AMA Pro Racing motorcycle circuit grapples with two deaths at Sonoma County Fairgrounds

The green light flashed and the race continued Sunday as paramedics fought to revive Charlotte Kainz, a 20-year-old dynamo in the dirt track motorcycle racing world, who was gravely injured in a crash with other bikers at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds.

Just two hours later, another rider and rising star, 17-year-old Kyle McGrane, went down on the same dusty one-mile horse racing track and sustained severe injuries.

Both young riders were competing in the Santa Rosa Mile event before a crowd of about 4,500 people. They were taken separately to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital, where Kainz died Sunday afternoon and McGrane died Monday evening.

It was an unprecedented loss for a fairgrounds event and the national AMA Pro Racing flat track circuit.

So far, no law enforcement agency is investigating the crashes or track conditions for the one-day professional dirt track bike event, which drew about 60 riders, who are paid through sponsorships and earn winnings for top finishes. The rules of the road don't apply in a closed-track accident at a privately organized race, officials with several Sonoma County law enforcement agencies said.

But the deaths of Kainz, of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area and McGrane, of Gap, Pennsylvania - both on the cusp of promising racing careers - have pushed racers to call for officials to place stricter controls track conditions. In the aftermath of the tragedy, several riders described the Santa Rosa track as narrow, dusty, bumpy and “treacherous.”

“In my opinion, there shouldn't even have been a race on that track at all,” said Jake Mataya, 29, of Blaine, Minnnesota, who knew both Kainz and McGrane well.

After Kainz crashed, about 12 p.m., Mataya opted to sit out of the race and he said he urged McGrane to do the same.

“I just basically told him that the track's unsafe,” Mataya said. “I knew that he still wanted to race. It wasn't going to stop him, because he's a racer. And I just told him to be careful and don't do anything stupid.”

Track racing is America's original adrenaline-fueled two-wheeled motorsport, originating in the early 1920s when a rider pushed a Harley-Davidson to 100 mph. The sport has evolved to include half- and one-mile dirt tracks as well as the TT Steepchase, an irregular course with jumps and elevation changes.

Riders can hit 120 mph on the straightaways and 80 mph on the corners.

Sunday's event was the AMA Pro Racing Flat Track 2016 season finale. Tickets were $40 in advance and $50 at the gate for general adult admission.

Promoted by local race enthusiasts, the event was run by AMA Pro Racing, a Daytona Beach, Florida-based sanctioning body that establishes the rules, runs the race and ensures the riders are qualified and licensed. The promoter secures the venue and insurance and prepares the track. AMA Pro Racing manages the track and its condition as soon as the event begins, said Michael Lock, AMA Pro Racing's chief executive officer.

“It's incredibly rare” for the event to involve a fatality “let alone two,” but Lock said he does not believe the track's surface caused the riders to crash.

“On review so far, I can say it looks like two racing incidents where bikes have collided, but obviously we will look at that more deeply,” Lock said.

He declined to describe the circumstances of each crash - two of the three “red-flag events” that halted racing on the day. He did not elaborate on the third incident and said his organization is still studying the footage from numerous cameras placed at various points along the track to better understand what happened in the fatal crashes.

Lock said the promotion team - Terry Otton with Napa's Ramspur Winery and Steve DeLorenzi of Burlingame-based SDI Insulation - prepared the track “and invested considerable time and resources in that preparation. They are an experienced team and AMA Pro works closely with them both before the event and during it.”

Lock said track crews typically use calcium chloride to condition the dirt and allow it to retain moisture. On the day of the event, “maintenance was done” to the surface and the track was watered down “a number of times during the day.”

“Rider feedback is sought and given at all our events and the rider community is very active in this regard,” Lock said.

Otton also defended the track's surface. He said his team gave the track preparer “carte blanche, whatever he needed to do to build a safe track.”

“I don't think anybody, if they thought the race was unsafe, that they would have let the race continue, but people will have different views on how the track was maintained that day,” Otton said.

Otton said he was present Sunday throughout and said he didn't observe any troubling or unusual conditions.

“I'm not blaming anybody,” he said. “I don't think I've ever experienced this type of pain. I'm devastated. I do have a passion for the sport. I try to help out the sport in every way I can.”

The Santa Rosa Mile put down its roots at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in 1968.

After 1970, it took a four-decade hiatus for reasons that remain unclear.

The Santa Rosa Mile was revived in 2012 by two former riders, Bob Bellino and Jim Rice under the promotion group Circle Bell Motorsports. But the Santa Rosa company canceled the event after two years because of financial problems.

Otton and his team brought it back in 2016.

Last year, Otton was with a promotion group that put on the AMA Pro Racing's Half-Mile event at Calistoga's Speedway at the Napa County Fairgrounds in which rider Jethro Halbert, was injured. Halbert, 29, died 10 months later as a result of his injuries, according to motorcycle industry media reports.

Otton said he wasn't aware of any investigation into that crash or any changes, which would ultimately have come from AMA Pro Riding, the governing body.

“It's a tragic loss and there's nothing else that can be said about it,” Otton said.

On Sunday, professional rider Cory Texter, 29, of Willow Street, Pennsylvania saw Kainz go down in her heat.

“A rider crashed and she had nowhere to go,” said Texter, who was watching from the sidelines and rode in a later heat.

In the stands, longtime track racing fan Michael Carnacchi of Sebastopol said he saw paramedics doing chest compressions and trying to revive Kainz. The race resumed after about 45 minutes.

“There were pretty grim expressions on the faces of officials around the track, but the race just continued on as business as normal,” said Carnacchi, a bootmaker who is running for Sebastopol's City Council.

Texter said he thought about sitting out but because he had heard a positive report about Kainz' condition he decided to race. Texter said once he was on the track, he encountered treacherous conditions - fine, sandy dirt that he said made it difficult to see and maneuver.

He said he rode cautiously at “50 percent of my ability the whole day.” He was washing the dust out of his eyes for days.

After Sunday's race, Texter, one of four dirt track racers on the AMA Pro Rider advisory board, sent a scathing report to his sponsors about the track. “It's just not a track we should race at in the future,” he wrote.

Texter and McGrane grew up 20 minutes apart in small Pennsylvania towns. He said McGrane was like his little brother, and had just entered his senior year at Pequea Valley High School.

“To lose two (riders) in one day, I can't even wrap my head around it right now,” Texter said. “As riders we need to come together and decide what's safe and unsafe. If we need to stand together and all of us decide we're not going to race. It sucks because promoters are going to lose money, riders are going to lose money, but our lives are more important than our jobs.”

Becky Bartling, chief executive officer of the Sonoma County Fair, said the fairgrounds provides the event space but is otherwise not involved in the event. Bartling said she's not aware of any fatality occurring during a race of any kind held on the fairgrounds.

“We'll definitely have a conversation about whether this is an event that we want to host,” Bartling said. “All the staff is very sad, sad for the loss of those two young individuals and very deeply sad for the families.”

The fairgrounds is host to events throughout the year, highlighted by its signature summertime Sonoma County Fair, including demolition derbies, rodeos and monster truck rallies. Tawny Tesconi, the former fair manager who ran the space from 2007 until 2014, said she's not aware of any fatal injuries among event participants during her tenure or in recent memory.

Tesconi said there was a bad crash during the Santa Rosa Mile's first year in 2012. A racer was hospitalized but eventually released, Tesconi said.

The racing community was bracing for bad news Sunday. The event wrapped up shortly before 5 p.m. at the fairgrounds.

Kainz was pronounced dead at 4:03 p.m. . Her death was announced at beginning of the banquet held that evening at the DoubleTree Hotel in Rohnert Park to mark the season's end.

McGrane died at 5:45 p.m. Monday. The AMA Pro Racing announced his death late that night.

The news sent a shockwave throughout the track racing world. Racers have been sharing their grief and frustration through social media.

“We know the risks, but there are also precautions to be taken within our sanctioning body that can reduce and manage that risk,” well-known flat track racer J.D. Beach wrote on a widely-shared Facebook post.

Petaluma resident and professional road racer, Shelina Moreda said she was on a pit crew for a friend during Sunday's event. Moreda, who adored Kainz and admired her fearless racing style, said she and others feel the organizers should have slowed the event down and done more to evaluate the day's crashes and track conditions.

“We as racers, we go out there trusting the officials are going to make the call to put us on a safe track,” said Moreda.

Staff Writer J.D. Morris contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer Julie Johnson at 707-521-5220 or julie.johnson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @jjpressdem.