Photo finish at Pikes Peak
Californian Carlin Dunne won the 2018 Motorcycle Section of the Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb on June 24 by just 0.692 seconds – the closest margin in the event’s 102 year history, and his fourth victory. Throughout the lead-up week, where cars and motorcycles practiced over the three sections of the 20km climb, Dunne (Ducati Multistrada) and Aussie Rennie Scaysbrook (KTM 1290R) swapped positions at the top of the leader board, with Rennie taking pole position for the second time in his three starts. On Sunday, race day, the qualifiers start in reverse order, with the pole man starting last, and this had a profound effect on the results. With about two thirds of the field dispatched at one-minute intervals, an accident caused a 20 minute stoppage, leaving the fast men to cool their heels at the starting area, while the weather began to close in over the top section. By the time 2017 winner and outright record holder Chris Fillmore (KTM 790 Duke), Dunne and Scaysbrook got away, heavy mist shrouded the last third of the course, leaving the track surface extremely treacherous. Both Dunne and Scaysbrook said they survived numerous front-end slides through the hairpins, but the result was a nail-biter to the very end, with Dunne stopping the clock at 9 minutes 59.102 seconds – 10 seconds off Fillmore’s record time from last year. “To come that close to the win and not get it is a hard pill to swallow, but I can hold my head high as I rode as hard as I possibly could,” Rennie said. Fillmore’s third place finish outright, and first in the Middleweight Division, on the little KTM was another superb performance, as the engine of the bike was untouched from standard.