By Pat Jenkins The Dispatch Brad Baker finished the 2014 flat-track motorcycle racing season with a roar GÇô and some physical pain. Before being temporarily sidelined by injuries while practicing in Spain for a race there, the former AMA Pro grand national champion with Eatonville ties won the second-to-last leg of the 2014 Grand National Championship series in Calistoga, Calif., and then finished third in the finale at Pomona, Calif. Those results gave him a top-five finish in the overall point standings for the year. "It wasn't another championship," Baker said, referring to the season title he won in 2013. But, he reasoned, his end-of-2014 ranking among "the best flat-trackers in the world was still a good accomplishment" after a "rough season" in which he suffered a broken arm and struggled with performance issues in his bikes. "By the end of the year, I was feeling just as strong as I ever have, and the team, bikes and I were starting to gel together really well," Baker said. "Ending the year on such a good note has me super-excited and pushing hard for next season." International events beckoned recently. Baker was entered in the second edition of the Superprestegio race in Barcelona, Spain Dec. 13, but was knocked out of the event by a dislocated shoulder and other injuries he suffered during practice. He won the event's dirt track title in 2013. He told amaproracing.com, the website of American Motorycle Association, that the accident won't keep him out of the Troy Bayliss Classic in Australia. He's entered in the Jan. 17 race that's named for the Australian flat-track star. "Australians take their dirt track pretty seroiusly. This will defininitely be a challenging race for me," Baker said. Baker was based in Eatonville before relocating in the past year to Dryad in southwest Washington.
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