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RACE WATCH

U.S. Roadracina: Chandler, no contest

Doug Chandler’s first-ever National Superbike Championship was a veritable cakewalk. After finishing third and second in the first two races of the year, the 25-year-old Muzzy Kawasaki rider from Salinas, California, turned up the flame to win four straight races, then set it on simmer to claim the title with one round remaining in the eight-race series by finishing third at Heartland Park Topeka. Chandler only needed to finish seventh in Kansas, provided Commonwealth Honda’s Randy Renfrow, his nearest challenger, won, but Renfrow could only manage a fifth-place finish. Chandler cruised comfortably to third while Yoshimura Suzuki rider Miguel Du Hamel engaged Chandler’s teammate Scott Russell in a heated battle for the lead. DuHamel, son of legendary Canadian factory Kawasaki roadracer Yvon DuHamel. took the win, his firstever in an AMA national, with Russell second.

Renfrow did manage to win the final race of the year at Willow Springs, California, riding a heady race to conserve his rear tire and then passing Vance & Hines Yamaha pilot Thomas Stevens in the late stages when Stevens’ rear tire went away. Chandler sensed a tire problem developing early in the race and played it safe, then passed Stevens in the final corner to finish second.

Chandler’s runner-up finish at Willow Springs brought his tally for the year to four wins, two seconds and two thirds. Not a bad season, and likely to be his last in the U.S., as he looks set to depart forfeit her the World Superbike or Grand Prix circuits.

While Chandler had an easy time of it, there’s no denying that Doug Brauneck had to work to win the 1990 AMA 250cc Grand Prix Championship. Riding a Yamaha TZ250 owned and tuned by AMA Chairman of the Board John Hasty, veteran Brauneck held oft'the advances of AÍ Salaverria and Chris D’Aluisio to win his second-ever national title, his first having come aboard Dr. John Wittner’s prototype Moto Guzzi in the 1987 Pro-Twins GP division.

Brauncck won the title through consistency, as his younger challengers sometimes ftoundered. D’Aluisio fell while leading at New Hampshire International Speedway, then missed the Mid-Ohio race due to a broken wrist suffered in a crash at a Canadian National. D’Aluisio returned to action in Kansas, and was able to keep his championship hopes alive going to the final round at Willow Springs, but he fell there when his bike seized in practice and reinjured his wrist, forcing him to miss the race.

Salaverria fell while chasing Brauneck in a heat race at Heartland Park, and having to start rear of the grid in the final hampered his performance. A week latei at Willow Springs, Salaverria fared no better and wound up second in points behind Brauneck; D’Aluisio was third.

U.S. 125, 500CC MX Championships: Ward thwarts Stanton again, Cooper tops 125s

F or the second consecutive year, JelTWard prevented Jeff Stanton from adding the 500cc outdoor MX title to his 250cc outdoor and supercross titles.

The six-race 1990 500cc outdoor MX series got off'to a close start with Team Honda’s Stanton and Team Kawasaki’s Ward leaving Washougal, Washington, tied for the points lead. Ward won the first moto, with Stanton finishing second. but Stanton reversed the positions in the second and deciding moto to take the overall win. This pattern would be played out repeatedly during the series.

A week later at Millville, Minnesota, Stanton won again, despite handing a seemingly certain secondmoto win to Ward after stalling his engine. Ward finished third in the first moto after crashing and wound up second overall.

Stanton won for the third time at Broome Tioga in upstate New York after trading wins and second places with Ward, much as they did at Washougal.

The series turned around at Steel City, Pennsylvania, where Ward took over the points lead when Stanton crashed in the first lap of the second moto and was taken to the hospital with a severe concussion.

Stanton rebounded to win the second-to-last race of the season at Maryland's Potomac Speedway with yet another 2-1 performance, but Ward again went 1-2 for second overall, retaining his points lead.

The final race at New York’s famous Unadilla Valley Sports Center saw Stanton’s teammate Rick Johnson post 2-1 moto finishes to take the overall win, but Ward’s third overall via a pair of third-place moto finishes was enough to sew up the 500cc title. Stanton went 1-2 for second overall, ending the year 19 points shy of Ward.

For Ward, who began his career as a child racing minibikes, this was his seventh career title, tying a record jointly held by Johnson, Bob Hannah and Broc Glover. However, Ward remains the only rider in U.S. MX history to win championships in all four professional categories—

125, 250 and 500cc outdoor MX, and 250cc Supercross—and, at age 29, is the oldest rider ever to win a U.S. motocross crown.

The 13-race 125cc outdoor MX championship functioned as a support class for both the 250 and 500cc series, and it, too, went down to the wire.

Team Honda’s Jean-Michel Bayle led the series point standings until round eight at Washougal, where he crashed, breaking his arm. There, Team Suzuki’s Guy Cooper took over the points lead for the first time.

Team Honda’s Mike Kiedrowski, the 1989 I25cc outdoor MX champion, shadowed Cooper in the point standings, gaining ground in round nine at Broome Tioga where Cooper had a tough time and finished a dismal eighth overall.

Kiedrowski took over the points lead in round 1 1 at Steel City, where Cooper retired from the first moto after a rock punched a hole in his engine cases.

So, as in the 500cc class, the 125cc title was settled at Unadilla, where Cooper turned in a 1-2 performance to Kiedrowski’s 3-1, giving Cooper his first-ever national title by one point.

Schmitt wins 12Scc Wo rid MX Championship

A merican Donny Schmitt (Suzuki) wrapped up the 125cc World MX Championship by sweeping the Portuguese GP, which ended up being the final round of the series when the subsequent round in Spain was canceled due to extremely dusty conditions. Schmitt, from Minnesota, headed fellow American Bobby Moore (KTM) in the final point standings, Moore having missed the second moto in Portugal after breaking a finger in the first. Mike Healey (KTM) and Tyson Vohiand (Suzuki) made it four Americans in the top 10 by finishing fifth and sixth, respectively, in the final standings.

Team Sports: U.S. excels in two out of three

A mericans Jeff Ward, Jeff Stanton and Damon Bradshaw won the 44th Motocross des Nations, bringing the number of consecutive victories posted by U.S. teams to 10. However, this most recent win, in Sweden, did not come as easily as the others, as the U.S. team edged the runner-up Belgian team by just one point.

Of the Americans, only Stanton was able to win one of the three combined-class motos, riding his Honda CR250 to the win in moto two for l25/250cc machines. Stanton backed that up by finishing second to Italian 250cc World Champion Alessandro Puzar in moto three for 250/500cc bikes. Ward tallied 2-17 moto scores on his Kawasaki KX500, while Bradshaw finished l lth in moto one for 125/ 500cc bikes before crashing his Yamaha YZl 25 out of moto two.

In Speedway competition, the American team of brothers Kelly and Shawn Moran, Sam Ermolenko, Billy Hamill and Rick Miller defeated England by three points to win the World Team Cup Final, held behind what was once the Iron Curtain in Czechoslovakia.

Kelly Moran was the top American at the event, despite an inauspicious start which saw him finish last in his first heat. However, Moran rebounded to win his four remaining heats, earning 12 points.

The win marked the second time the U.S. has been victorious in World Team Cup Speedway competition: in 1982, the Morans led a team including Bobby Schwartz, Scott Autrey and Bruce Penhall to victory. Some will remember Penhall as the two-time world champion who went on to a supporting role on “CHiPs,” a 1970’s television show about the motorcycle cops of the California Highway Patrol.

The U.S. didn’t fare as well in that other bastion of motorcycle team sport, the 65th International Six Days Enduro. Sweden used its home-court advantage to take the win in both the Trophy and Junior World classes, despite the best efforts of Americans Kevin Hines, Jimmy Lewis and Kelby Pepper, all of whom earned gold medals.

Pepper’s is an interesting story. Originally entered as a Junior World team member, he was drafted into the Trophy team to replace Jeff Fredette, who injured his hand while working on a bike prior to the event. The Trophy team’s efforts then took a turn for the worse when, on day two, Randy Hawkins houred-out with a broken piston. The U.S. Trophy team eventually wound up 12th, though our Junior World team did somewhat better, finishing fourth.

Hawkins wins third enduro title

A11 eight rounds of the AMA national enduro series were needed to crown the 1990 champion. KTM’s Kevin Hines had a comfortable points lead by mid-season, but reigning champion Randy Hawkins got things sorted out after the Colorado event, and blitzed his Suzuki RMX250 into first overall in rounds four through seven prior to the final event at Redding, California.

If Hines won there and Hawkins had, say, a tree fall on him, Hines could still have taken the crown, but it wasn’t to be. Hawkins’ ride went smoothly for a third-place overall finish, and Hines’ KTM lost a crank seal and started running poorly toward the end of the last loop, knocking him out of the top 10 and handing Hawkins his third consecutive title.

Hawkins described the 1990 title chase as too close for comfort: “Kevin Hines had a good lead on me after the Colorado event, and I was worried. But 1 started having better luck during the last half of the season. I really liked the last race. It had a good variety of terrain, and I finished close enough to bag the championship again.”

Faria wins U.S.

Speedway

Championship

tsFlyin’ Mike” Faria beat Alan “Crazy” Christian in a runoff to win the 23rd annual U.S. National Speedway Championship, held on the tiny, 1 /1 Oth-mile dirt oval at Southern California’s Orange County Fairgrounds.

At the completion of the evening’s regular program, veterans Faria, 32, and Christian, 34, were tied with 13 points apiece, meaning a runoff would be held to decide the champ. Faria won the coin toss for lane choice and gated perfectly, then led Christian for four laps to win his first national championship in 12 years of trying. B3