Weekend Race Recap
Saturday 1:00 p.m. - Frank Krmel powered his Donkey Kong to a hard fought victory over Adam Anderson and Taz in the championship race, then Anderson came back to win the freestyle competition in front of a sold out, raucous crowd in Helsinki, Finland's Hartwall Areena Saturday afternoon.
The first competition in front of the excited Finnish fans was the wheelie contest, with Charlie Pauken in Grave Digger earning the top scores from the trio of fans selected as judges.
Next up was racing on the straight-line dirt course, something brand new for the Helsinki crowd that had packed Hartwall Areena for the past three years to enjoy a Thunder Nationals style non-dirt event. This debut on Finnish dirt saw Krmel's Donkey Kong first eliminate Grave Digger in the semifinals in a race that required a video replay review to determine the winner, then Krmel edged Anderson and Taz by inches to claim the event racing victory.
Anderson still ended the matinee a winner, showing the Helsinki crowd just how he won this year's World Freestyle Championship at the age of 22. Now in his third year competing in Europe, Adam's high powered freestyle performance included the afternoon's best save, and Taz was the only truck able to perfrom donuts on the tacky dirt, probably two of the factors that earned Taz the vote of the tie-breaking judge after the three fans serving as judges scored both Taz and Grave Digger with identical scores, each judge giving both Anderson and Pauken a score of 9 for a 27 total each, bringing the tie-breaking judge into play.
Freestyle Motocross was again a hit with the Finnish fans, with Sweden's Daniel Bodin taking the FMX victory in the first of three events scheduled for Helsinki this weekend.
RACING RESULTS
1st Round - Taz def Thor; Grave Digger def War Wizard; Donkey Kong bye run when Jetix lost oil pressure at the starting line (War Wizard advanced to semifinals as fastest loser of the 1st round)
Semifinals - Taz def War Wizard; Donkey Kong def Grave Digger
CHAMPIONSHIP RACE - DONKEY KONG DEFEATED TAZ
FREESTYLE RESULTS
TAZ 27 (won on tiebreaker)
Grave Digger 27
Donkey Kong 24
Thor 20
War Wizard 19
WHEELIE CONTEST RESULTS
GRAVE DIGGER 29
Taz 26
War Wizard 22
Jetix 21
Thor 20
Donkey Kong 18
Saturday 6:00 p.m. - For at least this one Saturday in Helsinki, the road to freestyle victory started with a close loss in the championship race. Following the same path Adam Anderson took in Taz Saturday afternoon's matinee, Charlie Pauken bounced back from a close loss to Frank Krmel and Donkey Kong in the racing finale to take Grave Digger to the freestyle triumph in front of another large, excited crowd of Finnish Monster Jam fans Saturday night in Hartwall Areena.
Once again Krmel was dominant in the racing bracket and earned his second Championship Race victory of the day with his photo finish win over Grave Digger in Saturday night's racing final. Donkey Kong had eliminated Taz in the semifinals, while Digger knocked off Dan Evans and Jetix in the other side of the bracket. With the entire crowd on its feet for the final race Grave Digger and Donkey Kong left the starting line together, and stayed side by side all the way to the finish. Officials needed a slo-motion replay of the trucks crossing the finish line to see that by a matter of inches Krmel had driven Donkey Kong to a second straight race event win.
Pauken had started the night by winning the sky wheelie contest, then duplicated that huge sky wheelie to begin his wild freestyle performance that also included a spectaular slap wheelie on the arena floor, then as he filled the time clock to complete his run Pauken flipped his Grave Digger onto it roof to really put the crowd in a frenzy and the judges scored the Grave Digger freestyle two points better that the strong run posted earlier by Anderson, the reigning World Freestyle Champion.
RACING RESULTS
1st Round - Grave Digger def Thor; Taz def Jetix; Donkey Kong def War Wizard (Jetix advanced to semifinals as fastest loser of the 1st round)
Semifinals - Grave Digger def Jetix; Donkey Kong def Taz
CHAMPIONSHIP RACE - DONKEY KONG DEFEATED GRAVE DIGGER
FREESTYLE RESULTS
GRAVE DIGGER 28
Taz 26
Donkey Kong 24
War Wizard 19
Jetix 19
Thor 15
WHEELIE CONTEST RESULTS
GRAVE DIGGER 29
Taz 26
War Wizard 22
Jetix 22
Thor 21
Donkey Kong 21
Sunday - Frank Krmel completed an undefeated weekend in racing by driving Donkey Kong to victory in his third straight Championship Race of the weekend and Charlie Pauken recorded the weekend's only perfect scores as Grave Digger won the freestyle battle Sunday afternoon in Helsinki.
Starting the day with a big target on his back as every other superstar in the star-studded line-up made it clear that they were out to end Donkey Kong's winning streak Krmel was up to the challenge, beating Adam Anderson in Taz and Anders Flogard in Thor before completing the weekend racing sweep with another triumph over Pauken and Grave Digger in the Championship Race. Krmel's truck was hooked up on the new dirt surface in Hartwall Areena all weekend and he was quick to credit Crew Chief Dennis "Bucky" Foltz for having Donkey Kong prepared perfectly for the straight line race course.
Freestyle action kept the crowd roaring throughout, from an excellent performance by Swedish truck Thor to open the competition all the way through Pauken's winning run. The most talked about moment came in the middle of the pack, when Dan Evans attacked a huge car stack in Jetix, landed the truck on its tailgate and rolled it over backwards. Coming onto the track as the final performer of the weekend Pauken opened with a huge sky wheelie similar to the move that he won the wheelie contest with, then kept up a blistering pace until he amazed the appreciative Finnish crowd with a slap wheelie that he rode the length of the arena, putting the black and green wrecking machine back on all four tires just inches from where Jetix was pitted. Pauken found more big air after that and for the first time all weekend each judge held up a score of 10 to give Pauken the only perfect 30 earned in this rugged field of competition in Finland.
RACING RESULTS
1st Round - Donkey Kong def Taz; Grave Digger def Thor; Jetix def War Wizard (Thor advanced to semifinals as fastest loser of the 1st round)
Semifinals - Donkey Kong def Thor; Grave Digger def Jetix
CHAMPIONSHIP RACE - DONKEY KONG DEFEATED GRAVE DIGGER
FREESTYLE RESULTS
GRAVE DIGGER 30
Jetix 26
Donkey Kong 26
Taz 25
Thor 22
War Wizard 18
WHEELIE CONTEST RESULTS
GRAVE DIGGER 29
Thor 23
Taz 23
War Wizard 22
Jetix 19
Donkey Kong 16
