GEICO Honda's Barcia earns podium spot on crazy night in Indy

INDIANAPOLIS (March 17) – GEICO Honda's Justin Barcia saw his
four-race winning streak in the Monster Energy AMA Supercross Series
snapped on Saturday night, but he still salvaged a podium finish by
crossing the line third.

"For now, I'm calling this the 'nightmare race,'" Barcia said. "The
track was just brutal, and it was just a weird night overall. But it's
great to finish on the podium again and not lose many points."

As disappointing as the third place was, the final outcome could have
been much worse. Barcia got caught up in a mob scene in the first turn
of the Lites main. He briefly went down during Lap 2, and came up in
ninth place.

Barcia worked his way into eighth place by Lap 4 when Kyle Cunningham went down hard, bringing out a red flag.

The stoppage triggered a new-to-2012 staggered restart rule. Had
three laps or less been completed before the red flag, the riders would
have gone back to their gates. Since it had gone beyond the three-lap
mark, the riders were lined up in a single column that stretched from
the hole shot line to near the starting area.

"It was a confusing scene," Barcia said. "It's the first time they've
had to do this, so it was crazy – but it fit the madness of this race."

While Barcia was still eighth, the gap between himself and the front
of the field was greatly reduced. Barcia made the most of his second
chance to storm through the bunched-up field and claim his spot on the
podium.

Barcia leaves Indy with a 22-point lead over second place Darryn Durham.

The night was just as helter-skelter for GEICO Honda's other two
riders, but neither Lites rider Justin Bogle nor Supercross rider Kevin
Windham had luck on their side Saturday.

Bogle seemed poised to make the most of his second chance following
the red flag. He restarted sixth, worked his way up to fourth within
three laps before a spill dropped him to eighth. The rookie dug back in
to finish sixth.

"I switched things up and just tried to have fun this week," Bogle
said. "I felt good in practice today and I played it safe and got third
in my heat race. The main was pandemonium, pretty much.

"I was feeling really good after the restart, but had a fall. I'm
getting sick of these rookie mistakes. I know I'm learning, but I really
want to get to the point where I have things figured out."

Bogle is now in seventh place in the Lites standings, 11 points behind Jake Canada for sixth.

Indianapolis was more unkind to Windham than it was to Bogle. Windham
suffered two hard spills during the night and ultimately finished 18th
in the main.

The first crash happened when James Stewart went down right after the
start of the first Supercross heat, collecting Windham and a handful of
other racers in a pileup. The second came 10 laps into the main event
when he was running fifth and battling for position with Mike Alessi.
The two made contact and Windham wound up the worse for wear in that
exchange.

"I'm sore everywhere right now," Windham said. "My GEICO Honda was
running good, I won the LCQ. It just didn’t come together for me
anywhere else tonight."

After his finish, Windham drops to fifth in the standings and is five points behind Davy Millsaps for fourth.

The GEICO Honda team gets little to time to rest as they are back at
it on March 24 for the next Monster Energy AMA Supercross event at
Toronto's Rogers Centre.