Honda riders Ricky Carmichael and Kevin Windham will vie to become the first rider to win three 250 AMA races at Washougal on Sunday, when the AMA Motocross Championship moves to the scenic environs of the Pacific Northwest for round eight of the twelve-round championship.
Windham comes into this weekend's race the defending 250-class winner at Washougal, but the Mississippi rider has taken a back seat to Carmichael so far this year.
Carmichael, the defending and four-time AMA 250 Motocross Champion, has gone undefeated in the seven rounds leading to Washougal. Motocross fans have been talking about the incredible possibility of Carmichael having another perfect season as he did in 2002.
A perfect season in pro motocross racing means that a rider wins each moto at each event. It had never been done in the history of AMA Motocross and most believed it to be nearly impossible until Carmichael pulled off the amazing feat two years ago.
For Carmichael to accomplish that again this season would be even more remarkable considering he's coming off of knee surgery this winter, riding a totally new motorcycle this season in the Honda CRF450R, and is up against the likes of Windham and Reed.
Previous to this year Carmichael had ridden his entire racing career on two-stroke motorcycles. Now he's riding a four-stroke. As he did in '02, Carmichael is downplaying his run at a perfect season. "The championship is the only thing I'm worried about," has become a mantra for the 24-year-old Floridian.
To this point Carmichael has survived all the major challenges presented him. He won the season opener at Sacramento in May, putting to rest all the talk of him not having enough time to recover from knee reconstruction; his repaired knee was tested when a rut caught his boot earlier this month at Unadilla violently wrenching the knee; and he caught and passed Yamaha's Chad Reed last week in Troy, on a Supercross-like track that many thought favoured Reed's riding style.
