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Nate Adams Destroys FMX Finals

With Travis Pastrana a no-show in San Jose, Nate Adams was untouchable.

PHOTO GALLERY   Photos from the FMX Finals in San Jose View Gallery>

The Dew Action Sports Tour Toyota Challenge has been exactly that for FMX riders this week in San Jose: challenging. Course workers slaved all night Thursday and into the wee hours of the morning to get the FMX course ready for riders to practice on Friday, only to have the wind kick up and make it too dangerous for practice. Prelims were cancelled and all 15 of the riders went straight to the Finals on Saturday in a best of two format.

Nate "The Destroyer" Adams, Mike Mason and Jeremy Lusk brought out their A-game to the Toyota Challenge and took the top three spots. Not surprisingly, no one came close to Nate Adams’ killer performance. 

Many of the riders had difficulty linking big tricks on the challenging outdoor course, with its short runways and landings. But Adams still conquered all. He explained, “It was difficult to keep it together. A lot of the guys had difficulty. I was afraid of that.” But, apparently not afraid enough. Nate slaughtered the field with a sizzling high score of 93.5 linking big no-handed backflips to giant seat grabs, and super smooth backflip cordovas.

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With Travis Pastrana out of the way, Mike Mason showed up looking for blood. He came out very aggressive with a lot of speed pulling backflip variations left and right. The judges also rewarded him for changing up his first run from his second run showing his versatility and mastery of the difficult course. 

Jeremy Lusk placed 3^rd with an impressive couple of runs highlighted by two huge scorpion kiss-of-deaths and countless backflip variations including a textbook no-handed backflip and no-foot, one-handed backflip. So, the overall points leaders for the first four stops of the Dew Tour have Nate Adams in the lead, followed by Travis Pastrana, Mike Mason, Jeremy Lusk, Jim McNeil and Robbie Maddison.

Travis Pastrana didn’t show up to the Toyota Challenge and opted instead to focus on racing rally cars for Subaru. No word yet on whether he’ll return to the Dew Tour in Orlando for the Playstation Pro. At the end of Saturday’s victory lap, Adams said, “If [Pastrana] decides to show up in Orlando, I’ll be ready for him.” Regardless of whether Pastrana does show, Nate Adams is guaranteed the overall Dew Tour Title in FMX this year barring any serious mishaps.

Aussie FMX rider Robbie Maddison said of Pastrana’s no-show, “Well, he’s got so many points that he’s going to finish in the top 5 [overall] anyway. And I know what Travis is like; he doesn’t just aim for the top 5. So, obviously it doesn’t matter too much to him. But, I honestly feel that he’s proven so much in FMX this year with his double backflip,,, it’s just incredible. I know he likes a real challenge, and FMX may have been getting boring for him. I don’t know. I think it’s a shame, though. I look up to the guy. But, he’s off rally car racing. And, hey, he beat Colin McRae [at X Games], so it’s not like he’s going down a dead end street. He could be the best in the world at that now.”