FONTE: FIM-ISDE2014.COM
SOURCE: FIM-ISDE2014.COMISDE 2014: The United States took the lead in JuniorsAfter a very hard day for drivers, the Junior American team benefited from Justin Jones’ excellent performance today beating everyone. Australia lost one rider and went down one place. Sweden holds the third place now.
Day 3 is over in San Juan and drivers are exhausted, and some of them retired. The hot weather played a decisive role regarding bikes performance.
Among the Juniors, Australia, who was dominating the first two days, was not able keep the same level. Not only did they fall to the third position, but they also lost one rider, Thomas McCormack, who was having a great race until test four today and had to retire on test 5 due to mechanical problems.
Now, the Kangaroos, have to face the remaining days of the competition with a three-driver team and in order to qualify the three of them will have to finish.
Lachlan Standford closed the day with a time of 47m43/02 which took him to the sixth place in E3 and he said that in spite of this, they will continue pushing. “The day was difficult, I think it was the hardest in this SixDays. We lost one of our riders, but we will continue pushing”, he said after leaving his bike in Parc Fermé.
This time, the United States took the leap. They were quite close and their riders’ performance was good enough to let them get to the first place. Justin Jones clocked the best time in the day and he finished the six tests in 45m30/97.
Grant and Steward Baylor also contributed to the team’s objective with their times totalizing the day with 2h22m34/5. They now have a 26-seconds gap over the second and 1m43s over the third.
Sweden also went a few steps up. Yesterday they were on the fourth place and their great performance on the sandy tests today helped them get the second place in the podium so far. Nelson Oliver was one of the fastest among the Junior with a time of 45m53/47.
Chile keeps its consistency half way through ISDE 2014 leaded by Esteban Lanz, who is doing a great job, and today clocked 49m07/76. However, Chile lost a rider, Benjamin Herrera whose bike broke.
“Today was very bad. In stage number 5 I was driving very fast and the back wheel got stuck and I lost like one and a half minute. Tomorrow I will try to be more concentrated and try to finish, since the tracks will be very complicated as they are quite destroyed”, said the rider who finished 7th in E1.
The Argentine team in the Junior category closed the day with a total of 2h33m35/97. Martín Mercado, Juan Ignacio Zunino and Nicolás Kútulas` times were considered for the classification.
“The day was very hard, too hot, and long road sections. We had to take care of the bike, I had to change the filter a lot. You have to think a lot in at some moments because they are crucial for the race. I´m happy with my performance on this third day”, said Zunino.
Thinking about tomorrow, when riders will have to race again in the east, the Argentine rider said: “The strategy for tomorrow is to have a cold mind, be concentrated and try to finish the day. That will be very important”.
