Team J&R Sizzles in Sunny/Squishy Phoenix

After a full day of racing, it is always cool to stick around and see how the team sheets shake out. Team J&R topped a 15-team field at the recent ABA Winternationals to take the Bike Shop Team win both days. Here is the official team report, as filed by Team Manager, Scott Angus:

The entire team attended the ABA Winternationals in Phoenix, Arizona last week. The race was held at the famous Black Mountain BMX track, as it as been for the last several years. With Phoenix getting an entire year’s worth of rain in the month of February alone, the track wasn’t as butter smooth as in the past, but the ABA crew and track volunteers put in a lot of time to get it in to “national” condition.

Speaking of showers, weather.com called for a 60% chance of rain on Sunday, so lots of people were holding their breath…and packing their panchos just in case. You couldn’t prove it by Saturday, however, with perfect racing weather in the mid 70s providing enough sun to gently crisp the foreheads of snow-belt types coming west. Sunday, on the other hand, was more befitting of Pittsburgh than Phoenix, with a cold, soaking rain falling from the middle of the first round until the last car had cleared out of the lot. The one-moto-transfer mudfest that ensued was a chuckle at first, seeing as many as five slick-track slideout crashes in a single moto, but it made for a lot of unexpected results come main time.

Pro turnout was thick, with 56 AAs and 46 A Pros on Saturday, racing was super-intense, with 274 motos on Saturday. Our very own Matt “Hot Rod” Rubeck did the team proud with an awesome high-low move in Saturday’s A Pro main event to take second place. This was a nice pay check for Matt after a rough start in Reno. Jason Morris made the main event in Sunday’s A Pro mud race, but crashed and finished 7th for the day.

Bryce “B.B. King” Batten from Glendale, Arizona, used his home track advantage to earn two wins in 10 expert and a 3rd and 4th in 10 cruiser.

Also looking great for the team was Ryan Pettigrew. Ryan took two wins in 11 cruiser and a 1st and 3rd place in 11 expert. Teammate Levi “Littleman” Pope, who just had his birthday on Friday, finished with a 5th and 6th place in 11 expert as well.

Zack Vankammen, KJ Romero, Tyler Tinsley, Nick Tuttle, Lauren Whisler, and Jessica Navarro also pulled in some impressive finishes to help the team to victory both days. We scored a respectable 215 points on Saturday, followed by 186 points on Sunday to beat out 15 other teams for the weekend.

The team is looking forward to racing the ABA Great Northwest Nationals in a couple weeks, followed by the NBL Easter Classis and Gator Nationals in April.

Thanks to our sponsors: J&R Bicycles, Intense BMX, T.H.E., Intense Tires, Sinz, Troy Lee Designs, Alienation, and ODI Grips.

Team Picture, Above (L to R): Bryce Batten, Jason Morris, Levi Pope, Matt Rubeck, Jessica Navarro, Scott Angus, Lauren Whisler, Tyler Tinsley, Ryan Pettigrew, Zack Vankammen, KJ Romero, and Nick Tuttle.