Thunder On the Magic Mountain
THUNDER ON THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN
RACE WATCH
Team Cycle World goes wheel-to-wheel with the road warriors of Oz
RON LAWSON
STEVEN L. THOMPSON
THE SLIDE WAS SHORT, PUNCTUATED BY A STACCATO sequence of noises no racer likes to hear. The fingernails-on-a-blackboard screech of too much metal in contact with the unyielding road. An unloaded engine screaming. A helmet hammering the tarmac. Glove studs shrieking as hands skitter palms-down. A back protector's articulated plates clattering. And my grunts exploding in counterpoint.
The concrete barrier on the outside of the turn spat the Suzuki back into the middle of the track and halted my backside slide with brain-rattling suddenness. I lay there looking up at the cobalt blue sky and watched the instant replay in my head of what had gone wrong.
I had dived into the steeply cambered entry of the tight lefthand hairpin called Forrest's Elbow a little sooner than usual, trying to dice with a lOOOcc FI bike. Fd expected the fairing to drag harder as a result, so had hung farther off the seat, knee well into the tarmac, to keep the GSXR750’s bodywork off the ground and the rear Metzeler Comp K in contact. But though I was only a few inches off my previous line, it was too much; the road rose too sharply. The fairing impacted with a sickening lurch and levered the rear wheel off the ground—a classic kiss-it-off low-side slide.
As my mental playback tape stopped, the barrier that the bike and I had struck at maybe 60 mph was full in my vision. I recalled how Vladimir Hegel, the Yugoslavian endurance-racing champ, had withdrawn his entry at the last minute after deciding that those concrete barriers were just too dangerous. Somehow, that made me smile. Which was nice, because just for a moment, I could ignore the fury that welled up as I realized what I had just done.
What I thought I’d done was put to waste the whole enormous effort Team Cycle World had expended in coming to Australia’s premier racetrack to compete in the Aussies’ most demanding, most prestigious event. A circuit so unique it combined the wildest sections of the Isle of Man, Daytona and Laguna Seca. And an event so important it happened only once a year.
As the cornerworkers rolled the mangled GSX-R out of harm’s way, oil began spilling from the crankcase. And when they helped me up, I began to feel the insults of the impact manifest themselves in my knees and coccyx. I leaned on the wall, caught my breath, let the traveling marshal know I was okay and waited for the ringing in my ears to fade. I watched the other riders skirt the oil under the yellow flag and thought about what a silly low-side seemed to have cost us—about why we’d come here in the first place.
We’d come because this track—the Mount Panorama circuit in Bathurst, New South Wales—was one of the dwindling number of real road courses left on the planet. We’d come because we could continue the unique experiment of race-testing, in world-class competition, the same sweet-mannered, box-stock Suzuki we’d campaigned in the 1987 Isle of Man TT (“The Long and Winding Road,” September, 1987). We’d come because we knew almost nothing about Bathurst, save that to the Australians who tackled the 3.86-mile course, it was a magical place. A place many said had contributed a great deal to the formidable racing skills of the famous Aussies who’d done so well in Grand Prix racing over the years.
They started racing at Bathurst 50 years ago, to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the landing of the First Fleet in Botany Bay and the establishment of the British penal colony that ultimately would become the nation of Australia. The goal of those founding racers and civic boosters in 1938 was to make Bathurst Australia’s version of the Isle of Man. Fifty years later, the nation’s leaders designated the 1988 Bathurst races as an official Bicentennial event—the only motorcycle competition so honored.
Like our racing in the Isle of Man TT, competing in Bathurst’s annual Arai 500 endurance race would be, we thought, not just roadracing in its purest form, it would be the truest kind of sport: adventure in an unknown land. To make everything run more smoothly, we’d ask the Brit who had managed our Isle of Man program, Terry Shepherd, to come to Oz to direct our efforts in the 500-kilometer endurance race, in which Editor Paul Dean and I would share the riding.
Until my crash, we’d only done 31 laps—about a third of the race—with Paul logging the first 23 laps. Along the way, he’d diced with the field of mostly Superbike-spec 750s and 1000s in fine style on our box-stock GSX-R, putting us comfortably in 17th place out of 65 starters. Had it not been for his brief detour into a sand pit outside of Hell Corner to avoid an erratic slower rider, we might easily have been a few places higher by the time he handed the Suzuki over to me at our first pit stop. And I had been holding onto that position until I managed dropped bike.
As soon as my head cleared after the crash, I thought perhaps we could still finish—maybe not in 17th, but respectably-if the Suzuki could be coaxed back to the pits. But the short slide and subsequent flip had wiped off too many controls—footpegs, clutch lever and front brake lever.
Worse yet, oil continued to leak from the right-side case, which meant the marshals would never let me onto the track, even if I could somehow start the bike and ride it. So, all that was left for me was the long, lonely walk back to the pits while the Team Marlboro duo of Michael Dowson and Michael Doohan—two of Australia’s brightest young stars—were piloting their FZR 1000-based Superbike to a convincing victory.
After the race, as we disassembled all of our pit equipment, it somehow seemed unfair that a simple get-off could undo the efforts of all the people who had worked so hard just getting us to Bathurst. But Terry, Paul and I, as well as our ad hoc chief mechanic, David Munro, knew all too well how easily that can happen. With close to 100 years of racing experience between us, we all had eaten the bitter fruit of sudden failure after enormous effort—as had every veteran racer. It is simply part of the sport.
But here in Oz, we discovered, “sport” means something a little different from just “competition.” And when our Suzuki finally came back to the garage on the crash truck half an hour after the race was over, we began to see just how different.
Actually, we’d already had a strong taste of Aussie sportsmanship. A month before we even departed for Down Under, Mike Esdaile, Editor of the Australian bike magazine Revs, reacted so enthusiastically to the mere mention of us racing at Bathurst that he began paving the way, acting as middleman between us and the various entities we would have to deal with. More pure sportsmanship surfaced when we met David Munro while retrieving the GSX-R from the Suzuki importer in Sydney after shipping it there from Shepherd’s race shop in England. A service technician for Suzuki Australia who knows GSX-Rs inside and out, Munro not only helped us uncrate the bike and prep it for the race, but then insisted on coming to Bathurst with us to help with the mechanical chores.
That camaraderie continued at the track when Dick Hunter, team manager for the powerful CorningSilastic team allowed us to appropriate a section of his extensive garage for our workshop—no small favor, given the crowded paddock conditions and intermittent heavy rain. Then, once word had spread that the American team was seriously short of equipment (our only tools had flown to the event with Paul in a small fanny pack), Oz racing teams cheerfully donated their own stuff: a pit signaling board from Team Honda Australia; a quick-fill setup from a privateer racer; a pit fire extinguisher from the father of David Luthje, one of Team Silastic’s top riders.
This kind of comradely give-andtake happens in any sport; but at Bathurst, we were at the country’s biggest race meeting of the year, when tensions on the track were at their height, when points and money were at stake in every race. This was Daytona, Oz-style, yet the paddock atmosphere was distinctly club-like. It was a mixture none of us had ever encountered either in America or in Europe, where club races and pro races produce vastly different environments.
After the crash, our own shop's atmosphere swiftly changed when the Suzuki was stripped of its broken bits. We quickly saw that it was fundamentally sound; that with a few of the spares provided by Suzuki Australia and some cannibalization of the GSX-R 1100 David had ridden to the race, we could get the bike into action again. We’d only entered Saturday’s Arai 500, but a quick check of the two-day, 17-race program showed there were two events the next day we could conceivably contest: the 750-to-1000cc Superbike “A Grade” (Expert) sprint; and the weekend’s grand finale, the Australian Grand Prix, open to just about anything between 249 and lOOOcc. An hour later, we were entered in those two events and working like madmen to prep the bike again.
But not before yet another show of Aussie sportsmanship by the organizers—headed by Event Director Arthur Blizzard, a sporting gentleman of the highest order—who helped us figure out how to get into those races. The rules said that any entrant could change a machine or a rider, but not both. Thus, Blizzard explained, we had to find somebody who’d entered a GSX-R750 in the two events and then retired, and who would allow us to use his race number. So large was the Bathurst entry and so strenuous the conditions that one such dropout was quickly found; Southern Suzuki’s Wayne Kinerson, who rode for the Wollongong Club. We’d have to start dead-last in both races, since we hadn’t actually qualified for either, but at least we’d be racing rather than watching.
As we worked in Hunter's garage, a steady stream of well-wishers trickled in and out, offering ribald humor, mechanical aid and Foster’s beer. Soon, we felt like we’d been racing with these guys for years. As we slowly whipped the bike back into shape, we learned more of the lore of Bathurst from them; about the Hinton clan, whose Mount Panorama racing heritage goes back three generations; and about the “bikie” problem, which culminated in a pitched battle with police in 1985 and almost shut down the track.
As much as anything, we found, that much-publicized riot was responsible for the surprisingly small crowd on hand this year. Bathurst once drew as many as 80,000 spectators—about right, given the superb race-watching terrain and the quality and quantity of the racing to be enjoyed. But media exploitation of the bike-gangs’ combat in McPhillamy Park and the subsequent severe police crackdown had scared away all but the most dedicated fans.
At a dinner given by the Bathurst city council, we'd heard the officials' side of the story; while we dealt with the GSX-R's bent wheels and cracked cases, we heard the racers’ side. Their view was predictable: They’d race at Bathurst as long as they could. There was simply nothing else like it, anywhere. Alone among the Oz tracks, it provided valuable lessons in high-speed riding—lessons that translated to confidence at places like Spa, the Island and Suzuka.
We didn't need convincing; Paul and I were already besotted with the circuit. The lines we’d worked out with the wily Shepherd in our only pre-practice walkaround on Wednesday evening allowed us to get comfortable with its wild dips and nearvertical elevation changes almost immediately; we had fun even in our first, very wet practice on Thursday morning.
It was a good thing. The sun that soaked the circuit for the endurance race on Easter Saturday disappeared behind low, wet clouds on Sunday. We knew we'd be racing in the rain. But that actually worked to our advantage; as in the FI race on the Isle of Man, our bike was as much as 30 horsepower down on power against the competitors in both events. And while that was a major disadvantage in the dry, the Stocker’s more-tractable engine helped offset any power shortages in the wet.
Shepherd arranged our race strategy so that I would run the first race, the 8-lap lOOOcc “sprint,” and Paul would do the longer, 12-lap Grand Prix. This would put our fastest rider, Paul, on the bike with freshly scrubbed-in new tires and brake pads, and allow him a better shot than I would have-not only because I was so beat-up I had to be assisted onto the bike, but because the Grand Prix had a considerably larger field of much more diverse hardware.
One minute from the start of my race, the officials walked through the grid, shouting in everyone’s helmet that there was mist on the mountain in addition to the steady rain all around us. For some riders, that was the final straw, and the 41 entrants were down to 15 by the time the starter gave us the True Blue Aussie flag. Starting dead-last on the grid, the amazing GSX-R—which hadn’t gone so much as a dozen feet under its own power since I’d flung it into the wall—squirted into the melee at Hell Corner with free-revving guts. The Metzelers stuck well in the wet, and I quickly found myself once again winding up through the gears along the uphill Mountain Straight, amidst the swirling spray and blare of Superbike machinery.
Midway along the straight, a crest lofts your front wheel if you’re going fast; the Suzuki’s got light and 1 wondered who among the handful of guys around me would dive into the steep, uphill righthand sweeper of Bridgestone with the same élan we’d seen in the dry.
A good many did—those who wore the trick Michelin or Dunlop racing rain radiais. The rest fell back with me, and we swooped through the cambered turn in a freight train of water and noise. The pain began to disappear as the joy of this circuit once again captured me.
The hill steepens sharply from the exit of Bridgestone to the deceptively short straight and entry to the hard hairpin of the BP Cutting. Right here, especially, I was reminded of the uphill sections of the Isle of Man’s famous TT Course; places like Creg Willie’s Hill and the Ramsey Hairpin. The road’s so steep here that just rolling off the throttle does most of the braking you need; but the numerous tire and paint scuff marks on the trackside concrete attest to guys who whacked it on too soon. I tiptoed through the lefthander and waited until the tires had some bite before I let the Suzuki loose again.
Again, as at the Island, I marveled at the smoothness and evenness of the GSX-R’s power delivery. From about 4000 rpm, the engine wound up like a lightweight turbine, flinging me back to within a few feet of the sliding FI bikes. Even though our valiant stock shock had given up many laps earlier, the chassis stayed stable under the hard direction change you have to make —still climbing steeply—as you haul the bike from the wall on the right at the BP Cutting to the left in order to crest the rise with precision near the edge of McPhillamy Park.
The line Paul, Terry and I had jointly decided on still worked perfectly, and the Suzuki hurtled over the top, again catching faster bikes. That put me into the “Castrol” section, involving two very fast left turns taken essentially as one. Again, the Metzelers hung on tenaciously and we moved up a bit more, exiting the Castrol Sandtrap and heading toward Skyline in the wake of an FI bike.
Bathurst lore makes much of Skyline and the subsequent plunge down The Esses and through the deeply dished Dipper. Just as at the entry to Laguna Seca’s Corkscrew, you have to enter this section right, or the speed you’re carrying over the top will catapult you into the trees. Stories abound of world-famous foreigners coming to Bathurst ready to show the Aussies a thing or two about fast riding and coming back to the pits pale-faced after their first encounter with leaping into space and almost simultaneously having to turn right.
In the wet. it’s not nearly so dramatic. because the required drop in speed to maintain grip eliminates most of the airborne stuff. But it still concentrates the attention wonderfully. The sight picture you have after exiting the Sandtrap is of a nice little straight simply running off the edge of the world; ahead, you see not racetrack but sky and distant countryside. It’s a place where, at tentenths, you must be perfectly positioned and precise with the heavy braking necessary to scrub off speed before entering the steep downhill.
Photos don't show just how steep that drop off the mountain really is; but the slightest cracking open of the throttle produces startling acceleration that flings a bike down the hill. Again, the Suzuki’s steady chassis and trusty tires kept us in sight of the Fl pack as 1 negotiated the Esses and arrived again at Forrest's Elbow, the final hard turn off the mountainand the place I'd pitched it the last time I’d been around.
Motorcycles, lacking memories, ignore embarrassments, so the Suzuki cranked sweetly around Forrest’s as if nothing had ever happened there. But I used some extra caution that lost me the possible high-speed tow down the long, long, downhill Conrod Straight. By the time I got to the bottom and bent the bike around the righthand kink leading to the Caltex Chase chicane—introduced just this year to slow' arrival speeds over the hill at Murray’s Corner-the pack ahead of me was a hundred yards away and gaining ground fast. The adrenaline drained away as I realized the next seven laps w ere essentially going to be an exercise in tire and pads break-in for Paul. I felt better that it took the race winner-Arai 500 co-winner Michael Doohan, this time riding a Team Marlboro FZR750R Yamaha Superbike—that long to lap me. I finished dead-last, with lap times only 10 or so seconds faster than our wet practice. But at least I finished.
After Terry and David peeled me off the GSX-R, we gave the machine a post-race inspection and found nothing amiss. So, until it was Paul's turn to suit-up for the GP contest a few hours later, we passed the time by watching the races, the weather and the Aussies who continued to amuse themselves and us with an endless supply of stories.
Perhaps it was the rain, which thinned not just the trackside crowds but cooled the ardor of the racers. Perhaps it was something else. Whatever it was. I felt an atmosphere of comradeship, not combat, everywhere. The riders duked it out fiercely on the track, especially in the 250 Australian Grand Prix, which featured one of the most exciting duels and closest finishes I can remember. But by the time Paul was kitted-out and awaiting his race in the pre-grid shed behind the pits. I had the feeling that somehow, the racing we all had come to do was only a part of the sport—and heretically enough, I began to think that it wasn't the most important part. I thought of the four laps of pure fun I'd had the day before with a rider on another GSXR. dicing back and forth, drafting one another down that incredible straight, grinning like fools at each other and waving thumbs-up.
I knew that each of the riders who lined up on the grid with Paul were thinking about ways to finish as high as possible; like Paul, they were all serious racers, from pole-sitter to tailend charlie. But as they tore off in a cloud of spray for their warm-up lap,
I suddenly thought about the sidecar racers. One of them had suffered a horrendous mechanical failure in practice on Friday and gone flat-out into the wall along Conrod. His passenger and he seemed too badly injured to continue, and his outfit was a wreck. But the sidecar folks got together and worked all night on his machine, and on cheering him up. Ultimately, he checked himself out of the hospital, got a friend to sit in as his monkey, and drove again on Sunday. And won the race—and the $ 1000 prize. So, his competitors had, in essence, provided him the means to beat themselves out of the money.
By the time the flag started the Australian GP and Paul rocketed from dead-last smack into the middle of the 40-bike field, I was convinced that what was going on here wasn’t just racing. You’d never know it by the way they went at it on the track, though; Paul’s skill and veteran tactics were no match for the sheer power of the Superbikes and GP machines, so he slowly lost ground to the faster hardware. But not without contesting every second, so that by mid-race, he was still firmly attached to the second group of dicing bikes, mixing it up in the pouring rain with the likes of TZ350 Yamahas and going 1 5 seconds a lap quicker than he had in his wet practice session. Only a high-rpm ignition misfire apparently caused by water seeping into the black-box connectors under the seat kept him from lapping even faster. He soon hooked up with one of the TZs and swapped places for half a dozen laps in a classic dice, hugely enjoying himself in the midst of the downpour.
All too quickly the 12 laps were gone, and Michael Doohan concluded his remarkably successful weekend by winning yet another event on his FZR750R. And as Paul blasted under the checkered flag to take 19th out of 25 who'd survived the deluge, Terry Shepherd clicked his stopwatch and smiled.
“Well,” he said, “that’s it.”
And that was indeed it—but only for the racing. As far as the Aussies were concerned, the party was still on, and the Cycle World team was invited. Like us, nobody involved really wanted it to end.
Most racetracks empty quickly once the competition is done. But Bathurst did not. The spectators drifted away, but the racers remained. I wandered along the paddock shelters, among winners and losers, rich and poor, and saw and heard the evidence of the place’s hold on the imagination. People were gathered in fluid groups, drinking, eating, laughing, reliving great moments and lesser, relishing one another’s company and the animating spirit of the event. This was no hormonally supercharged collection of thrill-seekers, desperate for world acclaim and riches; these were sportsmen and women.
That point was driven home in the evening. Instead of beginning their long treks home, most of the racers were gathered in the big auditorium of the race control building for the awards ceremony, which Team CW had been asked to attend. We hadn’t won any awards, so we knew we weren’t there for that. We stood amid the group for an hour or so, cheering the winners as they received their trophies and checks, and listening to the nonstop commentary from the crowd; everyone, it seemed, knew everyone else. Babies cried and children played among the adults. Finally, Arthur Blizzard introduced us-not as jet-setting American magazine guys, but simply as riders. Racers who just wanted to race at Bathurst. We mounted the little dais, and Paul spoke for the rest of us when he told everyone how we'd been captivated by the people and the circuit and the racing.
Everyone in the room knew that Paul could have been handing them a polite line, but that he wasn’t. So, when he was done, they applauded loudly, and' from somewhere in the back, a guy shouted, “Come back next year, then!”
The comment halted us momentarily as we stepped off the podium. Paul raised his eyebrows. Terry cocked his head appraisingly.
It was absurd, of course, even to consider coming back. As journalists, we’d gotten the insights we wanted into Aussie racing culture; we‘d attended their “University of Roadracing,” mentally tagged the up-andcomers we might be seeing explode onto the GP scene the way their forebears like Gardner had. And as racers, we’d enjoyed four days of speed and fun spoiled only by my premature ending of our Arai 500 race. There were other circuits to be explored, other races to be run, other stories to be written. We had no excuse to return.
But there’s only one Bathurst. And sport needs no excuses. Especially not sport, Aussie-style. S
