Race Watch
RACE WATCH
Fast Eddie Lawson Takes Another 250cc Title; Vance Beats O'Brochta at Indy; Singleton is U.S. Formula One Champion
LAWSON IS 250cc CHAMPION
Eddie Lawson rode his KR250 Kawasaki to his second consecutive 250cc National Championship, winning four of five final events. The season started at Daytona, where Lawson had an incredible battle with newcomer (and Kenny Roberts protege) Jimmy Filice on the Roberts-Lawwill Racing Yamaha TZ250H. Lawson’s Steve Johnson-prepared KR ran practice and a heat race with a KZ400-style belt drive, but reverted to conventional roller chain for the final event. In that final, Lawson made up in the infield what Filice took on the straightaways. On several individual laps, Filice pulled two seconds on Lawson between the chicane exit and the first turn, with Lawson making it all up in two or three turns. One lap Lawson made up the gap in a single turn and passed in the next, but Filice doggedly kept on his tail.
The win was Lawson’s when the pair came up on traffic in the critical chicane exit on the last lap, Lawson stuffing the lapped riders and Filice balking for the moment it took Lawson to get far enough ahead that Filice could not pull by on the banking. Filice was ecstatic that he finished second, well ahead of World Champion Anton Mang (KR250), saying "I couldn't believe it. I thought those guys were supposed to blow me off!"
Filice missed the next round, at Elkhar Lake, due to a conflicting dirt track dat (it wasn't conflicting until a rain storm de layed the dirt track one night). Lawson, a~ would become usual for the rest of th season, stormed away to an overwhelmin~ victory, using the sorted-out belt drive.
At Loudon, Lawson won agam, Filice trailing in fifth place on the very difficult, tight New Hampshire track.
At Laguna Seca Lawson ran away once more to cinch the title, with Filice 30 sec. behind but 10 sec. ahead of a dramatic race for third place that at first included six riders but boiled down to a classic battle between David Emde (Bob Endicott TZ250H) and Rusty Sharp (Flower Company TZ250G). It was wheel-to-wheel. Sharp’s bike’s rear tire often leaving the ground as he desperately tried to outbrake Emde at the entrance to turn nine, the slowest corner on the course. Sharp led the last lap until the pair encountered traffic on the backside of the track. One of the slower riders panicked and straightened up, Emde making it underneath but Sharp running off the outside of the track, and Emde was third.
The big news at Pocono was that Filice beat Lawson. “His bike is really fast,” said Lawson afterwards, “and he rides good, too. He definitely gets on the gas. That’s the best I’ve seen him ride. He had power on me, and he used it.”
Magnanimous words from tough-asnails Lawson, and well deserved, too.
SPENCER'S GRAND PRIX STROKES
Fast Freddie Spencer will ride a twostroke Honda in 1982 World Cham pionship 500cc Grands Prix, but only until the four-stroke NR500 has been de veloped to the point of being competi tive for outright wins. It's the same idea as the Yamaha dirt track team using Har tey-Davidson XR75Os while develop ing Virago-based racebikes, except less embarrassing.
VANCE BEATS O'BROCHTA AT INDY
Terry Vance and his Byron Hines-built GS1 100 Top Fuel dragster beat Top Fuel Champion Bo O’Brochta and his Terminal Van Lines Kawasaki at the NHRA Nationals in Indianapolis, Indiana. About 120,000 people attended the event, an NHRA car race with NMRA-sanctioned Top Fuel and Funnybike motorcycle races run as an exhibition.
Vance qualified fastest with a 7.40 sec., 187.89 mph run. Vance beat Jim Bernard (Tesón/Bernard Yamaha) in the first round, defeated Russ Collins (RC Engineering Honda) in the second round and faced O’Brochta in the final. The shootout between Vance’s 1075cc Suzuki and O’Brochta’s 1260cc Kawasaki was delayed one day due to rain, but when they met, Vance won. More remarkable, 400 feet before the finish line,Vance’s bike« stretched its heavy-duty cylinder studs allowing oil to fill the cylinders and blow* back all over Vance and the bike. “It was just like I threw the switch,” said Vance/ who coasted through the lights to win. “We’ve got some new super cylinder studs now, and we’re making the motor 1260cc.^ That’s been our problem, running the little motor against everybody else’s big motors. Now we’ll get some power.”
Jon Baugh won the Funnybike race om the Orient Express Kawasaki, turning 7.88 sec. and 164.53 mph in the final4 round.
FAST BLONDE
John Dixon of Wallace, North Carolina rode a hydrogen-peroxide-burning rocket motorcycle to an AMA/Dragbike eighth-mile record of 5.2 sec. at 145.76 mph in Cicero, N.Y. AMA officials d~nied reports that every person in the grand stands became a bleached blond as the rocket bike passed.
BELL WINS DUTCH SUPERCROSS
Mike "Too Tall" Bell won Europe's first stadium motocross, held in the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam, Holland. Bell beat former 250cc World Champion Hakan Carlqvist (250cc GP contender Gerard Rond was third) in front of a huge crowd.
The success of Supercross in the homeland of outdoor motocross already has promoters in other European cities planning stadium events.
SINGLETON TAKES USRRC AT POCONO
Dale Singleton won the United States Road Racing Cham~pionshi~ by finishing second at Pocono, behind Honda’s Freddie Spencer. Singleton’s title victory marked the first time in three years the U.S. Championship has not been won by Richard Schlachter, who gave up the title by concentrating on racing in Europe.
Singleton raced in Europe as well, but without Schlachter’s impressive results, and returned to America three times to race for the title. Entering Pocono, Singleton was tied on points with Honda’s Mike Spencer, and raced against Mike Spencer—who qualified fastest—during the final event. But Mike Spencer’s Honda lost its brakes and he crashed in a slow corner as a result.
Finishing third was Nick Richichi, after Wes Cooley ran off the track on the last lap and dropped to ninth.
FREDDIE WINS POCONO SUPERBIKE
Honda’s Fast Freddie Spencer won the Pocono Superbike race, beating Kawasaki’s Eddie Lawson and Honda’s Roberto Pietri.
Lawson came from a last-place start when his bike jumped into gear and stalled on the grid moments before the flag fell. Lawson was pushed to the rear of the grid for the start. But although he didn’t win, Lawson did take the Superbike Championship points lead. Pre-Pocono leader Wes Cooley retired due to a seized engine. Pietri’s third place marked his first trip to the winner’s circle in U.S. Superbike competition.
Mike Spencer had held second early in the race but pitted with ignition problems.
ADAMO WINS TWINS TITLE
Jimmy Adamo, the brash Long Islander riding Reno Leoni’s Ducati, won the Battle of the Twins championship with a victory at Pocono. David Emde, who battled Adamo for the title at race after race, was forced to retire with mechanical problems while in second place.
AMERICAN ON THE ISLAND
John Williams of Emoryville, Calif, was one of two Americans (the other was Dale Singleton) competing on the Isle of Man. Williams, 22, saved his money and crated up his TZ250G and left for six months in England. During his stay he lived out of his van and hooked up with noted British sponsor Mai Carter, the man behind English star Ron Haslam. Riding a TZ250 and a TZ350 owned by Carter, Williams entered several national and international races in England, serving as his own mechanic, transport driver and rider.
Williams was running second in a national at Mallory Park when his 250 seized, and came back to finish fifth there on his 350. He took a sixth and seventh at Donnington Park in national 250cc races, and rang up a bunch of other top-10 finishes in national and international races at Caldwell Park, Donnington, Snetterton and Mallory. >
In the Isle of Man TT, Williams finished 22nd in one race and DNF two others.
Williams, now working as a mechanic at TT Motors (a European-oriented motorcycle shop in Berkeley, Calif.), is saving up for an assault on 1982 AMA Nationalsand his next European foray.
BARNETT DOMINATES MID-OHIO 125cc USGP
Team Suzuki’s Mark “Mr. Magic” Barnett had little problem running to double moto wins over the best 125cc competitors in the world at the Valvoline. I 25cc Grand Prix at Mid-Ohio Motocross Park. Even a fall relegating Barnett to the back of the pack at the start of moto two wasn’t enough to stop him.
All the I25cc world title contenders were on hand as only 10-points separated the top five riders in the point standings. Reigning 125cc champ and current points leader Harry Everts of Belgium, Marc Velkeneers of Belgium, Michele Rinaldi of Italy, Eric Geboers of Belgium and Akira Watanabe of Japan, along with a host of other notables came to America to race. Barnett was running hot in AMA I 25cc
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Nationals and had yet to be beaten in that series as he prepared for Mid-Ohio (since then Barnett locked up his second con-1 secutive 125cc National Championship). In moto one he left the gate, pulled a 10yard lead through the first few turns, and started to build a one minute, 48-sec. lead^ by the finish, lapping up to 10th place.
Team Honda’s Jim Gibson was second. Everts and his works Suzuki up to seventh,-* faded to 11 th, and worked his way back up to an eventual fifth place finish. Honda’sRich Coon came up to finish third with Yamaha supported Rick Johnson taking" fourth. Rinaldi was sixth, the only foreigner besides Everts who finished in the top 10. Only the top 10 riders in each moto, receive points in GP competition.
A light but steady rain accompanied moto two and this time out front it was Honda’s Johnny O’Mara, the winner of last year’s 125cc USGP. While O’Mara was putting ground on the pack Barnett was picking himself up out of the mud^ Gibson and Barnett clashed together on lap one and Barnett was left behind. Watanabe, Suzuki’s Denny Bentley, Gibson, Everts and Yamaha’s Donnie Cantaloupi. followed O’Mara off the start.
Rinaldi had been moving up, but caught his foot between the swing arm and rear wheel on his factory Güera and was' out of the race. The crowd of 12,000 picked up on Barnett’s charge and cheered him on. Barnett cut through the pack and finally set up Everts. Barnett altered a few of his lines and made the pass, within a lap. He then set out after O’Mara, closed the gap, and swept by to lead, still having time to put a near half-minute margin on O’Mara by the checkered flag.
O’Mara held second with Watanabe putting in a commendable ride for third. Cantaloupi jumped over and past Everts for fourth with Everts fifth. Everts’ pair of fifths gave him second overall, as Gibson and O’Mara had inconsistent finishes to match against their second place rides.
Everts retained his championship lead at 136 after points were tallied. Rinaldi" followed with 125, and Velkeneers’ eighth in moto two put him one point ahead of Geboers, 124 to 123. Watanabe was next at 1 14.
There will be no 125cc Grand Prix at Mid-Ohio next year, or anywhere else in the United States, either. The FIM (GP sanctioning body) decided to drop the race from the schedule, due in most part to America’s apathetic attitude toward the Trophée and Motocross des Nations team races held in Europe each year.
“Oh, Ed rather not ride here,” said Everts with a grin when asked what he thought about the Mid-Ohio cancellation for next season. S
season. Tom Mueller
