One night down and one big win for James Stewart at the historic Bercy Supercross in Paris, France. The recently run U.S. Open in Las Vegas included, James is undefeated on the new 2010 YZ450. The L&M Yamaha rider kicked off the evening by streaking away to easily win the hot lap contest by 1.6 seconds. Justin Brayton had a good ride on the JGR Yamaha YZ450F and captured second overall. Ben Coisy was third.

Following the hot lap contest came duel races where fifteen riders went out for five laps and the last five riders were eliminated. The remaining ten lined back up for another gate drop and four laps, and again, the bottom five were eliminated. Finally there were five riders and a three lap winner-take-all race. James Stewart swept all three races.

The main event was eventful for a few reasons and one of them was not good. Steve Boniface, the semi-retired former KTM factory rider, came out to Bercy to try his best and went down hard seven laps into the main event. Boniface grabbed too much throttle up the finish line and did almost a complete flip. The red flag was thrown smartly came out as Boniface’s appeared to be serious.. After seven laps it was Stewart out in front, with MX2 World Champion Marvin Musquin in second and Brayton in third.

The restart changed things up a bit when French Kawasaki rider Gregory Aranda surprisingly jumped out in second. He gave Musquin fits before finally relenting in the whoops. Brayton also snuck by in the whoops and worked on Musquin next. Eventually the JGR Yamaha rider snuck by on the inside of a turn and there was nothing the crowd favorite Musquin could do. Aranda finished fourth and Fabien Izoird was fifth. Matt Boni was sixth and Nick Wey was seventh.

James Stewart was in a league of his own on Friday night in France and is going to be difficult to beat the rest of the weekend. It’s also apparent that this year in this team race the Americans have some work to do. Musquin, Aranda and Izoird showed everyone that the French are not to be taken lightly. Add in Ben Coisy, who was very fast in the super pole and duel races, and the Yankees have a fight on their hands!