USGPRU S.E. Round 1 Welsh Cleans Up at Jennings Odenton, MD. The first round of the USGPRU’s southeast regional series brought racers out from winter hibernation last weekend. An especially strong showing from the Canadian GP racers made for outstanding racing in the Florida sunshine at the fabulous Jennings GP circuit. Canadian Alex Welsh led most of the 125 qualifying on Saturday and claimed pole position with a time of 1.20.172 over Scott Smallwood at 1.20.979. They were closely followed by Mike Himmelsbach and local fast guy Steve Wenner. The start of the race saw Welsh and Wenner leading with USGPRU President Stewart Aitken-Cade hot on their heels. Himmelsbach and Smallwood made quick work of Aitken-Cade mid way through the first lap and set their sights on the leading two racers. Smallwood passed Himmelsbach and worked his way up past Wenner to sit right on Welsh’s rear wheel. Smallwood made the pass for the lead and started to step away slightly. Just when it looked like Smallwood had the race in the bag, he got held up slightly by lapped traffic and Welsh took advantage to close the gap. Welsh made the pass midway through the last turn on the last lap and narrowly beat Smallwood to the line. Himmelsbach followed to claim the final podium position aboard the USGPRU raffle bike. During the 250 GP qualifying, Canadian Welsh led for most of the 15-minute session with a time of 1.19.671. In the last 30 seconds, local favorite Wenner pulled the trigger on his Zambrana-tuned RS250 Honda and squeaked out the pole position with a time of 1.19.289. The rest of the front row included Canadian Matt Cooper and Zach Lee from Texas. The drop of the green flag saw Welsh and Lee catapult their Honda RS250s towards turn 1, with Welsh winning the drag race as Lee power wheelied the bike and had to chop throttle. Wenner quickly recovered from a mediocre start and picked off Lee and started tracking down the 18-year-old Welsh. By lap 4, Wenner had made the pass for the lead and it looked like he would wrap up his first win for the weekend. On the last lap, Wenner had a 1.5-second lead when his bike started developing power problems and Welsh was able to close the gap. Wenner was leading out of the last turn, but Welsh was able to lay the power down and narrowly win the race by 0.013-seconds! Matt Cooper had the best seat in the house to watch this battle, but didn’t realize he was being stalked by Sean Wray. Sean had recovered from a bad start and worked his way up through the pack. He was closing on Cooper at about 1 second per lap and caught Cooper with 2 laps to go. Wray made the pass, but nearly high-sided himself in the process and Cooper was able to regain the position. Wray recovered to finish fourth. Notable mention goes out to Daniele Lenarduzzi who was able to finish in fifth place aboard a very underpowered Aprilia RS250 Challenge cup bike. The USGPRU would like to thank Henry DeGouw and all of the CCS Florida staff for allowing us to come out and race with them this weekend. Additional thanks to Kevin, Jeanne, and Alan for the use of the ASRA timing system. We had a great weekend and couldn’t have done it without you. 125 GP Race results: 1 Alex Welsh Hon RS125 2 Scott Smallwood Hon RS125 3 Mike Himmelsbach Hon RS125 4 Steve Wenner Hon RS125 5 Mike Orien Hon RS125 6 Stu Aitken-Cade Hon RS125 7 Barry Gilsenan Hon RS125 8 John Klaras Hon RS125 9 Matt Cooper Hon RS125 10 Shawn Sundheim Hon RS125 11 John Lemak Hon RS125 12 Adam Loeffler Hon RS125 13 Kent Moffitt Hon RS125 14 Fredrica Cortes Hon RS125 15 Lee Hollimon Hon RS125 16 Crystal Campagna Hon RS125 17 Michael Santelia Hon RS125 18 Marcus Matthews Hon RS125 19 Steve Belknap Hon RS125 20 Brian Gordon Hon RS125 21 Morten Frederiksen Hon RS125 22 Scott Thompson Hon RS125 23 Alejandro Fiallo Hon RS125 250 GP Race results: 1 Alex Welsh Hon RS250 2 Steve Wenner Hon RS250 3 Matt Cooper Hon RS250 4 Sean Wray Yam TZ250 5 Daniele Lenarduzzi Apr RS250 6 John Dempsey Yam TZ250 7 Zach Lee Hon RS250 8 Scott Smallwood Hon RS125 9 Adam Loeffler Hon RS250 10 Shawn Sundheim Hon RS250 11 Chris Reynolds Hon RS250 12 Scott Coccoli Hon RS250 13 Oliver Brama Yam TZ250 14 Mike Wright Yam TZ250 15 James Bergey Hon RS250 The 2006 USGPRU National Series sponsors include Roadracingworld.com, Rising Sun Cycles, Revit Leathers, Bridgestone Motorsport, CCS, AGVSport, EBC Brakes, Hjelm Motorsports, Ian Emberton Engineering, Motion Pro Cables and Tools, Dunlop, Power Stands, Redline Cycle Imports, Regina Chain, Repsol YPF, and VP Fuel. About USGPRU The USGPRU is the officially recognized Motorcycle 125 Grand Prix National Championship ® and 250 Grand Prix National Championship TM series. The USGPRU emulates true World MotoGP racing experience and serves to attract young riders to gain experience in a professional environment and provide a path to world-class motorcycle racing. The USGPRU structures events with extended length grand prix racing exclusive to the GP machines, timed qualifying and strong contingency and sponsor support. For additional details, visit www.USGPRU.net .