Troy, OH - July 25, 2004
By Steve Cox

In a year of records, James Stewart just pulled within three overall 125cc National Victories of tying future-rival Ricky Carmichael’s all-time record of 26 tiddler overall wins. With the dominance he’s shown so far this year, it seems to be a foregone conclusion that he will probably win the last 5 nationals of the season, which would put him at 28, two ahead of Carmichael. At this point, it just seems to be a week-by-week countdown. All 49 of Carmichael’s and Stewart’s 125cc wins have come on Kawasaki KX125s.

Hondas had the holeshots down in the 125cc class at Troy, as Josh Grant sped out to the early lead in moto one over teammates Ryan Mills and Chris Gosselaar. Mills quickly went by Grant to lead the first lap, but by the time he came around to get the green flag, Stewart was already all over him.

Stewart went by almost immediately and set sail, eventually winning the moto by some 31 seconds over Grant, who got by his teammate Mills and rode alone in second for much of the moto. Third went to Pro Circuit Kawasaki’s Matt Walker over his teammate Ivan Tedesco and Suzuki’s Davi Millsaps.

“ I’ve been feeling really comfortable on my starts lately, and I’ve been training with LaRocco and Stanton, and I think that’s helped me out a lot, but I still have work to do,” Grant said. “The race wasn’t bad, and the track was good, but other than that, I just think I need to work on my conditioning.”

More Hondas led the way off the start of moto two, with Nathan Ramsey leading Grant. Bubba was nearby, though, and he worked his way into the lead well before the conclusion of the first lap, and he simply checked out once again. He eventually took the checkered flag over Ramsey by 28 seconds.

“All I know is there were a lot of ruts and it was rough, and it was pretty fun today,” Stewart said. “I had a good time and I rode hard today and I put my Kawasaki on the top again. I’ve got to savor the flavor, and it feels good.”

Ramsey wasn’t too upbeat about his second-moto runner-up finish.

“ I got up behind James and I kind of got it handed to me,” Nate Dog said.

Walker came from behind to nab third over Grant, which secured Walker second overall.

“Yeah, you know they call me the Stalker for a reason,” Walker said. “I had to come up through the field that time, and I couldn’t pass Nathan at the end there. He was riding the track pretty fast, and it made it that much harder for me.”

Grant finished third overall, his second such result this season. Fourth overall went to Ramsey, and Mike Brown rounded out the top five.

Kawasaki’s Bruce Stjernstrom had this to say about his amazing employee Bubba Stewart: “I think one of the things that he was able to do today that a lot of the guys couldn’t do was maintain a consistent laptime from the first lap to the 17th lap. A lot of these guys were running a 2:06, then they’d run 2:08, then they’d run 2:07, then 2:09, and he was just flat 2:05, 2:05, 2:05, 2:05, until the end of the race when he had a good lead and got into some heavy lapped traffic. I think that’s his strength, and when you look at Carmichael, the reason he wins is the same thing. They do it lap after lap after lap and the other guys just can’t do it. That’s why they get the big leads and run away with it all the time.

“Yesterday he came in after both practices and he had a bit smile on his face, saying, ‘Man, I’m having fun out there.’ I mean, he had a flow going, and he loves high-speed tracks, and he really looks at the rutted tracks as somewhere where he has a huge advantage over everyone, because he’s not afraid and he’ll just run it hard into the ruts and go for it. I think that’s one of the things that really separates him from the other riders at this point.”

AMA/Chevrolet Kenworthy’s 125cc National Overall Results:
1. James Stewart, 1-1
2. Matt Walker, 3-3
3. Josh Grant, 2-4
4. Nathan Ramsey, 8-2
5. Mike Brown, 7-7
6. Danny Smith, 10-8
7. Broc Hepler, 14-5
8. Ryan Hughes, 13-6
9. Greg Schnell, 11-9
10. Chris Gosselaar, 12-10

AMA/Chevrolet 125cc National Points Standings (After 7 of 12 rounds):
1. James Stewart (325/6 wins)
2. Mike Brown (252/1 win)
3. Broc Hepler (212)
4. Nathan Ramsey (186)
5. Josh Grant (171)
6. Matt Walker (149)
7. Ryan Hughes (139)
8. Kelly Smith (136)
9. Ivan Tedesco (131)
10. Danny Smith (120)