Bennett Newkirk wins IXS Rookies Cup

[Curtis Newkirk]

Hello Fellow Utah BMX Brothers and Sisters,

Just a quick update. Bennett won the IXS Rookies Downhill Cup for the Kids 2 category (1998 and 1999 birth year). This was a eight race series over four weekends with three race weekends in German and one here in Switzerland. He had some battles and it was not all easy, but he got the job done by scoring best time in three of four weekends.

Here is a video of the last race (with shots from two other races thrown in): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PROJ_1MEI6o

Also, here is the excerpt from the Race report on IXS. It is translated, but you kinda get the picture:

"Particularly exciting was the result in the most recent category Kids 2 because there the dominant Newkirk Bennet and Philippe Wimmer has alternated throughout the season with the numbers 1 and 2. They came with a tie point for the race and also went with a tie from the place, because Wimmer decided to run for the first and the second Bennet. And so was the rule applied, that the last run Valued decides. So Bennett decided the overall standings before Wimmer and Swen Bartha for themselves."

It basically said bennett broke the tie by pulling the fastest run on run two.

OK, back to work and the kids are already back to school. Hope all is well back home!

Cheers,

Curtis

[joeynsophia]

That is soooooo cool!

Congrats to Bennett! Hope all is well for you and your family.

Steve Foresta

[bnd]

Congrats Bennett!

b.

[Curtis Newkirk]

Thanks to both Steve and Bruce!

Please give us some insight into Mitch and Cody's DH exploits. How did the national championships turn out?

[joeynsophia]

Curtis,
The National championships were alot of fun. Joey took home the championship jersey in DH for 10 and under. Cody took a 6th in DH after 2 crashes. He also took a second in 4X after going down. (He was the fastest kid in his class by far and was leading by 5 bike lengths until the crash, then got up and past 2 others). Mike took a second in 4x and won his age class in DH.

Unfortunately, Mitch went down in his 4x practice and wasnt able to race the weekend. He wound up breaking his collar bone and had surgery on it a few days later. That being said he is already on his bike, took a 2nd this weekend in Whistler Dual Slalom. (Kid is amazing!)

[Curtis Newkirk]

Steve,

Thanks for the update and big congrats to Joey! Sounds like an excellent job by the crew from Utah. Crashes and collarbones aside, people know who the fastest is now

Cody and Bennett have obviously trained together. The whole reason he went into the last round in a tie, as well as lost the first run by .5 seconds was....drum roll...crashes! The kid he was tied with was plenty fast, but Bennett was always five to thirty seconds faster on most runs. Still, it made for an exciting series.

We were supposed to hang with the Ropelatos at Champerey, Switzerland so it was disappointing to hear that Mitch broke his collarbone. We did get to spend some time with Steve Spencer and his GT team so that was cool.

What is joey riding? Bennett got his Stinky 2-4 stolen so we replaced it with a custom-build 2-4 that is pretty cool. I will try to get some shots of it up. Great to hear that Joey is doing so well. He is one tough kid!

Curtis

[joeynsophia]

Curtis,
Joey is on a specialized 24". Its a pretty cool bike, there are actually a few of the BMXR's riding them now. Its a good group of kids that get together once in a while and do I-street, Deer Valley or Sundance. I dont know how to attach a pic on here but if you go to vastaction.com, pick the championships, then type in joseph foresta, it has some cool pics from the weekend and you can see the bike. There are some cool shots of cody in there too.

Hopefully our travels one day will allow us to meet up.