Byers, CO – The third race of the 2023 MRA Championship Series took place at High Plains Raceway over the weekend of June 24-25th. For the first and only time this season, racers used the two-mile West Course configuration.
The Race of the Rockies (RoR) Qualifying on Sunday was conducted under clear blue skies, which was a nice change from the previous round which saw mostly damp conditions. Ray Thornton claimed pole position with a best time of 1:23.75 followed by Mike Applegate (1:24.37) and James Wilkerson (1:25.15).
The Start of RoR saw Wilkerson get the holeshot going into turn one, Applegate was in close pursuit followed by Thornton and Brad Hendry. On the exit of Turn Five, a rider further back in the field suffered a highside, and unfortunately their bike was on the racing surface, which brought out a red flag on lap one. The second start of the race saw Wilkerson once again get an incredible start and secure the lead going into Turn One. Applegate was close behind and lined up his move nicely on the exit of Turn Three to take the lead going down the back straight. Applegate, Wilkerson, Hendry, and Thornton started to break away from the rest of the field as they all were clicking on times in the 1:25’s. At the halfway point, Hendry made his way through the pack and executed an excellent pass to take the lead from Applegate. However, on lap 10, Applegate fired back and reclaimed the lead from Hendry. Thornton was biding his time and on lap 12 he decided it was time to strike. Thornton seized his opportunity, took the lead, and stayed out front for the final two laps, claiming his third RoR GTO victory of the season. Applegate managed to maintain his second place, while Hendry took third, rounding off a tense and exciting race.
In Race of the Rockies (RoR) GTU, Ken Yee took the lead and was followed closely by Jeremiah Downing and Salvatore Rizzo. Downing was putting up a good fight and was doing his best to take the lead and prevent a third successive victory from Yee. Rizzo was maintaining his third position by throwing down some impressive lap times ensuring a sizable gap to fourth place. Downing was unable to pass Yee and maintained his second position until the final lap of the race when he ran off in Turn Eight. This moved Rizzo up to second position and Tyrel Diekmann to third. Diekmann fought hard with Dennis Stowers and just narrowly beat him across the finish line by three hundredths of a second. Yee was able to claim his third straight RoR GTU win of the season, followed by Rizzo in second, and Diekmann in third.
Next up, the MRA returns to High Plains Raceway in Byers, CO for Round 4 on July 15-16. The highly anticipated 4-hour endurance race will take place this weekend running on the full course configuration. There will be no Superstreet this weekend due to the endurance race. See https://www.mra-racing.org/racers/come-race-with-us/ for details.
