Stardust 7-11
STARDUST 7-11
DAN HUNT
STRONG is the reed that bends softly in the gale, goes the old Zen saw. And that is the story of the $25,000 Stardust 7-11. When machine and man are tested against 711 miles of hot desert, rock and fire road between Las Vegas and Death Valley, brute force is not the answer.
Adaptability, reliability, agility-those are the requirements.
The most fabulous non-winner that auto racing has produced in this decade didn’t have it. The Oldsmobile-powered Baja Boot is one of the fastest bludgeons GM has ever put together, but it seemed to lose two parts for every blow it dealt. The Jeeps and Broncos were re hable, but clumsy. The buggies were not as rehab le-and too slow.
The bikes, however, had “it.” They seemed to bend with Nature, bobbing over the desert hkc corks on a rough, rolling sea. Bikes needn’t enter into acts of self-destruction to get through rocks and washes.
Motorcycles, ridden by California’s top desert stars, swept the first four places overall at the Stardust, repeating the decisive victory scored at the Mint 400 a few months earlier. The buggy drivers were beginning to realize that the 4-wheeler victory at the Mexican 1000, run along the knobby spine of Baja California, last year, was not matter of course.
“We’re not racing the bikes, really,” opined one buggy driver. “It’s not the same thing at ah.” The bike riders sitting at his table generously allowed that he was right.
Overall winner was the Larry Berquist/Gary Preston duo, alternating on a stock 350-cc Honda scrambler. Few changes had been made. A Ceriani fork and Girling rear shock absorbers were the major alterations. The remainder was the usual detail work that is bestowed on a desert sled. The bike was brand new and had only 22 miles on its odometer when Berquist began the first 355-mile loop from Stardust Raceway.
Ten hours and 15 min. later, he emerged from the darkness to turn the bike over to Preston. The Honda required two quarts of oil! “Weh, I guess we broke it in right,” Berquist quipped. He complained that he had wasted time to borrow fuel at one point, and that he had become choked with dust on the way toward Ash Meadows and Death Valley.
Otherwise the Honda was going well, making extremely non-desert bike sounds as it yowled healthily to 9500 rpm without a single misfire. Berquist looked rosy cheeked and fresh. He said he could have done another 355 “no sweat.”
“I really was having fun out there,” he grinned.
“Why that dirty rat!” said a buggy driver’s wife. Her spouse was four hours overdue at Beatty.
So, Larry went to wander around the pits, and make a few points with some girls, while Preston took over, inheriting Berquist’s 30-min. lead. When Preston finished at 10:30 a.m. the next day, he’d stretched that lead to 1.5 hours over the 2nd place TR-6 of Dick Dean and John Coots. The winning time was 22 hours, 5 min.
Third overall and 1st in the 250-cc bike class went to Gary Conrad and Russ Darnell on a Husqvarna. District 37 desert champion Steve Hurd and his partner Mike Patrick brought a 750-cc Norton home in 4th place.
Fifth went to Larry Minor and Jack Bear aboard a Ford Bronco, the first 4-wheeled vehicle to cross the finish line. Good for Ford, for the company spent more than $50,000 to support the Bronco entries in this race!
The bike clan was not without casualties. Eddie Mulder, an early leader on the leg to Ash Meadows, about half the distance to Death Valley from Vegas, suffered heat prostration from the 115 F temperature, and awakened next to his bike, quite naturally out of the running.
J.N. Roberts, key man in the winning of the Mint 400, retired more ignominiously with the simple clogging of the air filter on his 360-cc Husqvarna. Another mainstay in distributor Edison Dye’s copiously staffed Husqvarna team—Bill Bogner—crashed, and retired with a shoulder injury.
Eddie Day’s TR-6 locked its fork, and became impossible to control on the rocks near Beatty; the strain blistered his hands, and wore down his strength. “It’s the first time I’ve never finished with the bike still running,” he moaned.
Marvin Miller flipped his Honda 250 in a rut, and was hospitalized for rib fractures, but later was released. Max Switzer, who was 3rd with Bud Ekins in the Mint 400, was forced to retire his Triumph in the first 100 miles with gearbox trouble.
In spite of the attrition, the bikes showed a much better finish ratio than the 4-wheeled entries. A healthy 33 percent of the bikes finished under the required 40-hour maximum. The 4-wheeled entrants didn’t do half as well, and several drivers complained that the 7-11 was a “destruction derby,” not a race.
Bud Ekins and Steve McQueen passed up bikes this time to drive one of the two Hurst Performance Specials, nicknamed Baja Boot. Made up of GM components, the Boots are a lumpy blend of jet fighter, Sherman tank and earth mover. The engines go rumpety-rump and reputedly will drive the Boots to 140 mph. The maximum bhp did neither Boot any good. Both quickly dropped out of the running.
Ekins and McQueen did a brave job, and managed to get their car to Ash Meadows, where they discovered that their pit crew had gone on a bender. Furious, they managed sufficient repairs to be able to continue and complete one lap.
More fortunate was motocrossman Malcolm Smith, who went over to the dune buggy camp to drive a 1700-cc Meyers Manx VW. Teamed with Frankie Freeman, he brought the buggy home 1st in class, albeit about 9 hours after the first bike came in.
Much of the action, however, was disappointingly amateurish. The rank-and-file 4-wheel drivers revealed, in large measure, a lackadaisical attitude about the race. One team entered a glistening, showroom stock Olds Toronado, and merely lowered tire pressures before setting off. Many of the drivers were in poor physical condition for such a grind. Perhaps, as a result, their speeds were shamefully slow on the smooth fire roads which made up a large portion of the course.
The sanctioning National Off Road Racing Association, a young organization to be sure, seemed to disdain marking the course for danger spots. This is a particular hardship on the motorcyclists. The winning Honda was geared for about 85 mph. Some of the 650s and 750s can approach 100 mph on the fire roads, and become disastrously airborne if their riders are not warned to shut down for hummocks or unseen dips. NORRA would do well to have a desert rider flag or lime these spots.
But things are getting better. Fewer of the 137 starters became lost this time. The Mint 400 in April was a confusing debacle by comparison.
Bring on the Mexican 1000, and just watch the motorcycle boys romp!
STARDUST 7-11 RESULTS
