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/125835
• • • = • I II I II ~ g C(') , r-.. O'l ~ 0 C'l 1-0 ~ ..0 E ~ ;> 0 Z Top bike _ the 400 HUlqvarna of A.C. Bakken and Mitch Mayes. A.C. shared vic:tory in his fint ever ride in one of the big Baja events. dark. The same duo won this year's Baja 500 on a DKW. Night in Baja. If it's clear, there are 50 million stars that provide scant comfort to the biker. If it's foggy, which it sometimes is down on the southern coast, visibility is gone as the comparatively feeble lights from the motorcycles are diffused in the gray mist. No matter what the weather, it is a scary experience. It is usually in the first hours of darkness that the bulk of the fast cars start to catch and pass the bikes. Even the quartz-iodine headlamps specially rigged on Baja bikes look like a shadow when backlit by the 50,000 candlepower illumination banks on the fronts of the four-wheelers. When the cars do get past, there is instant white-out as the gray, hanging dust billows in front so that seeing the front wheel is a major chore. The very good riders say that is easier to go fast at night since you don:t have anything to distract you. What you do have is a dancing beam of light that sometimes illuminates the course, the 'spiny witches' fingers of ocotillo that leap out to grab you, and sudden flights through the air caused by a rock you never saw. It is easy to overshoot the turns if Y0l!'re really cooking it, like just about everyone is, and then you're off in the rocks and cactus and mesquite, bouncing and struggling for control. Getting lost at night is amazingly simple, particularly after hours of riding and a mind drugged with fatigue poisons. Sam and Gene Dempsey are two brothers who have been entering their 650 Triumph desert machines in Baja events for years. Success has always eluded them until this year. They led the Baja 500, eventually finishing second, and managed to wrestle the big Limey bike to a second overall motorcycle f'mish this year in the 1000. Just when everybody had about written them off as a serious threat t the mature, experienced brother team is starting to enjoy the success they have sought 'for so long. Dick Vick and Niles Ussery, winners of this year's Baja 300, were teamed with Steve Hurd on a Husqvarna. They never got to ride when the Motoplat ignition on the Husky went out with Hurd in the saddle on the first leg. This was the first time that three man teams had been allowed for the 1000 under the new rules of the Baja Sports Committee and there was some experimenting with the concept. l.t was still the two man teams that prevailed. Dick Vick said, "Two strong riders will be better than three since a guy then has a chance to get attuned to the bike and find his rhythm to push it a little faster. " Second 125 to finish in La Paz was a Mexican team sponsored by Carabela. J Gene Dempsey came thu!1dering into a twisting downhill section on his 650 Triumph sled. He got a little out of shape in the second tum. But got a fOot down and rode the big thumper over the edge (and the rocks) to head off cross· country and finish second bike. "