High Drama
HIGH DRAMA
DAYTONA '93
EDDIE LAWSON GOES OUT IN STYLE WITH A STORYBOOK ENDING AT THE DAYTONA 200
KEVIN CAMERON
LAST YEAR'S SENSATIONAL LASTlap Daytona result seemed impossible to improve upon, but the 1993 race topped it in every way. Had the script been written as fiction, it could not have been more crammed with drama and plot shifts.
The story begins with Vance & Hines Yamaha looking for a rider to replace injured Jamie James. Four-time 500cc World Champion Eddie Lawson, although officially retired, says yes to the team's invitation to ride Daytona. This will be, he says, positively his last motorcycle roadrace. Might there be a glorious finale to Lawson’s distinguished career?
Using AMA/CCS races the previous week as practice, Lawson quickly gets down to 1-minute, 52-second lap times. Muzzy Kawasaki’s Scott Russell and Ferracei Ducati rider Doug Polen, who finished so breathtakingly close in a 1-2 finish last year, likewise post quick laps.
Fresh plot element: Ominously, one of the Yamaha engines breaks in practice. Don’t get your hopes up, Eddie.
Balancing plot element: Using onboard diagnostics, V&H chassis consultant Dale Rath well finds a fix for a suspension problem Lawson is having exiting the Chicane. They try it. It works.
Timed practice, which grids riders for the Twin Fifty qualifying races, is a disaster for Lawson. His engine pushes out an internal oil gallery plug in the first session, and fails to complete the second session for unstated reasons. Lawson will start the second 50-tnile qualifier from the back: row 11, with 42 riders ahead of him.
Next plot element: Ferracci’s Pascal Picotte and Doug Polen blister three rear tires in their qualifying sessions. Are Ferracei and Polen already considering running the whole race with only one fuel-and-tire stop, not the usual two? Reportedly, the Ducati has the fuel consumption to do it.
In the first Twin Fifty, Russell and Mike Smith on the Commonwealth Honda RC30 get off first, with Smith appearing able to close. Is there life in the old RC30 yet? Behind them are four fast Kawasakis: the factory bikes of Takahiro Sohwa and Miguel DuHamel, then privateers Steve Crevier and Dale Quarterley on a Muzzy lease-a-racer. Russell splits on lap three, quickly pulling out 6 seconds. Quarterley and Sohwa then crash, both, fortunately, proving more durable than their bikes. Meanwhile, back in the garage area: Six laps into the first heat, Lawson's and teammate Cohn Edwards' bikes are still not together for the second Twin Fifty. Engine changes take time. Red herring plot element: Akira Yanagawa, on the new liquid-cooled Yosh Suzuki Superbike, equals the drive of DuHamel's Kawasaki on the back straight. Potential.
After 15 laps the checkered flag comes out, and Russell has a crushing 22 seconds over Smith and Crevier. The second heat rolls out-with the Yamahas. But will they run?
Polen, Picotte and Edwards lead the start. Lap one sees the two Ducatis drafting back and forth. A Yamaha stops. it is Edwards. With luck like this, can there be any hope fbr Lawson? Dark chords, drums roll menacingly:
Lawson's bike is not only running~ he is catching the leaders at almost a see ond a lap. Then, a roar from the crowd and Lawson gets between them, a sandwich of Ducati bread and Yamaha meat. F-Ic takes the lead on lap six. By gosh folks, this is what world champi oiis are supposed to do, isn't it? Riders are fast because of what they know, not what they dare, and Lawson knows a lot. By lap 11, he leads by 5 inc redi ble seconds-from the back of the grid.
The fairy-tale ending flickers out, though. Lawson's bike begins to vibrate, indication of a blistering rear tire. At high temperature on the bank ing, tire heating can cause volatile components of the tread rubber to boil, foaming and softening the rubber. A blistering tire slides and vibrates. He dives into the pits, where the prepared
V&H crew slides in a new rear. Rejoining in sixth place, Lawson con tinues hewing his way forward. At the end, he is a sensational third behind Picotte and Raymond Roche.
L IL~UtL~ clilU 1~Uy1[[IUILU I\U~[[1~. Right at the end, Polen also blisters a tire, losing enough places that he will have to start far back in Sunday's 200miler, in row two of the second wave. There ishis tire with its quarter-sized blister, still hot to the touch, sitting on a cart in the FetTacci pit.
Happy with Lawson's showing. V&H team owner Terry Vance says, "I don't think you become a four-time world champion without knowing what you're doing." Lawson is gra cious. "It was this thing," he says, indicating the bike. "I'm good on the straights."
Sunday morning brings one final practice for Superbikes. Then, after the 600 Supersport and U.S. TwinSports events, comes the 200. Soon we will know.
Most Superbikes get 14 to 16 miles per gallon, and so will have to stop twice, generally around lap 19, and around lap 38. Just slowing down, stopping and accelerating again takes 15 seconds. A fuel stop adds 6 seconds to that, a tire change 12-25 seconds. The Ferracci Ducatis, apparently getting 18 or so mpg, can stop once-tires permitting. But Daytona, because of its high speed and the extra loading of its banked turns, is uniquely hard on tires.
Time to grid the 200. Shortly, the machines and riders are invisible in the dense crowd of people. Forty percent of the grid is Kawasakis, and, significantly, the next most numerous brand is Ducati, with nearly 20 percent. After the sighting lap, the returning machines alight momentarily to top off fuel tanks, then move out to their start positions.
The 10-second board turns and the noise boils up. Russell and Smith win the start, but Smith’s clutch dies in the attempt, and Daytona 1993 is over for him. Russell and Lawson are closely engaged, but on lap two, Lawson takes over going into the Chicane, where he has clear advantages. Meanwhile, Polen had passed 37 machines in two laps. By lap seven, Lawson is a full second clear from Russell. These men are not cruising; Russell’s big slide out of the East Elorseshoe is not tactics or strategy-just the price of going fast.
Now comes a five-lap caution, caused by the fatal crash of long-time Ducati racer Jimmy Adamo (see sidebar, page 58). Behind the two leaders, the order is DuHamel (skillfully exploiting the caution), Aaron Slight on a Muzzy Kawasaki, Yanagawa on a Yosh Suzuki, Crevier on the Weld Rite Kawasaki, and Polen.
Racing resumes, but Russell stops early on lap 17, and Lawson does the same three laps later. And, already, Polen’s strategy is eroding. He comes past the pits pointing at his rear tire. On lap 27, he stops for fuel and rubber. Can Polen run the remaining 30 laps on one tank? Where Russell’s stop added only 25 seconds to his lap, Polen’s takes critically longer, his crew visibly agitated. Teammate Picotte’s fuel sputters out between lap 28 and lap 30, revealing how marginal the Ducks’ mileage really is. Polen will have to stop again.
Two laps later, Lawson slides frighteningly at the Chicane. The pace is killing his tire. Lawson is fast, but not enough to make up for an extra stop. Is this the race’s end, to be followed by a cruise for Russell? Is this a battle of power characteristics, with the bike and rider kindest to tires the winner? Then, Russell makes a second stop on lap 33, surely ahead of schedule, for his crew scrambles to meet him. If 5060 miles is all a tire can do at this pace, both Russell and Lawson will have to pit again. Duelling air-wrenches.
Now DuHamel and Slight have the lead to themselves, but give it up as they pit on lap 39. At this point, Kawasaki appears to have the race covered, with three solid chances to win. One of these green bikes will surely go the distance. Russell is leading again, by a bare 3 seconds from Lawson, who is 20-25 seconds ahead of DuHamel, Slight and Polen. But Lawson rides like an irresistible force, making time in the Chicane, and in the drive from it to the finish line, shooting high up the banking, using the drive down off it to get a deeper hold on sixth gear.
Lawson pits for the third time on lap 47, handing Russell a 35-second lead. Back up to speed, Lawson tucks-in small on even the short straights, racing hard all the time, assuming, like the good racer he is, that what fate takes from him on one lap, it might give back on the next.
It happens just that way. Russell’s tire doesn’t feel right. He is in for the third time on lap 52. The choreography is perfect; as he rolls out the access lane beside Tum One, Lawson comes past Start-Finish. Now Russell has a lead of just 2.7 seconds, and the final nail-biter begins. Lawson takes back 1.2 seconds on the next lap, another two-tenths on the next, four-tenths on the next. On the last lap, the two men enter the Chicane together, only to find Chuck Graves’ Suzuki on the racing line, slowing suddenly, out of gas, right in their path. Only violent braking prevents a collision. Lawson goes high, Russell goes low for the drag race to the finish. Lawson’s Daytona-craft is powerful, generating a 10-bikelength lead, but Russell is in the strategic draft-frombehind position, from which so many Daytona races have been won. He eats up the separation quickly, but the finish comes too soon. It is Lawson by .051 of a second. What a way to retire.
Lawson is gracious as before in Victory Circle, saying, “The bike won. I was just along for the ride. Scott just about collected that guy in the Chicane, then we just went up the banking. I knew I had the horsepower.”
Of his second place, Russell observes, “To finish second to Lawson isn’t bad.” All three top finishers are former Daytona 200 winners-Lawson (1986), Russell (1992) and DuHamel (1991).
While DuHamel gives his impressions of the race, Russell and Lawson talk and gesture animatedly to each other about their last lap, Russell making a big gollywobble with his hands. Later, in the pressroom, Russell explains: “Eddie almost went off in Tum One, some guy cut down on him.” Russell himself had to split two lapped riders in the West Horseshoe, a frightening thing to watch. His description is mild, in almost-toneless speech. “I had to get by and I couldn’t wait around.” Chuck Graves, asked about his unintended part in the last-lap drama, answers accurately. “That’s racing,” he says.
