Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1960's

'1'Ile Nodlaeraers caae do.. lite a wolf o. tile fold .... toot an, aoat of tile Long 8eacIl gold. AllIund tile h.yblll' and Into till short cltuta. Track Clrcu. MuIH' f . turD. tIIuIIIb. lID. . 011 til, ClI,hll_ _ 0.,_ Saullllnl C.II....... Nortblm II...........elI no _y. .as trI_.I.r for ...&Iawm paliina. Followers of lightweight indoor short track racing, and the nlUDbers are growing in large bunches, were treated to the best action show ever last Saturday night ill the first professional race of 1967 iD Southern CaliforniL The Loug Beach Arena hosted over 140 total entlies in Ibe two class program for the nltra-lightweight 100cc machines and Ibeir hig brothers, the 250's. Five novice liders and four amateur chargers dented the money paying ranks in the three main events after fightiDg their way through the heat races and the semi-main agaillst & record &IIIOunt of expert liders for a new-season race meeL Star of the show was amateur Jim Odom riding in his second race as a wearer of the yellow namber plate. The DoRbero whiz blasted past Gene Romero on the last lap to capture the 15 lap feature race for the 250cc machiDes. Pbotos by Dellllis Greeoe AIII.e: Joe 511._ lud.lOOce com-d•• In prell... The northern invasion was large and the lads from Dist. 36 walked off with three of the front running four positions. or a sweep of all four if you class Gene Romero as a northern rider. No. Cal. Whips So. Cal. Romero. Odom and Pbil Cancilla took the main event right down to the wire in a three-rider squeeze with Cancilla right on the rear wheel of Romero at the finish and Odom inches in front! Last month's winner. Mert Lawwill had an UP and down evening hy winning the fastest six lap semi of the night and then followed it UP with the tropltY dash win over Dick Mann. Eddie Mulder and amateur Mike Yarn. . 'l"he main event found Lawwill going over the high side and on bis head in the early laps. The Frisco Flash later remounted to finish in 9th place ahead of Dan Haahy who also took a header and was forced out of the race. Odom hecame the first amateur rider to ever win the feature race in the 250cc class and will again be back and favored tbis coming saturday night in round two at the Long Beach indoor events that boast more knock downs and fall downs than a professional football game. Watch This Novice Veteran Ralph White. who won the 250cc "B" final a month ago. dropped down to win the IOOcc main event tbis time out over first time novice. Tom Rockwood who came from seventh place Mert Lawwlll, #18, was one of the Invaders. Captured trophy dash. in the early laps to run a closing second. Second year novice Rick Woods again made a good night by finishing 5th in the lOOcc final and then a close second to Jack O'Brien in the ten lap "B" main for the 250cc riders who finished third and fourth in the larger bore semi-main events. The action-packed evening that featured more spills and more close racing than in any of the previous events found novice riders Woods, Rockwood, Mike Spitzer. Merle Hamm and Carl Cranke coming up as money winqers in the three main events. Cranke was the only novice to qualify for the 250cc feature race. Amateur money winners who gunned 91 Dusl)' Coppa,. and92 Butch Corder battle. their way to the finals were Odom. Mike Yarn. Mike Lintbicum, Ron Pierce and Paul Wilde. Yarn made it all the way to the trophy dash with one of the four fastest times of the race loaded evening. An outstanding note of interest is that Mert Lawwill was the only repeat rider in the ten man 250cc "A" final.or feature event for the 250cc machines. The other nine did not compete in the feature a month ago. Trojan EnterPrises expects an even larger entry for tbis coming saturday night and all of the front runners and winners from last week will be on hand for round two in '67. The arena will open for an afternoon practice session at noon with regular activities getting underway at 8 p.m. They will also follow up a week later. on January 21st, with another saturday night event. •

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