BAWLStyle Report: Tangent/BAWLS wins in Oregon
The Tangent/BAWLS factory team is back to healthy and it showed this weekend in the Great Northwest. The full amateur team loaded up and made the haul to Deschutes County Fairgrounds in Redmond Oregon where the ABA hosted this year’s Great Northwest Nationals. It’s the newest indoor facility on the circuit and it proved to be the perfect venue. The arena and track were awesome and it made for some great racing for the riders and fans alike.Â
Being so far north we didn’t really know what to expect as far as turnout for this late winter National. All the hype and a new indoor facility must have really got people excited because when motos where posted on Saturday morning there was an astounding 200+ moto count!! With that high rider count and a good amount of Factory competitors we knew we were really going to have to turn in on. And the Tangent/ BAWLS Factory Team did just that. When the dust settled on the weekend the team had picked up its two best scores of the year. A 2nd behind Factory Answer on Saturday and a first ever WIN for the Tangent/ BAWLS Team on Sunday!! Here’s how it all went down…
After missing Arizona with a broken wrist, the little man Jacob Abbe was back on his bike and ready to get back up on the podium. Some great riding and a little luck put Jacob 4th in class on Saturday and a Sunday Double, winning 11-12 Open and 11 Expert!! Jacob’s wrist is feeling better by the day and to prove it further he put on a show for the ABA tear down crew doing berm to berm transfers after the races. Look for him to back to 100% and ripping it up again in Tulare next month.
Not to be out done by his brother, our newest Factory Rider and Jacob’s older brother Nate Abbe stepped to the plate and had an outstanding performance on his brand new Tangent loaded Intense race bike capturing 2nd both days in 13 expert. Nate’s been hanging around the pits and riding locals for some time now and it looks like he’s finally decided to get back into the national scene full force…We’re expecting big things from this guy!
Teammate and class runner to Nate, Blake Paulson showed why he’s rockin’ the Tangent/ BAWLS colors this weekend as well. Blake always has his Fly uniform clean but on Saturday hit the ground in the last corner of the 13x main getting it a little dirty. On Sunday, with a fresh new uni, he came back with a huge 3rd place finish right behind teammate Nate. The 2 – 3 podium was an awesome closer for the weekend in 13x.
Riley continues to impress everybody on the circuit with another pair of wins in 16x. It goes to show that training with past X-Games Champ Brandon Meadows makes you really fast. Riley was rolling his Sinz wheel set to more first place laps that you could count, and with two seconds in open and the win both days in 16x we don’t see him slowing his roll one bit going into Tulare!
Tyler made the trip up from San Diego with the Abbe’s and was the lady of lane 8 as she had it in both of her semi’s and all four of her mains. Tyler made the best of the short first straight and closed the weekend with 2nd and 3rd in 14 girls and 4th and 3rd in 14-16 girl cruiser.
Tangent’s oldest am Kevin Shankle has had a rocky start this year after severely dislocating his shoulder at the Grands last year. The slow healing shoulder coupled with a practice crash while getting back into shape has kept Kevin on the sidelines a little more than he’d like this year. But not even all that is going to keep Kevin down. He’s feeling a little better and decided to make the trip to Oregon to round out the six man Tangent/ BAWLS Am team. A couple of Advil and some BAWLS energy got Kevin around the track looking good as new. Kevin road great and took 2nd behind Phantom’s Jake Pebbles both days. We’re all looking forward to see what a 100% Kevin has for us next month.
Now that the team is healthy they showed what a force they can be in the Factory ranks. The whole team is more pumped than ever and looking forward to the next West Coast ABA tour stop in Tulare. We hope to see everyone there.
Tangent/ BAWLS would like to thank all of our sponsors: Tangent Products, BAWLS Guarana, Fly Racing, Intense BMX, Sinz, Thomson, Clifbar, and Riders Pro Shop.
