The National Hare Scrambles started on our home turf in Hollister, Ca. We have raced in Hollister a bunch of times and extremely comfortable riding there. We feel that we can go as fast as anyone can in Hollister and have been riding down at the lower ranch for the last couple of weeks, so we felt ready to go. However, a lot of fast riders showed up including Shane Watts, defending champ Paul Edmondson, Chuck Woodford, Russ Pearson, Jason Raines, Fred Andrews, The Gas Gas Factory Squad, Brian Brown and many others so we definitely had our work cut out for us. It hasn’t rained much in California this year so it was a little dusty on the fireroads, but perfect in the trees. All around, the course was in great condition and  many of the tight trails under the canopy of the trees were being run to keep the conditions perfect. Brian and I had the second and third picks for starting position so we were lined up right in the middle of the fireroad. Brian didn’t get his bike started on the first kick so he was back in the pack. I was somewhere right ahead of midpack but dived inside in the first corner. I overshot the next and Brian tucked inside and we were spotted in 9^{th and 10th positions. A few riders crashed really hard right off of the start including Fred Andrews, Shane Watts, Jason Dahners, and Paul Edmondson. Brian and I saw that and started pushing for the leaders. We passed locals Steve Lebo, Eric DuCray, and Shane Esposito overshot a turn handing the lead over to Brian. I was right behind him and we settled into a comfortable pace. We had to ride a bit cautions not knowing which trail we would be running but still were opening up our lead. We climbed to the top of the mountain and we were heading to Elvira when we did an unexpected turn on a new trail that Pete had put in. It was a good off camber trail that required us to be careful and not end up way down off of a cliff. We started to rapidly drop elevation when I made a mistake and thought that we would be going down a fireroad when we jumped off down a trail. I parked my bike in the bushes, but couldn’t ride through with a poison oak vine stuck in front of me. I pinned the bike and pulled it around in a 180 and ripped it out of the bushes. I lost about twenty seconds right there and started charging to catch up to Brian. The next time I saw Brian he was whipping it out of the Gravity Cavity on the Motocross course. The next lap we stayed about the same distance, we both felt a bit tight and didn’t have a good lap. The guys behind us stayed about the same distance. We stopped for gas after this lap since we were running a long course of about 14 miles. I started to loosen up and made a charge for the lead. Brian was still charging and I didn’t catch him until the downhill section. Brian picked up the pace when I caught up to him. We could stay right together for most of the course except for the dusty fireroads where the one in second had to ride blind in an attempt to stay in the hunt. I passed Brian on the fourth lap and picked up the pace and tried to get away. Brian matched my pace and got me back near the end of the lap. We stopped for our second pit and I got a quick splash of gas and took off before my pitman Kirk had even finished gassing me. I took the lead again and pushed hard again and Brian was right with me. We swapped positions a few times on that lap and I was leading coming into the pits when Brian slipped under me. I went into the empty scoring barrels and we left at the same time for our last lap. I had an edge on Brian but he squeezed by at the end of the pits going through the fence. We were in last lap go for it mode right now and weren’t feeling tired or anything we were both in the zone. We ended up catching Dean from Motohead in the only mud puddle of the course and he sort of hesitated. Brain ran into him and he fell in the mud. I went to the inside to try to miss the mess but he fell right in front of me so I had to wheelie him. We were still wheel to wheel and not giving each other an inch. Brian slowed down for some braking bumps and I railed around the outside. We both went for the inside on the next corner and Brian didn’t let off but I had position on him and regained the lead. I opened up a slight lead but not for long as he was right on my back fender. We got to the big uphill and I caught up to a lapper. I didn’t get around real smooth and Brian saw the whole thing and got his shift to fourth. He squeezed by me and we were neck and neck going for the next hill and I had a run on him but was squeezed out. We freight trained for a couple more miles. We got to the last dusty uphill and I was right behind him in the dust and hit a hole that I didn’t see. I lost some momentum and he pulled about ten seconds right there. I got it again and went all out. Brian was charging to the finish and had a couple of seconds on me going into the motocross section. Brian crossed the finish line first with me following just a bike length behind. This was a great feeling for us beating all of the top riders on our home turf. It was amazing racing so close with each other with the win at stake. We stepped up our level of intensity a couple of times during the race and both were determined to win. It was a great way to start the season by getting first and second at the first race. We both want to win the championship and this is just the beginning of the war. Shane Esposito was the third rider on the podium and Paul Edmondson and Russ Pearson rounded out the top five. Jason Raines was sixth. Cole Marshall was running fifth for most of the race but crashed and ended up fourteenth. Fellow G Brother Steve Silvestri had a good race and finished fifteenth. Practice buddy Dennis Stappleton raced his second cross country ever and sported hand guards for the first time, finishing an impressive tenth overall.}

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