Cooper Webb rode fantastic in the mud in Philadelphia but even he couldn’t find his way past a perfect Ken Roczen to leave Webb 24 points back of new championship leader Roczen with two rounds to go.
After Roczen said lappers held him up in the press conference, as to why Webb caught him, Webb made a point of saying he got held up too! “It’s like Ken said, the lappers were brutal. Yeah, so like, you know, it wasn’t just him. I’m sure he’ll watch that and see that.”
Then when asked about battling with Roczen late, something Webb has been used to winning historically, Webb commented: “I mean, I think we know Kenny gets late in the race how he is. So I started catching him there at the end and, you know, just kind of ran out of time. Shorter main event didn’t help us tonight.”
Webb then added: “I think I was able to catch him that last half and then like anything, you know, like he said, he realized and put it in gear and was really going after it. And then I had to switch some lines with lappers as well. But yeah, overall, like I said, it was a fun race. Battled hard and, you know, was able to close there late. Just wasn’t able to execute.”
The small margins haven’t gone Cooper Webb’s way this year but despite that and the historical feud with Roczen fading away to respect between the two these days – that competitive fire still burns in Webb when titles are on the line, and Webb, who is the ultimate competitor was clearly frustrated – he is simply not used to getting beat by Roczen in that scenario.
This time it was Roczen who came out on top of a last lap shootout, underlining yet again that the stereotype from years ago when he was battling Webb for the title is no longer the case – but Webb isn’t ready let Roczen forget how it usually went!
