national championship of high-profile stadium events.
But the New Zealand-born globetrotter, who leaves tomorrow to prepare for this year’s world motocross champs with the Italian-based Berni Honda team, was put through the wringer in his final US outing.
After a heavy crash in Friday practice, the likeable Coppins was considered a doubtful starter today.
But he bounced back to make morning qualifying, only to be taken down from behind at the first corner as happened in last week’s final event and he had to go all out to climb from dead last to sixth spot.
Again in his heat race Coppins was caught in a first-corner pileup and his comeback 10th place meant he missed automatic entry to the main event by one place.
Sent to a last-chance race Coppins again made it look easy, shutting down several big American names for third.
Then just as he was about to leave the pits for the big race of the night, his Italian mechanic Fabio Santoni noticed a puncture.
Only frantic work saw Coppins line up in what was a poor barrier position caused by his torturous route to the final, and again he was caught in a melee at turn one.
“This whole championship is all about the start and muscling your way through right from the first corner,” commented the 24-year-old.
“It’s so different from our long outdoor races at grand prix where you need to conserve your energy.
“But that’s what I’m here for … and I’ve sharpened up my competitiveness so much this month.
“I’ve learnt a lot and taken a couple of heavy crashes: last week I tried to leap a triple jump and managed two and a half, yesterday I tried a quad and got three and a half, so at least I’m improving!” he joked.
Coppins’ doughty showing, alone against the mighty US factory teams, was witnessed by 49,000 of the highly vocal US fans who make supercross a Saturday night extravaganza.
It was a sellout crowd at the Bank One Ballpark, home of the proclaimed world baseball champions Arizona Diamondbacks, with the stadium roof retracted to a warm winter evening.
They got their money’s worth as Coppins’ 125 main event was won by the fast-rising 16-year-old African-American star Bubba Stewart on a Kawasaki, while reigning champion Ricky Carmichael wrapped up the 250 for Honda.
At the same time Coppins’ consistency over the past month was put into perspective as numerous factory stars fell by the wayside -none more spectacularly than David Pingree, winner last week, who broke his KTM in two today when he flew sideways off a jump.
After four rounds in the series the Americans claim to be the biggest in the world, several top teams have at least one rider out through injury one team has lost three of its four stars.
Coppins plans to contest the Italian championship and other European events for Berni Honda Racing before the team lines him up at the year’s first grand prix in The Netherlands on 24 March.
