Blake Young (Photo: Evan Williams)

Young was downbeat about his chances on Sunday before the race. He’d wanted to run with Hayes in California -- or at least make some serious inroads -- but couldn’t find the pace. He was about to get a big gift, though.

For the second race, Hayes got away first to no one’s surprise with Young behind Josh Herrin and Roger Hayden.

Then Hayes fell down -- in the same spot Eslick was able to pass Young on Saturday, and the same spot Chris Fillmore dropped the KTM -- on lap two.

Young had just worked his way up to second, which quickly became the lead. “I thought from there it would be a long race, so I need to concentrate,” said Young, who added that a huge problem at Infineon was getting too aggressive and slowing himself down. “I knew I needed to mellow out, ride my own race, and watch my board. That said, I knew there were a lot of hungry guys behind me itching for their first win.”

Hayes described the crash afterward. “I tucked the front. It was early in the race. You know, you have to do some hard work and I was trying to turn in a good lap. I made a little mistake. I got past the bump and then I started to lose the front a little bit,” he said.

The bike stopped running but Hayes got it restarted, with the levers a bit out of whack but in generally good condition. Josh said he “didn’t have a scuff or scratch” from the fall. The problem was he lost about 20 seconds on that lap.

“The bike didn’t feel bad, but it wasn’t the same,” added Hayes, who rejoined 17th and last. “I tried to come to grips with that and the crash took a little fight out of me.”

Hayes said he tried to focus on one man in front of him at a time. He made up about eight seconds over the course of the race despite having to pass people but could only get back up to seventh.