Elsilore Wil To Olga
Pbotos by Maureen Lee
and Ray Cooper
H.,e's how It looked lat. as the front runners hit the first water bath.
I
•
Then came the mud. The IIchtwel&hls loosened It up for the blC bores
that raced the next day.
by Wayne FlemiJlgton
ELSINORE, Cal., Feb. 8- Ever bad tile
urge to take your dirt bike and wa1l down
tile main street of a small town with open
pipes? Well 1100 ridersdldjustthatdurIng the annual two-day Grand Prix bere.
The Grlpsters M.C., who sponsor the
event, told entrants on the posters that
went out to gear for a 60 mpb straightaway. But they hadn't figured on tb1s 79year record rainfall for Southern California. So if you've ever tried bitting 60
in two feet of very slippery mud you'll
know what trouble the riders bad. Only
about 20% flnisbed.
Anticipating the problem of getting out
results with that many riders to keep
track of, the Gripsters bired a computer
to do the work. The set-up came complete
with automatic camera for recording
number plates as they came by; and it
was all co-ordinated by a supposedly
competent operator.
The way the Gripsters tell it, theoperator was substantially less than competent. They bad to scrap the wbole Idea of
using the computer taPes and go back to
the old lap-chart method. Because of that
it took 10 days to get the ligbtwelght
results out.
Bill Onga emerged as the overall winner on 250cc Husky. Onga was listed as
a novice In tb1s scrambles event, but be's
no stranger to mud and motorcycles. This
is the second time Onga outlasted an
endless pack of riders In the mud. He
won the 22nd. Annual Cowbell Enduro at
Upper Lake, California on November 10.
There were 1148 riders off the line
that time.
There Is talk that the Grlpsters disqualified many of the riders wbo cut
around the largest mud-traps rather than
follow the course as marked. No reliable
Information was available at press-time
on tb1s development, bUt, if true, it could
keep their phones ringing for some time.
The starts were tediously slow, as the
Gripsters insisted that riders line up In
exact numerical order. Just being In the
right line wasn't enough. You bad to get
between the riders with numbers right
above and below yours. The sbuffllng
around was more trouble than it was
worth, In the minds of most riders.
The beavywelgbt coverage and results
appeared In last week's Issue.
(Results on page 16)
into the
Bold World of
WINNER
AMA National Championship
Houston Astrodome
Amateur Final
Dave Aldana
2S0cc Starfire
See Your Bold World Dealer Now!
BSA Western
2145 E. Huntington Drive
Duarte, California 91010
Ph (213) 359-9211
