Team ITP Race Report: Limestone 100 GNCC

The sixth stop of 13 on the 2012 Can-Am Grand National Cross Country Series schedule this year found the ATV competitors and their supporters in Springville, in the south-central part of Indiana, for the first Limestone 100. And while many of this large crowd had never plied the woodsy, hilly trails of this venue — centered around the Lawrence County Recreation Facility — they found the conditions to be similar to what’s found at The Ironman GNCC which takes place not far from here every October.

That’s a race that Team ITP’s Adam McGill knows very well, and he put his extensive experience to good use by nearly winning at Limestone. McGill (Honda) worked his way up from a mid-pack start to hold fifth place at the end of the first 10-mile lap, then kept the pressure on to jam into first place on lap two. The West Virginia native led the majority of the race from that point (three laps) but on the last lap he physically ran out of gas — “I started to hit a wall,” as he described it — and had to settle for a safe second overall.

It was McGill’s fourth runner-up finish of the season, and kept him in second place in the premier XC1 Pro division point standings.

The start of the XC2 Pro Am class nearly spelled disaster for Patrick McGuire (Yamaha). A pileup in the first turn collected the class championship contender and he was forced to play catch-up for well over two hours. He ended the day in tenth, but it was still good enough to hold onto second place in points.

True misfortune struck our main man in the Masters 50+ class, Glenn McConnell. An abrupt encounter with a tree in the morning race snapped a spindle, putting a damper on his day and title aspirations despite having won the last four in a row.

Nobody and nothing were slowing Dave Simmons (Yamaha) in the morning’s wave of racing, which featured nearly 230 amateur athletes in a variety of classes. Simmons scorched the course for his fourth overall morning victory of the season and easily claimed his sixth straight Super Senior 45+ class win.

Sharing the top-three overall podium after the morning race was fellow Team ITP rider Angel Atwell (Honda). This former class champ out of Pennsylvania scooped up her third Women’s GNCC triumph of the season on her way to third overall. She remains in second in points for the year, just two out of the lead.

The next event takes place in Masontown, WV, with the Can-Am Mountaineer Run, May 26-27.