Issue link: http://trailridermagazine.uberflip.com/i/110132
stopped on the first lap and made a suspension swap which cost him around 10 minutes but he was able to make up a lot of time and could have been a top 5 threat as well. Fast forward to the following weekend and the action was back again with the 44th running of the Sumter Enduro. This year Sumter was not a National Enduro event, so the crowd was slightly smaller than years past but the competition level was just as high. With this event also serving as a great warm up for the upcoming season, the race for the overall win shaped up to be one that would be hard to pick a clear winner for. When things kicked off it wasm Jesse Groemm taking the win in the first section by dropping 2 points versus the 3 that the majority of the other pro class riders would drop. Groemm came out of nowhere in 2012 to have a stellar season the National Enduro Series aboard a privateer effort. This year he landed a ride with the Am-Pro Yamaha team for the National Enduros and select GNCC events. Mullins, Bobbitt, Lafferty, Delong, Mead and Ian Blythe would all tie the first section by dropping 3 points. The second section would be the first emergency check of the day and it would yet again be Jesse Groemm taking the section win as he logged a 3:42 taking a slight lead over Russell Bobbitt���s 3:49 while Charlie Mullins and Mike Lafferty even tied that section both dropping a 4:20. Andrew Delong ended up with 4:26 for fifth while Rory Mead dropped 4:29 and Nick Fahringer had a rough go in section two logging a 4:59. In section 3, which would be the final section before the official gas stop, we started seeing the first shakeups of the day. Groemm, Bobbitt, Mullins and Fahringer would all drop 3 points while Lafferty, Delong and Mead would drop 4. It would be after the gas stop that things would begin to get really interesting as Lafferty would win the section with a 2:40 over Bobbitt���s 2:57. Groemm showed his first weakness of the day dropping a 3:04 while Fahringer and Delong both dropped 3:29. Rory Mead had been struggling with bike issues all day after spending a portion of the morning working on the bike, and even had the tank off working more after section 2. The fourth section proved to be the worst for the New Zealander as he dropped an 8:15 which would hurt his results for the day. Section 5 proved to be another turning point of the race as Charlie Mullins would have a pretty hard crash which resulted in a shoulder sore enough to call it a day at the end of the test. Bobbitt, Lafferty and Fahringer would all drop a 4 in the section while De- long and Groemm dropped 5 ahead of Mead with 6. The final section would result in the biggest change of the results. After running a solid race all day, Jesse Groemm would end up folding his rear brake pedal under the footpeg and lost a lot of time getting it bent back. When the race was finished, Russell Bobbitt would come out on top with the overall win ahead of Mike Lafferty and Nick Fahringer which would make it a Husaberg sweep of the podium. Andrew Delong would finish the day in fourth while Jesse Groemm was able to salvage a fifth place after his bad luck in the final section. Rory Mead ended up sixth ahead of Zach Klamfoth, Ian Blythe, AJ Stewart and Alex Benhart rounding out the top 10. Could Sumter provide us with a preview of what we might see in the 2013 National Enduro Series? How would Mullins have finished had he not had a get off? We���ll see soon enough. One thing is for sure, it could definitely be a very interesting 2013 season throughout the entire off-road scene. February 2013 51