View From The Floor: Down And Dirty In Nashville

It's always good to see Jeremy McGrath and Ryan Dungey, and we always wonder about how guys from different eras would stack up if they could race each other in their prime.

Heat winners? Martin Davalos grabbed the first 250 heat.

Chase Sexton nabbed the second 250 heat.

How strong are those Brembo front brakes on the Red Bull KTMs? This was from the heat that got red-flagged. Cooper got a redo here, since he went down shortly after this when he got landed on. He was left a little banged up, and with half a visor, but he was able to restart.

Justin Bogle and Marvin Musquin each took turns running it in to make pass attempts here. It was funny here, as he was exiting the corner, Marvin waved his hand as sort of a "sorry" to Justin.

Unfortunately, Marvin went down in his heat race, after he got bucked off in the whoops.

Joey Savatgy took this heat race win after getting past Cooper Webb.

Justin Bogle has been showing some speed lately, grabbing a third in the heat, and a ninth in the main.

Ken Roczen took the win in the second 450 heat, but got tangled up in Joey Savatgy's crash in the main, which sent him over a berm. Luckily no one was going by in the sweeper on the other side of it. After climbing back over and remounting, he ended up with an eighth for the night.

How to tune out the noise before the main? Some tunes on a "Let's go kick some ass" playlist.

Caption time! That's Corey Shae (left), and Kyle Cunningham.

You can see where Justin Cooper lined up outside of the box.

In the 250 main, Justin Cooper grabbed the lead heading into the first turn.

Martin Davalos had a huge lead for much of the main, with a couple lane advantage over his nearest pursuer.

Chase Sexton worked his way back to second place, making a clean pass on Justin Cooper, and getting by Ryan Sipes here. Chase is now only three points behind Austin Forkner in the 250 East standings.

Josh Ellingson letting Justin Cooper know who he needed to pass to make it back to the podium after his rough main event...

...which he delivered a couple laps later. Click the play button below to listen to Justin talk about his night.

Mitchell Falk had struggled in the whoops during practice and qualifying, with no less than two crashes in them during that portion of the program. He ran in second for a good portion of the main, but slipped back to ninth at the end.

Add a win for Martin Davalos. The funny part leading up to this was that he had a huge lead, and slow-rolled the whoops leading to the finish. Given how many guys had trouble with them Saturday night, it probably wasn't a bad plan. It also had to make for a bittersweet night for the Monster Energy Pro Circuit Kawasaki gang, with Austin's troubles, and Martin's win.

Oh yeah, how sweet it is. It was even better after Martin revealed that he's been having nerve issues in his arms and hands all season long after a neck injury. He's started working on a treatment for it, and was pumped and grateful for the result.

Martin Davalos grabbed the win, and is now fourth in the standings. With Austin Forkner out of action for the night, it was a missed opportunity to grab a few more points for Chase Sexton and Justin Cooper. Either way, it's still a whole new season for the 250 East guys, and we still have to wait for the outcome of Forkner's injury.

The countdown before launch.

In both his heat race and the main event, Blake Baggett railed around from the outside to run up front.

Dean Wilson grabbed fourth in Nashville. He's made some big strides this season, and is pretty consistently among the frontrunners now.

When your husband (Tyler Bowers) is racing, and you have a front row seat to the action.

Emotions ran the gamut from looked like they ran the gamut from WTF moments to concern.

And yeah, there was some delight in there, too.

Tyler finished up in tenth.

Josh Grant went down at the end of the small set of whoops, and spent some time monkeying with his clutch lever. We're guessing that there was an issue with the lever or perch that prevented him from continuing.

Cooper Webb's weak spot was in the whoops, which were pretty nasty by the time the 450 main rolled around.

Check out this cluster of riders. Yep, Eli Tomac's bike was showing some smoke in the main (which hasn't been entirely unusual this season). And yeah, it's coming from a vent tube.

Cole Seely was seventh this week, which matches his spot in the overall standings.

Blake Baggett hounded Cooper Webb for several laps, and finally made his way by for second with three laps left to go.

Chalk up another win for Eli Tomac. The difference between the nights where he's on, and the others? Setup. They're still looking for the sweet spot, and sure seemed to hit it this weekend.

After the main finished, you could spot Roger DeCoster and Ian Harrison calculating points in the Team Manager's tower.

What was an off night for Webb could really be considered a win, as he actually extended his points lead to 21 over Eli Tomac, who moved into second in the standings.

Eli had suffered a DNF in his heat race, and the crew did a speedy engine swap, so Eli enlisted some help from Blake Baggett to make sure Brian Kranz felt well-celebrated.

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View From The Floor: Down And Dirty In Nashville

What a weird night, with crashes, injuries, DNFs, and pretty much a reboot of the 250 East title chase.

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