Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Four in one week! High School Motocross keeps coming on stronger High School MX comes of age / By Rex William Reese SANTA A NA , CA L., A PRIL 20 It's been alm ost a year since the first high scho ol motocross and th e art o f putting one on has imp ro ved. High school MXs are n o w suc cessful, an d th ey're spreading like th e proverb ial wildfire. Su ch was the case at Saddleback High Sch ool. Early arrivals at Elsinore find a smooth, well manicured scrambles track ready for a long Saturday night of racing. . Smooth track and pit squids at Elsinore TT By Greg Cain ELSIN O RE, CAL., APRI L 20 It is fine to be able to visit a race track and come back, sit down at the typewriter and put together a . report with nothing but nice things in it. There are times, however, when this is not possible. Some of th e things that wen t on a t Elsino re Raceway Saturday nig h t before las t could stand some im p rovemen t and sh o ul d be p o in ted out. Now d on't get m e wro n g - th e trac k is a b ea u t iful , we ll-kep t, fas t p lace to rid e. T he b est thi ng that can b e said abou t a ny scrambles t rack is t hat ' th e m anagernen t caters to the riders . Els ino re's manage ment does. If so mething big com es up d uring a ra ce th at affects the riders. they call a riders' m ee tin g and the problem is discussed an d voted u pon. Majo rity ru les at Elsi nore. Each engine size category is broken down into eno ugh separate classes th at a rider doesn't hav e to race against people who are far more skilled than he or she. This helps to make the ra ce s close as well as more fair for the younger riders. Raci ng at night is great - n o dust. Randy Bird smoked the 100 Experts . d igging a little t rench with h is left footpeg as he went. Bu t th e races were barel y under way when th ere was a lo ud crash in the p it area. In an al most co mpletely unlighted sectio n , two m otorcy cl es ha d run head -o n in t o each other, pu t tin g bo th riders in the ho spi tal . Pit race rs are often a p roblem and th e p rom o te r cannot always be bla me d fo r acciden ts lik e this. Wa tching o ver 160 rid ers can get difficul t at times and so it is up to the pe ople w ho are in th e pi t s to prevent pit racin g. Accidents on the track may be u na void ab le, be cause the y o cc ur un d er racing con di ti on s. But accidents in the pi ts are unforgivable . The prob lem with cat ering to t he riders is that the p rogram runs m uch too lon g and ca uses d elays and problems with scoring and everything . Not getting away from the track until afte r 1 :3 0 a.m . can be tolerated, barely , because th e races a t Els inore are well worth watching. All in all , if you have an urge to rid e TT scrambles (sm oo th mo to cross wi th progressive scoring), you will find Elsinore a very good place to begin. Most District 37 AMA scrambles run on the same track for p oints on Sundays. Results T R O PH Y W INNERS 70Cc NOV : 1. MiChael Pet erso n (Hon) . 2 . Rob Beach (Hon) . 80Cc NOV : 1. John Murph y (Vam) . 2 . Eri c Lu nd (Hon). M I N I A M : 1. Shawn McConnell (HOn) . 2 . D o u g N ic o l (H o n ) . i o oee B E.G : 1. Betty Welcher ( Kaw) . 2 . R i ck Marksta d t ( V a m) . 3 . D an ny Meyer ( Ka w ). IO Oce N O V : 1. Pe t e r Wankel (H o n). 2 . Keith Grant (H On) . 3 . Greag Faulkner (Kaw) . 100 E X : 1. R andy Bird (Kaw) . 2 . Pa u l McPherson (V am) . 125 B E G : 1. Carl o s Morga n (Hon) . 2 . Mark Lan d gree n (Pe n) . 3. D av i d Messimer (Suz). 125 NOV : L M ike Bird (Yam) . 2 . S tan K in sey (Ya m ) . 3 . Jim Fe lton (Pe n ) . 125 A M : 1. Jeff Spr i n gm an ( Y am ). 2 . Ste ve W a sk o sk i ( Vam) . 3 . Tony W an k et (Hen } . 10 1 25 EX : 1. D o n Gri gsb y (V am) . 2. Ma rk Pr e scott { v arni25 0 B EG : • J ack N ewm an (Ha n ). 2. Mark Mei ne r ( V am ) . 3 . M i tch B o g ue (Ma n ) . 25 0 A M : 1. C li n t Palmer (OSS). 2. Jim J in ge rs o ll ( Vam) . 3 . ~ar y Smith ( vam). 250 N OV : 1. Richard Pickens ( Yam) . 2. Gary Fee ner (OsS). 3. Greg Zehmer (Vam). OPEN N OV : 1. Tom Noceri no (Trl) . 2 . Robert R i ff l e (Hus) . O PEN EX : 1. Keith Moss (Vam) . 2. J im Wr igh t (Bul) . SPEC NOV : 1. Jim In gersoll ( V am ) . 2 . Dan M oin er (Yam) . 3 . St eve B la c k m an ( Han ) . S PEC EX : 1. D en n i s J u nker (Ya m) . 2 . J i m W r igh t ( B ul). o I j us t kne w th ey had ' it all together wh en I came u p an d ide ntified my self, an d they sai d, " Give this b o y a press pass!" Far o ut ! I'll put it u nder m y pillow next to my petrified iguana. The whole thing was e ngineered by jon Scott an d Tony Sandru, who really m ov ed their tails to m ake it all wo rk. They face d the same o ld proble ms like everybody else with ignorant school officials a nd red tape. But thro ugh sheer determination, they did it . In the p its , the usual stuff wen t on except fo r one thing: no pit racers at all! Maybe the kids reall y wanted to impress people. Maybe it was the friendly cop th at patrolle d p it al ley a few ti mes. A good PA system kep t every body cl ued in an d thanks to an no uncer j a y Sheldon, n obody had any p roble ms u nd e rs tanding the day's eve nts. A n a mbula nce was p rese n t, which un fortunatel y had to be u sed twice during th e d ay . Foxy yo u ng high sc hool c hicks d id the score kee ping a nd a b it o f zoot-class was ad de d with p ro grams th at gave a lineup o f the riders tha t d ay , sponsors, and a short h ist ory of MX . T he track on a vacan t fie ld n ex t to th e schoo l was set up by jon an d Tony, with some help from Pete Maly, who was also a n invited guest for the halftime race. Traction on th e track was really super, and no complaints. Pete said that this was the b est high school MX track he h ad ever ridden. Dur ing practice, a rider fe ll into one of the mud holes on the course and had to be taken to t he hospital. Th e ill-fated hole was quickl y taken out. And better yet, the kid didn't br eak a ny t hing and was soon releas ed fro m the hospital. The first class o ff was th e 100-125s, and at the flag drop Marty Morris (Bul) had zapped into th e lead and hel d it. Closest behind him was C. Ho le (Bu l) and third place was Rick Rassm usson (Ha n) . In the 100s, I hate to say it, but it was a real slow ra ce all day long between T yrone Trapp (Yam) and Debby Cruz (Suz) . As the day went on, the crowd of spectators grew. At its peak, t he crowd rea ched over 1.000. Pe op le w ere sitting on wal ls. roofs and hanging off telepho ne po les to get a good loo k a t t he races. Wit h that ki nd of t u rnout , everybody was rea lly p um ped. 250 action was interest ing. T ony Sandru (Ya m) lo o ked lik e he had it , ma de fo r th e d ay, d o ing so we ll that he wo uld slow down to show a b u ddy of h is ho w to go fast in a ce rta in spot , th en be rse r k it a way. Unfortu nately Tony . pulled a DN F in one m o t e , an d a decisio n by the scorekeepers on D N Fs put him out totally. Underdog of the day was Fred Hassen russ on an almost box-stock Kawasaki 250 F- Il. A ll Fre d di d was take off the ligh ts an d p u t on some num be rs, and that was it. H e d id a grea t job in al l th ree rnoto s, "!,,d. gai ne d the undivided at te n tio n of the ra ce fans. The Op en class had some real aca de mics going for it. Ron Lovel ad y rode a 500 Yamm ie to domina te the class all day long. The big bi ke m ad e instant berms all over the place as he jetted aro und the cou rse . During the last lap of the final Open class m o t a , Dave Collins di d an en d a as he passed th e scoring ta ble. As he go t up everyth ing loo ked okay , b ut when Clu b Advisor jerry White go t to h im , Dave co llap sed and went into sh oc k. A re al ly b ad scene, an d o ff to the h osp ital . Everybody was sw eatin g it be ca use th a t was t he sec o nd injury o f th e d ay th at ne eded an ambulan ce . Eve rythi ng went o ff be tter t han exp ected , a nd everybody was real ly im p re ssed . T he kids who ca me o u t t o see it sai d the y t ho ug h t it was better than foot ball. j on Sco tt, Tony Sandru, an d some hel p from Mr. j erry White made th e whole th ing work. R igh t no w jon an d Tony are so stoked t hat they ar e planning to do another one soon ! • Cypress High School MX By Tom Corley CY PRESS, CAL., APRIL 24 Within 45 minutes no tice fro m a Cycle N ews edi tor I rus hed down to see what was happening Wednesday in the sports d epartment at Cyp ress High. It wasn 't j ust anot her athletic event that was taking place bu t instead th ey fired off a new sport , high school mo tocross! . Like in m o st cases of school MX bat tles , there were only a few known ho ts h oes an d only a few names rung a school bell when I glanced o ver the schedule. A co m m on victor at Orange County International Raceway and Saddleback Park named Bob Quintin As the h igh sch o ol motocross moves to pe rmanent p ro fess ional facilitIes. the competition looks a lot like other young hotshoe MXers. Steve Ba ue r dominated school night at Corona. z ;: o a: In UJ .J < o

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