Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Local hotline cont'd. All-star day at ORA By Dale Brown CALI FORNI A CITY , CAL .• MA R. 2 Alth ough Kevin Hast en was the fast est o f a large gro up o f Ex pe rts tha t sho wed up fo r the ORA Triple Hare Scrambles, Bob Balentin e too k advan ta ge o f the brea ks th at came h is way an d won Overall. But for t he first two loops Hasten (4 00 CZ) was clearl y in contro l. He led it fro m t he bomb and completed the firs t 22- mile lo op in 25 minutes. He dropped it in the motocross area, pi cked th e bike up , adj usted the bars a n d was out of the pits before second place To m Brooks (360 Bul ) cam e into th e finish area. Balentine was runnin g in fifth , behind Benny Padilla (25 0 Yam) and Rick Sh irey (360 Yam ). On th e second loop Balentine (ru nning a Husk y 250 GP frame and engi ne with a wid e-ratio six -speed tra ns m ission ) moved up to oc cu py second. Hasten had a minute and a h alf lead when he started out on the third loop . Near the smokebomb , ho wever, disaster struc k. Hasten 's front ' brake cable snagged, lo cked t he brake full on and sen t him into a brutal high speed crash. He lost a co up le o f minutes there an d though shaken up, he co n ti nue d on for second overall and first Open Expert. Padilla nursed · a sic k transmission aro und the last loop and held on to third. Wayne Cook (250 Hon) moved up from ninth on the first loop to fourth at the finish. Bill Conroy and his new 400 Yamaha maintained a stea dy pace fo r fifth . Sh irey ended up sixth . Brooks lost his chain . A.C. Bakken (360 Hus) , Mark Adent (250 Pen) an d Dave Lap raik (250 Yam) all worked their way up from horrid starts to fin ish seventh, eigh th and ninth respectively. Dwayne Car ter (3 50 Hon) finishe d 10th on his quadrastroke . Usually th ere is an Am at eur and/or a Novice in the to p 10, but with all th e Experts on hand, they were back in the pack. Bob West got a new Ossa Desert 250 Phantom and rode it to first Ama te ur. Jim Artz (4 00 Yam) led the No vices. Very fe w Beginners m ad e three loops, but Monty Lee (25 0 Bul ) did and he won, with Donald Holmes (2 50 Hon) and Danny Jones 1lI (4 00 Hus), runners-up. The co urse was very fast , with a lot o f fifth gear trails, alon g with sandwashes and so me n ice sharp ro cks in a few pla ces to serv e as spice . The start was delayed because three idio ts in a van were overcooking it down th e dirt road to camp an d they lost con trol, flipped and had to be ta ke n to th e hospital. C'mon fo lks, do your racing wh en the banner drops. • Resu lts in Results Sec ti o n. Looks like Bob Balenti ne knows he's won. Tired of look ing at moto rcycles? Take a break. • public roads. A tech inspection was held to insure each bike was properly ·eq uippe d with horn , mirror. license plate . spark arreste r, and a working stoplight. The schedule called for speeds of 12 to 30 MPH averages wh ich was quit e reasonable. However, it did not include total milage for either loop so y o u had to guess wh ether th e signs would reflect to tal milage or loop milage. 1 It t urn ed out to be total milage. A rather strange rule stated that if y o u came in to th e finish of the firs t lo op late, y ou couldn 't start the second lo op until the amount of tim e you were late had elapsed. Their reasoning was to give everyone a 30-minute break between loops. This pl ay s ha vo c with the guys on th e c ou rse trying to timekeep while the late riders ar e trying to pass and catch up. The first loop started off at a fairl y easy 18 MPH average. Fun, windey trails that wo und over the hills and splashed through small streams made it a pleasant ri de . At th e three mile speedometer ch eck everyone was moaning. Just ab o ut every rider was coming up with 2.6 or 2. 7 error. Th at 's a lo t of error to dial in. The first check was located at 6.6 miles and caugh t some riders by su rp rise. Soon after the ch eck we came o ut onto a paved ro ad and th e avera ge kicked up to a brisk 30 MPH. The ro ad was an y th ing but st raight, so you had to keep it dialed-on to m aintain th e average. Th e ro ad went over the La Panza summit and dropped down in to The 25th Annual Hi-Mountain Enduro By Larry Langley Guess what minute the se guys are on and we will give you a rub ber duc kie. SANTA MARAGRITA, CAL. , MAR. 2 V. Carter is determined to prove that four str okes are NOT nose-heavy. This year marked th e resurgan ce of the Hi Mountain Enduro. Th e last two years had been bummers for the Cal Poly Penguins, sponso rs o f th e annual for est fest. A rain -out two years ago almost bankrupted th e small club wh en they had to .rerun it, and last ye ar they had less than 75 ent ries wh en they tried to cater to ju st the local riders. This year 250 or so showed up. The pits were located on the edge of the Los Padres National Forest just off Highway 58 abo ut 20 miles east of th e small town of San ta Margarita, in th e beautiful La Panza Mountains. 18 A threat of rain hung over the ra ce which had everyone worried. Th e club told me t he rangers would cancel the enduro if th ere was .0 15 inches of rain. Sunday dawned foggy but no rain was in sight and the fog had burned off before the 9 :0 1 st art. Riders were required to have street legal b ikes as part of the co urse was to be run on th e lovely Poz o farmland ar ea. We made a big loop and came bac k into the National Forest an d got back on to a trail and th e second check. Now onto som e really scenic trails which ran up in to th e rid ges. The average was a sedate 15 MPH wh ich wa s very easy to main tain. We were reall y enj oy in g o urselves wh en we ca me up on a ridge and faced a bad b o ttlenec k. Unfortunately there was no way around. The trail led up a small hill and some riders were having an d blocking it. Thick tr ouble un derbrush prevented fmding a way around. Th e only thing you could do was wait in line until y ou had a ch ance to m ak e a run at it . The minutes ticked away , putting us further and further beh ind. When we finally got over it 1 hit th e next chec k 11 minutes late. As it turned out the bottleneck decided the enduro. A number of rid ers on the late numbers ze roed the co urse except for th e check right after the bottleneck. Th e club had a strange attitu de about it. Th ey just said it was too b ad , the ch eck wasn 't going to b e thrown out. Further o n was a reall y nasty. long, rutted uphill whic h the club did figure would be trouble and had planned on it by keeping the average at a slow 12 MPH all the way to the finish . You had plenty of time to make up ti m e if you had trouble there . A 30 minute break and out on the second loop we went. The course was the same as the first loop, but at a higher average. What was fairly easy at 18 MPH was now flat out moving to keep on time at 24 MPH. If y o u m ade a mistake, yo u dropped out of y our minute . You knew there was going to be a check waiting and sure enough, just before the paved road, t he re it was. Made the big loop on the road again at the same 30 MPH average and we were wondering if the whole second loop was going to be the same as th e first when th e trail turned up into some new ridges. These were high razorback ridges with a view that you could see forever. At 12 MPH you had time to enjoy the view and still stay on your minute. Th ere was a chec k to ca tch the hot shoes and back we went onto some of the first loop trails again. The first loop b ottlenec k was a third gear hill this time ar oun d. The last check was just 5.8 m iles from th e finish. Th is made th e rest of the way free territory, and the race wa s on. On e of the local rangers was there on his new XL 175, observing. He was quite enthused with the enduro and hoped to open up even more trails with the cooperation of the local clubs. 1 hope the trail closure trend is being reversed in the ar ea . The club was scoring th e cards on the spot and awarded the trophies at 4 :30. . • Results in Results Sec tion. > UJ oJ G Z S > a: a:

• Cover