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/126023
counted . Agostini nipped Read at the end of the Gran Prix season to win his 15th Road Racing Championship . Motocross 125cc Class In its first ye ar of World Championship prestige the 125cc Suzuki of Gas ton Rahier to tally dominated the circuit winning 14 of 22 mo to s. Rahier claimed the t:-le early in the season and the battle for second was all that was at stake after six even ts . Andre Malherbe, two time 125 World Cup victor, was the odds-on-favorite at the season's b irth . 19 year old Malherbe's Zundapp was competitive, b ut the new RA-125 Suzuki and the Gra n Prix experience of Rahier proved , too m uch for the youngster to handle. The only event of any co ntroversy was the so und thrashing given to the Europeans by American National ' Ch am pio n Marty Smith at the US round of the World Championships. Rahier claimed t hat the track was too smooth, too fast and that "Things wo uld be different in Europe." A minor uproar of American ethnocentrism took nothing away from the Belgia ns championship year. Rahier hop es to ret urn to t he 250 class next year. 250cc Class With the decline of Joel Robert and the injury to 1974 World Champion Gennady Moisseev the 250 World Motocross Championship was open to more competition than it has ever seen. 250 Puch rider Harry Everts claimed the crown after a season long duel with Willi Bauer, Hakan Andersson, and the old man of motocross Adolf Weil. Bauer held th e points lead from the second event with a series of co nsisten t seco nd and third place finishes . F.I.M. sco ring goes on th e best 14 motos out of th e 22 moto long season. Young Everts, riding a motorcycle that isn't related to produ ction ma chinery, scor ed err atically, but wh en he scored it was no rmally a win. Jaroslav Falta was unable to co me up to last years form, when he lost the title to Mo isseev b ecause o f protests, h ard riding and politics, and finished out of the top ten. Joel Robert, six time World Ch ampion, finished the season in ninth. Harry Everts is the classic underdog World Champion. The Belgian rides for a small Austrian factory that produce s m 0 -p e d s and tiddler class dirt equipment. 500cc Class The ferocious battle between the gregarious Roger DeCoster and serious Finn Heikki Mikkola pic ked up righ t where it let off in 1974. Last years championship was decided in the final event after DeCoster suffered a season of incredible bad luck. DeCoster stalked his fourth world Championship with a vengence, The fierce Finn gave it all he had, but DeCoster rolled up an unca tch ab le series of moto wins and avoided last years gre m lin s, The heartbroken Mikkola managed to keep his Husky close in points, but in the process of selecting the best motos it was all Roger DeCoster. DeCoster, the champion in 1971, 1972 and 1973 scored first, second or not at all . With five events remaining on the calendar Roger D. had his fourth title sewn up. The R-Series 370 Suzuki proved again to b e th e dom in ant Gran Prix machinery after a y aer of sorting out. The 1974 minimum weight limit had wre ck ed havoc on the development of the GP bikes. DeCoster, a cap ab le R&D rider, took the works bike to th e World Championship and finall y into mass production. National champions motocross 125cc Nat ional Class Honda's Marty Smith clin ched his second I25cc Nat ional Championship in the most impressive display of racing performances in American Motorcycle Association history , Smith, the 1974 National Champion, started slowly in the mud at Hangtown and then caught fire to win everything in sight, including the 125 U.S. Gran Prix an d a record setting 12 straight National motos. 18 year old Marty won every moto from the second ra ce of the series and was headed b y o nly a small number of riders, and only for short periods of time. Touted as the first American World Champion, young Marty Smith, who rode into the top ten in all three classes t his year, has e normous potential. 250cc National Class In a fight to the finish Pennsylvania's Tony DiStefano and Texan Kent Howerton carried the drama out to the last l aps of the final 250 round. Howerton turned in two tremendous moto performances at Lake Whitney, but it was overshadowed by Tony D's powerful riding. DiStefano , in his first year on the factory Suzuki Te am, also won the Florida Winter ·Series, West Texas 10,000, and the Inter -AMA series. The tall and strong Easterner has taken his sudden rise to fame with modesty and st yle. 500cc National Class Five riders b attled throughout th e five ra ce series for th e Nat io nal Open Championship . Suzuki's Billy Grossi, J immy Weinert , Ma i c o ls Steve Stackable , Pierre Karsmakers, and Kent Howerton came to th e final race of the year in New Orleans with a title shot. 1974 National Champion Jimmy Weinert took hom e all the marbles for a second time by winning New Orleans and setting himself in the position of the dominant power in Open class competition. For the Jammer it is the sweet smell of success, made all that better because everyone had a shot and he got the prize. Observed trials 17 year old Marland Whaley won · t h r e e of the nine National Championship Observed trials rounds to ni p Yamaha's Don Sweet for the Ch amp i o n s h ip. Whaley, riding the factory Honda four-stroke , trials proto clearly showed the way home by winning the final round in Oklahoma with only 6 points lost. His nearest competitor ' was fifteen marks off Whaley's sweltering pace. Whaley, from California , becomes one of the youngest National Champions in AMA history. 1974 National Champi on Lane Leavitt fell back to finish fourth for the year as the competition gets intense in the plonker set. • Whaky Weinert Everts DiStefano