Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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CN III ARCHIVES BY LARRY LAWRENCE Y oshimura Suzuki was hurting. The team had new Suzuki GSX-R750s for the 1990 sea- son and to say that things didn't go well in the AMA Superbike season opener at Daytona would be a major understatement. Yo- shimura riders Steve Crevier and Miguel Duhamel both crashed and were injured in heat races at Daytona. Fortunately, the squad had a guest rider, Jay Springs- teen. He was able to salvage an eighth in the Daytona 200 on a Yoshimura Suzuki. Going into round two, Suzuki needed help and fast. They called on Doug Polen, who, at the time, was racing in Japan. But Polen had a major problem, and merely being able to race by early May was going to be a challenge. Some background: It seemed more than a little odd in the first place that Polen ever left the AMA Superbike Championship to take an offer to race in the Japanese Road Race Champi- onships in 1989. Polen would undoubtedly have been a heavy favorite to win the '89 AMA title. He'd finished a close runner-up to Honda's Bubba Shobert in the '88 series and equaled Shobert for the most wins in that year's championship. But this was the 1980s. Japan's economy was P112 Polen was preparing to defend his Japanese titles in 1990 when disaster struck. He was going to race for Yoshimura Suzuki in the Daytona 200 that March, but while testing at Willow Springs in February, he crashed and lost four toes on his left foot. Initially, the thought of Polen racing at all during the 1990 season seemed off the table, but the gritty Texan recovered much quicker than anyone had expected and amaz- ingly made himself available to race at AMA Superbike round two at Road Atlanta. Two weeks before Road At- lanta, Polen competed in his first race back in Japan. It didn't go well. Not only had he come back too soon, but he'd tried a heel shift mechanism, and it proved difficult to use. So, at Road Atlanta, Polen went back to a conventional toe shifter. To make near its peak, while in America, the economy was coming back, but the motorcycle industry was still recovering from the early 1980s recession and spending on racing was only just beginning to cau- tiously return. Suzuki had mostly owned the All-Japan TT-F1 class (that country's closest equivalent to AMA Super- bike) through most of the 1980s. But then Honda came on strong in 1988 with its RVF750 and took first and second in the series, with Shoji Miyazaki winning the title. Suzuki wanted it back, and it knew Polen was fast and capable of winning the series. He was offered a reported $300,000 to make the move to race in the Japanese series in '89. It paid off big with Polen not only winning back the 1989 Japanese TT-F1 title for Yoshimura Suzuki but, as a bonus, he won the TT-F3 class, as well. Doug Polen and Road Atlanta in 1990. POLEN'S TRIUMPHANT RETURN