Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

i ~ CD .n ii " en ~ ~ w c::l > U Clements Scores In Luxembourg Grand Prix! By Strawberry Enterprises ETfELBRUCK, LUXEMBOURG, Aug. 13, 1972 - In the season's last 500cc motocross Grand Prix, Husqvama rider Billy Clements from Pasadena, California won his frrst World Championship point by being the tenth and final finisher in a rain soaked ordeal which was climaxed by last lap surprizes that radically upset the 1972 World Championship table. Billy Clements is the second American motocross racer to score Grand Prix points this season but he is the highest fin~hing American in 1972. Bryan Kenney of Xenia,' Ohio became the first American to break into the World Championship table at the West Gennan Grand Prix at Beuem,' Germany on July 16th. Kenney finished 11 th in that race but the seventh place fmish of Gennan Maico rider Werner Schutz didn't count in the 500cc Championship because Schutz had scored points in an earlier 250cc Grand Prix. Therefore, Kenney was moved up to ten th position and he was awarded America's first World Championship pain t. Yamaha works rider J aak Van Veith oven won the Luxembourg race overall and it was the first Grand Prix win for both Van Velthoven and Yamaha. It was a Yamaha weekend because Hakan Andersson won the Swedish 250cc Grand Prix for Yamaha on the same Sunday. Paul Friedrichs, the 33 year old East Gennan CZ rider, rode a fantastic race in what may be his last Grand Prix. He came from dead last in the first heat to second overall at the end of the day. Friedrichs' strong finish gives him enough World Championship points to round out the season in second place bebind Roger DeCoster. The Luxembourg race was started in a downpour of rain that cT(:ated rivers of water on parts of the course and turned the grass meadows and orchards into a sea of bogging mud. . Maico works rider Ake Jonsson grabbed the lead in the first tum, but Ake's smooth 34 year old team mate Adolf Weil passed Ake and took over the race on the next lap. The mud and water caused a high attrition rate and one of the first riders to be forced out of the race was Husky rider Mark Blackwell. The Sou them Californian was racing in the middle of the pack on the first lap when a small stone from a spinning tire caught him squarely in the left eye. Mark is now recovering in a hospital near the Husqvama factory in Sweden, but his doctors expect him to be fit for the Fall Trans-AMA series. Roger DeCoster, who had been crowned World Champion at the Belgian GP a week earlier, got a poor start and he had worked up to about Third place before his chain came off and twisted beyond repair. Heikki Mikkola dropped out with a • Jaak Van Velthoven chats with World Champ Roger DeCoster before the first game of slide-in-the-mud. bad ignition coil and Andy Roberton, Pierre Karsmakers and Vlastimil Valek were among the many who succumbed to watered out engines. Adolf Weil continued to dominate the race until he, too, dropped out with water in the ignition in the final laps of the first heat. Ake Jonsson regained the lead and Bengt Aberg, twice World Chtunpion for Husqvarna, moved into second place. Bengt said that his Husky almost stopped on the back side of the course, but he jammed it into first gear and it began running again. But then with one lap left Aberg's Husky sputtered once and dribbled to a stop just after the fin ish line. Maico team rider Willy Bauer was out with wet ignition, and Christer Hammagren seized his Yamaha, but they had corne to rest before they crossed the finish line. Although they both missed the last three laps of the heat they were able to push across the line to be scored 14th and 15 th. Bryan Kenney was jamming very well through the grit and mire, and he was holding eigh th place as the end neared. But on the last lap his Maico ran out of gas and then he made the mistake of pushing across the finish line before the checkered flag fell. So he was nol scored in lhe firsl heat. Billy Clements finished 16th. four laps behind Jonsson. Van Velthoven was second ahead of John Banks who had ridden a strong and steady race. Paul Friedrichs crashed with two other riders corning oul of the fust turn at the start of the heat, but the experienced East German hacked away at the field through the mud and he worked up from last to sixth place at the finish. Most of the riders who didn't finish the first heat didn't even ride in the second race because by now the skies had dried up just enough to allow the mud on the course to tum in to clinging gumbo that stuck in layers to the riders and their bikes. As Andy Roberton, cleaned up and watching from the sidelines, put it: "It's like riding through porridge. " When the pack slithered around the frrst tum it was Ake Jonsson, Adolf Weil and Willy Bauer in the first three places. With three Maico shirts out in front the opening laps looked like a Gennan Holiday. But Willy bailed off soon after the start, so it was left to Ake and Adolf to lead the parade. And after the half way point the race was indeed a parade. Each bike and rider looked like a gian t mud ball circulating around the gooey track. Mud was caked inches deep on every e'lposed surface and some of the bikes looked like they must have weighed 300 pounds. For some it was a big efforl just to keep moving. The second heat, even more than the first, was not so much a' race as a battle of sheer endurance. A large group of mechanics, friends and riders who hadn't finished the first race gathered at one of the hair pin turns near the finish line. As the weary riders rolled through the turn at a walking speed they got lap information and encouragement from their crews. "Keep going, keep going" was shou ted out in various languages and some riders paused to have the worst of the mud wiped from their eyes. Behind the Maicos of Ake and Adolf, Jaak Van Velthoven was 'third and Friedrichs fourth. The first four riders were still riding hard and despite the weigh t and slickness of the mud they were entering the finisbline straigh t in a big power slide throwing a rooster tail of plaster-like mud. But when the checkered nag waved the leading Maico off the track, the crowd realized that it was Adolf Weil and AkeJonsson was not in sight. Adolf was immediately surrounded by people and one of the first to reach him was Roger DeCoster who asked Adolf in german HWhere is Ake?" Weil could only shrug and motion over his shoulder with his thumb. Jonsson had run out of gas on the very last lap and he was unable to finish the race. For Ake Jonsson the Luxembourg Grand Prix was a disaster. He was winning the race until the last and a win would have given him enough GP poin ts to finish second behind DeCoster in the World Championship standings. But instead Van Veith oven won th e race with two fine second place rides under the worst of conditions, and Paul Friedrichs was second. Ake Jonsson was draped to fifth place fo'r the year behind DeCoster, Friedrichs, Mikkola, and Van Velthoven. Billy Clements struggled through the mud for almost an hour and he finished 11 th in the second heal. Weil hadn't finished the first heat so Billy had earned 1 Dth overall and that all-importan t pain t. Sixth overall was Gerrit Wolsink who finished 11th behind Billy in the second heat. The Dutch rider had seized the big end bearing of his four-speed Husky on lap seven and he sat ou t the remaining four laps before he pushed across the nnish line. C U STO M Competition & Racing Leathers Pt4411 by The Lelttt'er'Shop 11171 Virginia Ave., Lynwood. Ca.90262 (213) ,,32·7419 Buy direct & save • 1 Week service SAME DAY UPS SERVICE (703) 358-0708 ALLIED CUSTOM CYCLES RICHMOND. VA.

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