Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/125815
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"Haul-Mor" is a 15 gal. high impact polyethylene utility drum with a high perform• once 10 GPM Hand pump (patented) and 36" clear vinyl hose. Guaranteed for 1 full year against dents, cracking, chipping, rupture. Only $29.95 Nome_ _-=__-:- _ _ _ quantity wanted _ Please print Address; ---'=----" ~ City State Zip, Calif. res. odd 5% Sales Tax. All shipping $2.00 each. Allow 10 days for delivery. _ _ OIDEI.' MAIL 01 ASI YOul./e DEALEI HAUL-MOR DIY. ROGUE INDUSTRIES 10556 Arnwood Rd., Lakeview T-errace, Calif. 91342 MILES AND HALF-MILES OF DIRT The siege of road races is over for a spell and many riden< are glad of it. Four of the first eight Nationals were run on the concrete. Now the next five will all be on the dirt with the next road race slated for Luguna Seca at Monterey, California. Gary Nixon is the new American road racing hero. He is the first Yank to win one since Cal Rayborn in July of '72. It was three years to the day since Gary had scored and that too was at Loudon. Nixon may be over-the-hill, Or at least on the downward side, on the dirf but he had Loudon dialed in every time he was on the track. After Loudon Gary had climbed to third in the National standings, his highest since 1968. This may pressure him into entering dirt track races on his Triumph that he had not considered just a few days ago. Mayor may not be a wise move now that he is running hot again in road racing with a first at Loudon and a second place at Dallas and five more road races to go. This weekend it's on to the San Jose mile, an even 1 that promises to be a ~ood one based on the previous two events there in 1958 and the revival last year. The '58 event saw the lead change fifty-five times and last year's final went to Lhe wire for three riders. What makes the San Jose mile unique is that it has those long, long straigh laways and a wide passing grove on both turns. Tom Rockwood and Dick Mann passed nine riders in less than a lap last year in one of the heat races. Riders can also ride the inside so tight that three of them, including defending champ Jim Rice, broke their shoulders leaning on the inside rail! Long chutes mean horsepower. Last year Gary Scott had the win in the bag until a push rod broke. Then Rice, Kenny Roberts and Dick Mann made it a three rider battle to the finish, the type that packs them in. The San Jose mile is the first head on meeting of the fast ponies on a track where a rider can tum it on and not have to worry how he gets oU the starting line' into the first tum on the first lap. Raw power and the guts to drive into the turns at better than 125 MPH will get the job done. Harley-Davidson, Triumph and Yamaha meeting for the first time this year in the horsepower ballie. The folloWIng week at' Colorado Springs it's another mile of a different color. The track is heavily flavored with sand and the altitude is the highest on the circuit. Rice won this one last year and nearly lapped the entire field. But what makes Colorado Springs (Tl;>e Pikes Peak Turf Club) unique is that for the inaugural race last year, the riders were riding anywhere on the track, down Iowan the pole, down the middle and up against the outside fence. Unlike any other mile National this year, Saturday will be devoted to Junior and Novice racing on the same oval. The riders.wiJI be out in droves for this one as it is one of the few chances for the learning classes to get on the big ovals this year. Two days at Colorado Springs mark the only National and only mile for an area that covers hundreds of miles for racing fans and riders. The track has light standards for night raci.ng but unfortunately somebody stole all the light bulbs last year and it would cost thousands 'to replace. Other than the cycle races the track is not used much anymore. However, the facility is not old but many horse racing plants have fallen on hard times of late, thus the addition of Sunday racing, special "Nites" and all the rest that goes with the so-called "Sport of Kings". The two miles running on a bac k to back basis as the first two National miles of the year will give cycle fans a preview of who is and wbo is not the rider to beat when later mile ationals come up at Jndianapolis and A t1;p1 ta. Indy is the only night mile running and there is nothing as red as the A t1an ta red clay oval. If a poll was ever taken. the mile would win going away. Maybe it is because there are so few of them each year. But based on past records the miles produce the close finishes, the side by side racing four and five abreast and the rider passing a half a dozen or more in one swoop. It only happens on a mile. Springfield and acramen to linger in the hearts of the older fans. They will never be forgotten. Time has a habit of dim ming and changing the facts to legend on occasion but the truth remains that both tracks did produce so excellen tracing. Springfield last ran in 1966. Each ye,!," since that time the rumor grows stronger that it is coming back. Sacramento last ran in 1970. Then the grounds sat empry for three full years before the property was sold for industrial development. Sacramento has a. new mile but it, like so many other publicy 'owned tracks, is sacred ground to the horse owners that pay less taxes for their steeds than the man that owns a cycle. It's called politics. Gary Nixon beat Bart Markel in the last Springfield mile by less than a foot. Gene Romero held off Tom Rockwood in the last Sacramen to mile by less than one second. That's the type of mile racing thaI people remember. Rice, Dick Mann, Dave Sehl and • Chuck Palmgren, the four mile track winners last year are all back for San Jose and Colorado, also. Old milers don't pass up many as long as they have something to throw their legs over. About the only bike that won't be there is Bobby HiII's old Indian which was reported for years after Bobby retired as being officially entered by one rider or another at every Springfield or Sacramento race. The only problem was that Bobby was not on it. Rice was the King of the Miles last year with a 750 BSA twin. Now he has switched to Harley and a pair of wins could prove that maybe it was the rider more than the machine. Some say that on a mile it's 40% rider, 60% horsepower. Everybody that campaigns the circuit would like to win a mile. Dick Mann tried for twenty years before he finally won one at Chicago last year. Like Rice he was on a BSA 750 and like Rice, he nearly lapped a field. Like Rice, he has switched brands this year and will be on a Triumph. Maybe Bobby Hill will come out of retirement and ride a - BSA! Regardless of who wins a lot of eyeballs will be watching Gary Scott and Kenny Roberts as they con tinue their own private war for the Grand National title. They have swapped the lead twice this year and htere is more to come. Scott is the only rider at this time that has scored points in every National race and he is the defending champion at Castle Rock, the event that runs the week after Colorado. Both Scott and Roberts took shots at winning San Jose last year but neither ran hot at Colorado. With San Jose and Colorado just around the corner and Indy and Atlanta to come the end of August and early September it gives a wann feeling to know thal the favorite race of them all is on the upward trend from a few years ago when the miles looked as though they were on their way out in total. In the future other mile ovals at such places at Syracuse, N.Y., Chicago, Boston and San Francisco may be added to the National slate. One avid follower recently stated, "Wouldn't it be great to have about ten mile and five half-mile Nationals each year?" Yes, it certainly would and nobody would argue that point. Who knows, perhaps Sacramento and Springfield will become more than just a yearly rumor in the next year or two. At least mile followers will not have to bank just on these two alone to fulfil what most people consider the best racing of all. Next time around we'll take a look at the National T.T. situation and the tracks in general that are running.