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/126013
; 11:1 • ~ g t' an r- - Wyman Priddy , fresh off the Kawasaki Team and riding a Bultaco , suffered a minor seizure during his first ride on a Pursang and said, "I guess it 's tir ed like me." Wyman 's not telling how tired th at ' might be. TH Texas motorcyclists are eligible fo r a 10-percent red uction in th eir insu rance premiu ms upon graduat io n f ro m t he eight hou r National Safe ty Council defe nsive driving co urse and it s two hou r su pple me nt o n motorcycle s. Th e 10 pe rcent reductio n comes alo ng just in time to be wiped ou t by the State Board of Insur an ces' 14-percent increase. Ci') 00 C'J l-4 Butch Lee's semi-serious remark at the Carlsbad Four Stroke MX National: "This is a preview of wh at it'll be like under the new emissions standards.t' It was fun racin g. all right , but four stroke dirt bike design has a lot of catching up to do to match the tw o stroke 's rough-ground han dling capabilities. Instead of the govern men t outlawing two stro kes, the ring -ding followers migh t want to outla w the govern ment . Mo re po rtra its . . . Pete r Starr's " Po rtrait of a Champion " film will be shown in Dallas, Ft. Wo rth, Hou ston, and Waco du ring the week p rior to th e Lake Whitn ey T ran s AMA. ClJ ..0 0 Th e Will Ro gers Co liseu m indoor short track in Ft. Worth has bee n cance lled until a be tter sy stem o f ventilat ion can be arran ged for cow barn No . Eight . The 1f16th mile track is not a blu e groo ve course. It is more like a blue air track. ..... u 0 The infamous Checkers' million-dollar lawsuit finally cam e to a head, three days before the Check Chase , with a hung j ury. That means nobody got rich except the lawyers, and the club is apparently out of the woods. Yamaha has released to the European p ress pictures of next year's "off·she lf" privateer 350 road racer. Designated the YZR 350. it features the can tilever monoshock rea r de veloped fo r last year's European works bikes. Also in the Euro-press, rumors that MV Agusta might lay off GP racing fo r a year to work the bugs ou t of the ir water-cooled flat four ; and Phil Read cham ping at the bit, trying to get them to go ahead and develop it on th e circuit. Next year's Eu ropean Sherpa T "250s" will be 238cc instead of the present 244 to get under French legislati on that puts bikes under 240cc in a significantly lower tax bracket. Wish our government would do something similar for our elephant cars. Though po sters went out o n it. we 've been notified that the Antelope Valley Fairgrounds MX scheduled for October 26 is can celled . Had to do with conflict of schedules with repaving the spectators areas . . Good new s for Rawh ide Park fans . the park will reopen for sport rid ing the coming week, under new mangement. The new leaseholder plans to revamp the MX course soon. California Se nato r Alan Cranston, speaking on behalf of S-2293, the helmet law repealer: "The safety of the general driving public is not enhanced by a mandatory motorcycle helmet law. The publ ic safety is better served by t he State's strong licensing program for motorcyclists. motorcycle drive r education courses in the schools. th e continuing safety programs of motorcy cle clu b s . a nd enforcement .• • " Right on. Senator. 01' Evel, bouncing back from his English tour, will try ju mping 14 American " standard" busses (a bit different from the Whitworth varie ty ) at Kings Island in Ohio October 25. Idaho riders concerned about land use and lan d closure should get in touch with Bob Creighton, Idaho MotorcYclists' Assn ., P.O. Box 5836, Boise, Idaho 83705. The group has been quite active in attending land-use meetings, adv ising government agencies, and getting the biker's side of th ings ai'red in the loca l press. Somebody in SoCaI has been discounting a lot of motorcycles. Overall, 3. 7% o f all vehicles registered in California are motorcycles. During ' August, 38,931 cars were registered in Los Angeles; 9800 bikes - one bike for every four cars . Wave when you see each other on the road. In Alp ine County du ring August, six and one cars were registered, mo torcycle. Must be peaceful up there. Califronia's State Lands Commission, headed by executive officer William Northrop, was reported to be pressuri ng for transfer of 16 million acre s of BLM land to state j urisdic tion. No reason was given in th e report except, to quote Northrop, "The BLM is just not taking We heard via the L.A. TImes that the SoCai MC has been den ied its race permit on grounds of no permission fro m landowners. requests from consideration." Beginning October 1. all new BMWs w ill carry a one year warranty instead of six months. the states into Both California's guy an d ex-guv appear to have had it with top heavy bureaucracy. Ronald Reagan , in a panel d iscussion with Ralph Nader, specifically drew the line against helmet legislati o n. Nader agreed with Reagan about big government, but then disagreed on the thrust of mandatory helmet laws, saying " more than self-protection is at issue." Seems our pious consumer advocate accepts top·heavy bureaucracy when it's assoc iated with some pet project of h is. 2 Citizens Band Channel 'l 4 will be used October 31 through Novem ber 2 to carry information and dire cti ons for th e Rand Area clean u p th at weekend. The work proj ect is a combined effort of M.O.R.E. , CORVA, BLM, and several four-wheel er clubs. Amateur road racers who want to go to Daytona next year must run the Amateur qualifier series this year. That's th e un varn ished wo rd - only the top ten in each o f nine classes in each of the three AMA Regio ns can enter the Amate ur Championships during Daytona Classic Week. Central Region 's standings are set (full rundown nex t week in Central Sectio n); Atlantic Region has one m ore qualifier to go ; and Pacifi c Region has tw o , both at Phoenix , October 25-26 and December 7-8. If you don 't qualify . d on't load up for Daytona unless yo u go t a pro license. Some pro license holders are running in th e AMA Amateu r road race qualifiers for fu n & games - no po ints. We rece ived a poster for the KOI L-Omaha Trans'AMA advertising riders Gemit Wolsink , J im Pomery , and Tony DeSte fano. Luckily Trans·AMA competition is nothing like a spelling bee. The propo sed AMA Amateur ro ad race class structures have been accepted by the Westervill e hierarchy, but the modified classes (Cafe) will be plugged into the Showroom St ock formulas instead of the GP disp lacements as originally submitted. Full details next week. Stadium motocross is a possiblity for . Southern Oregon. A committee of C.C. Riders were given the green light by the Douglas County Fair Board at Roseburg, to construct a motocross track on the present car racing track and half mile area. (With its shiny, new covered grandstands where spectators can keep dry and comfortilble. instead of fac ing Oregon's famou s Liquid Sunshine.1 The C. C. Riders are in the process of laying out a track and work is expected to begin immediately thereafter. Watch Calendarl Wanna try your hand at mo to rcycle drag racing? Th e Golden Gate Motorcycle Nationals in Fremont, California, on November 1-2, and the Hot Bike Nationals a t Irwindale, Califo rnia, on Novemb er 7-9, will feature " dial your own bracket " classes which anyone can enter. Dirt b ikes as well as stre et machines. Contact the A.\1DRA at PO Box ISO , North Hollywood, CA 91603. Or call the m at 213/374-1007. Pat Hennen will join Steve McLaughlin's Team Armor All in 1976. The team hopes to contest all four AMA nationals. as well as 13 European races. Th e Sou th west Cham pionship Road Race is defin itely on for Decem ber 14 at Oak Hill Raceway in Hende rso n, Texas. Oak Hill, originall y des igned for 135 mph go-karts, is "v irgin terrain " for motorcycle ro ad rash ers. Th e Central Ro ad Race Club will ho st th e even t on the two-mile, eight-turn circui t. Bill Wright of Sandak was to have donated trophies to the top three in each class of Ascot's final point standings. Since Ascot cancelled last Friday night. the trophies may now be o btained from Elsinore Raceway on Saturdays. or by calling Sandak at 714/870-5220. u.s. ISDT teams bounce b c from ak 'Crazy Monday; DOUGLAS, ISLE OF MAN , ENGLAND In the week th at followed " Crazy Monday," th e disasterous opening day of the 50th International Six Day Trials, the U.S. Trophy and Vase teams as well as a determine d band o f privateers registered outstanding performances, Th e World Trophy team, ex cluded from th e possibility of garn ering a winning score following Tom Penton's early retirement, struggled from the bottom of the list (11th) on Monday nigh t to a cre dible sixth by the week's end. J ack Pen to n led the team effort, placing seven th overall in the individual scores behind one West German and four Czech contestants. Jack placed third in his class and was the only American to break into th e top 20 overall. Silver Vase Ossa teamsters overcame the collisions with four wheel vehicles (M arkowitz and LaVoie), one machine failure in a cri tical special test section (Cutler) and a fifth day DNF (Vincent) due to motor failure. The Vase team had joined the Trophy team riders Not a t rials bike, but th is Bultaco stunt bike used bY Briti sh motocrosser David Taylor to entertain road race crowds. was the cu lprit in Barry Sheene's leg injury just before Ontario. Barry borrowed it to practice wheelies and .. .