Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

m uch about bikes, but it gave Debbie and girl ra cers some nice exposure. FOR HO RS EPOWE R FREAKS : You'll be im pr essed t o know that a 984cc Yos h i m u r a -p re pared Kawasa ki Z-1 showed 84.61 ho rse power on Webco's d y no at 8 ,500 R PM. T hat's rea r wheel ho rsepower, too. Torq ue pe ak wa s at abo ut 7500 RPM where it di d a maxim u m of 54.26 ftAbs. Webco's dy no is one of the standards of t he in d ustry, so that ki nd of readi ng boggles the b rain so me. Didn't break t he dyno either. Cycle News is ten years o ld today . Snore . If yo u m ad e a stack of all 500 issu es o f the paper so fa r, Yvon DuHame l co uld n 't see o ver th e t op, but Gar y Bail ey could, unless you ad de d Cycle New s Eas t to the stack , unless Gary is st anding on hi s bike. There are supposed to be like fifty million bicycles in the U.S.A. So how come you hardly ever see any being ridden? Right, it's work! But there are supposedly five million street-legal motorcycles in this same country. If you see ten a day on the road you're lucky. We wish everybody who has a motorcycle would ride it one day a week, say every Thursday. We wouldn't feel so lonesome. AL COHOLI CS BEWARE : When the gaso line ji tters st ruck, the speedway racers fel t lucky. T hey run on alco hol. T hen th ey learned tha t the alc oh o l they'd been b uying co mes from crude oil an d suddenly it's scarcer than petrol! Here 's wh at you do , guys: stir up a vat of sugarwat er , sp it in a hal f-chewed raisin , let it fe rment a fe w days, the n seal it , cook it , and ru n the steam through a coppe r coil. Wha t drips out of the co pper is p ure go-j uice - 190 octane. (Or sho uld that say proo f?) Sears Point lnt'I. Raceway announces a paved practice course for ind oor short track riders. Track is open weekends, regular cycle park admission to ride. Need more info ? Call 707/938~533. T hen there's the Ph oen ix racer name d Joh n Elsinore who, of course, rides a Ho n da. IT BRINGS ON MANY CHANGES. The Puch works bikes will go to Har ry Everts, top Belgian in 1973 250 Grands Prix and German Herbert Schmitz, formerly on a 250 Maico. Uno Palm . rode well for Puch last year, a lso . Don't know if he'll sign again. It is also rumored that former 500cc World Champion Bengt Aberg is negotiating to ride a 250 OSSA in the 1974 World Championship. Christer Hammargren will switch from Yamaha to Kawasaki for the 500 GP rounds. It seems, so far, that Kawasaki couldn't get Willi Bauer, who will stay on a Maico. Are you taking notes? No 25 0 Maicos in the 1974 Grands Prix ? No 1974 Grand Prix? IT 'S A GIR L ! Seven t een year o ld Diane Co x of Salem, Or egon has become th e AMA 's first licen sed girl J unio r after o n l y o n e yea r o f Professional co m petit ion as a Novice. She fin ished 21 st amo ng Western R egio nal Novices. Her racing career started in 1969 and since the n she has first place in the McMin nv ille moto cr oss 125 Junior class and th e 100 class at the Ben to n Lane sm oo th track th in g. She score d 60 poin ts as a Novice " we ll over th e 4 0 req~ed fo r transfer , an d will be weanng a yello w n um be r pla te with 66Q on it. One editor just got his first ride on the DKW Wankel. He reports that it is the smoothest machine he ever rode, it gets about 33 MPG, lo o ks nice, handles better than he expected, has a very low center of gravity, and is just dandy fo r riding around town. The single ro t or model he rode sells for $1500, and a twin rotor model w ith f ifty horsepower (cla imed) is on the way. Mike Hartwig has joined t he Ya maha team of Pete Kar sm akers an d Tim Hart which gives Ya maha another strong team. The AMA has decided to rearrange the letters tacked on the end of riders' number plates to designate the riders' geographic origins. Before the National season begins we'll let you know what the new letters mean. Former National Champions get single d igit num ber s, and Mark Brelsford has chosen th e n umber six. Dick Mann is number t wo, Ro mero is three, Markel is fo ur (he has a license agai n th is year), Roger Re iman is five, Mert Law will is seve n, an d Gary Nixon is nin e. Unless num ber o ne pla te holder Kenny R ob er ts recaptures the titl e or Rei man or Markel re tire , Kenny is lef t with the n umber eight. Sammy Miller didn't renew his contract w ith the Bultaco factory . He may go to Honda to develop a trials bike for them. Norton Triumph is considering building a two stroke that reportedly overcomes m ost of the objections to two strokes. A firm in England called Piper is building an eight valve dual overhead cam head for 250 and 350 Honda twins. Die te r Brau n , the world 250 road racin g champion , may be signed by MV Agusta to replace Giacomo Agostini who signed fo r Yam aha. Giacomo Agostini 's younger brother Felice has been offered a water cooled 250 by Yamaha. Someth in g th at we just fou nd out about is T riu mph 's 560cc kit for the 500 BSA{friumph single . T he kit b o osts p ower by 50% (fro m 24 to 36 , we' re tol d). Sounds interesting. Harley won't have the 350 twins th is year for road racing because of cost. The 250 twin is up in the air, but it may happen. We certainly hope so, some competition in the lightweight programs could make National road races much more int eresti ng. Girl flat tracker Debbie Reon is featured in an article in "Cosmopoli tan n this mo n th along with so me o ther dar e-d evil type ladies. T he writer didn 't kn ow too Co ngressm an John Melcher fro m Montana called us fro m Washington o n Monday. He is Chairman o f the Pu blic Lands Subcommittee of the House Interior Committee , and wanted to te ll us about a heari n g on use of pu blic lands that hi s Subco m m ittee is h oldin g in R iversid e, California. After ga thering informatio n, hi s group will be writing legisla ti on to d irect th e Burea of Land Manageme nt (BLM) in admin istering p ub lic lands. T he law, called the BLM Organic Act , will cover use , access, and regulations. Anyone w ho wishes can ex press t he ir views at the R iversid e Cit y Museum Auditorium, Secon d Floor, 3 720 Or an ge St. in Riverside, at 10 a.m . J anuary II. You can submit written statements, but be prepar ed to su m marize an d answer q uestions. Meetings will also be held in La s Vegas on Thursday, January 10, at 10 a.m. in the Courtroom of the Federal Bui ldi ng, 300 Las Vegas Blvd. South. Kawasaki has cut back their racing budget in favor of a safety and education program, wh ich, we assume , they fee l will be called fo r by a new wave of unfamiliar riders t aki ng up motorcycling in response to the fue l shortage. Some \of road racing's hottest talent went looking for rides : Art Baumann, Cliff Carr and Gary Nixon (who won the most road races this year). Kawasaki is sponsoring one rider, Yvon DuHamel, who will h ave Ran d y Hall tunin g for him. Gary Nixon has gotten a Ya maha TZ-750 and with Erv Kanemoto t uning for him will have to be reckoned with more than ever. Art Baumann had just found out the nig ht before we ta lked to him that he had no Kawasaki ride but was ho pin g to get ho o ked u p with Mel Din esen and a TZ-750 , which wo uld make him something mind-boggling to deal with . Cliff Carr see ms to be looking ove r Suzuki. There will also on ly be one official Kawasaki motocrosser this year. It will be Jim Weinert and Ron Self turning the wrenches. DEATH TO THE RUMOR DEPT: J oh n Gennai denies that he is dead. We hear that Malcolm Smit h is working on flexible handlebars. It sounds strange at first, but if you think about it , you'll realize that your arms a nd shoulders receive a horrendous amount of shock transmitted to them f rom the suspension during bumpity riding. Some riders notice that when the rubber bushings, on machines th at have them around the handlebar mounts, wear out they fell more pummeled about the forearms and thereabouts t han they do after they have replaced them. We doubt that the bars will be made of soft rubber, however. THERE'S NO GETIING AWA Y FROM IT: Mo to rcy clin g th e world o ver has its pro blems. Recently so me Spania rds, members of the Ro yal Moto Clu b of Ca tal un a , rode u p to the Ne palese villages surrounding the T hyangboche m on as tery and created a furo r. T hey have become th e o bject of a great deal of criticism - not because they d id any envi ronmen tal damage , but because the Sh erp as (m ust be named after the motorcycle) who live there were taken by the bi kes, wh ich they'd never seen before. The bikies gave everyone rides, and the villagers have changed their thinking somewhat about w ha t they want out of life. Almost every SoCal event was cancelled this past weekend by sno w, rain, and m ud sl id e. The mini world cha mpionsh ips were run partially and will be continued next week (the folks fr om Tennessee go t ripped off ), and the Iron Ho rse Enduro was rescheduled for Su nday January 20 at the same lo cati o n. We hope t hat everyone took their weekend off to go ride in the snow . It 's a gas. Jan de Vries, the Dutchman who presen tly holds the world 50cc road racing championship, has announced his retirement. He gave as his reason the absence of co mpetition in th e class an d little chance of improvement of the situation . Cliff Carr has been spending the winter i n J a m a i c a, racing several bikes incl ud ing Suzukis. He may end up on Suzuki this year, especially with , the death of Cal Rayborn who was to be on the Suzuki team. I taly has decid ed to allow the use of alcohol in certain types of mo to rcycl e co mpetition, including road racing, if the fu el shortage continues. The new face in the CN editorial department belongs t o Lane Campbell (a lias "Cornfed" Campbell), who t raveled to Los Angeles from Burl ington, Iow a. Lane will be handling the all-important Calendar section. ' We left out Triumph in t he warran ty complain t chart in the last issue . Here it is : For warranty complaints, call Customer Service at 213/438-1514. If there is any raci ng this coming year, there won' t be a ny Kawasaki Co ntingency Program supporting it in a big way. But them green leathers sure are snappy. Been a lit tle confusion about an ad th a t ran in this paper last time around. The Pro Bowl of Motocross at OC IR is a six-race series with a $15,000 p urse for the series and $1500 plus goodies for each event. Riders who attended the riders' meeting knew all about that. T he guys w ho came all the way from Texas for the $15,000 race we re a bit confused. Maybe the fact that our ad department took that ad at a cocktail party had something to do with it . The 49th ISDT, tentat ively scheduled for 1974 in Ital y, mayor may not come down with the energy crisis and all. Triumph Motorcycles, Inc. and Norton Villiers Corporation will be merged into a single company, Triumph No rton, Inc. The two companies will be headquartered at Duarte , California an d Norton 's Paramount facilities will be closed. They also said tha t dealerships would be "realigned", which means we 're not sure what. Some dealers hips will be combined. Italian Walter Villa w ill probably be at Daytona aboard a su pe r light Italian prepared Triumph Triple. T here w ill be two Bultacos again co n testi ng the 250 Grands Prix . American J im Pomeroy wil l be back o n the Spanish machine a ttempting to better his seventh p lace finish of th e 19 73 season . Belgian veteran Mar cel Wiertz will apparently retire fro m GP com petition after 10 seaso ns bu t Britisher Vic Allan who has been enjoying recent successes racing in Eng lan d w ill be back on the GP cir cuit fo r Bultaco, Vic has the experience an d t he Bult aco fac tory tends to fav or him but Jim h as the res ults and t he spe ed. Evel Knievp.1 is in Hollywood taping a kiddie program series fo r TV. Naturally he needed a new car and couldn't decide between a gold Ferrari roadster and a silver one. So he bought 'em both. AND ALL THIS TIME WE THOUGHT IT WAS ETAOIN SH RDLU. According to the Briti sh press, Harley- Davi dson's Nu mber One road racer fo r 19 74 will be Gian fran co Bon er a, Mama m ia ! 5

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