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/126047
DPRIX By Dave Coates G ILA BEND, ARIZ., MAY 2 The heat should have been off of a lot of good riders since Bob Rutton, last year's winner of the ADRA sponsored Gila Bend Grand Prix, w as un able to atten d. But as race day came, an d th e the rmom ete r p ushed into the p ost 100 degree ran ge, the event became an en d ura nce race for both bike s and riders as on ly 96 of t he 330 st ar ters finished. - .. . (Top) The streets of Gila Send looked Iike ,Sunday in the desert. (Above) Earl Roeseler (H·D) was first 125 and fifth overall . Austen Haydis (25 0 Yam) o utlasted an d ou tran the survivors to finis h first ~verall Ex pert and . head ed up the pay line fo r the $ 100 prize m on ey. Riders left t he start in eight t hree minute interva ls. The Experts ran four laps ar oun d the 25 m ile (actually 27.3 'mile ) co urse, while all other classes, Austin Haydis outran 330 competitors and 100 m iles of sand and heat t o win. I .~ I 81 91 > « o >Cl III o 1- 1 10 .~ ~I excep t the Po wder Pu ffs, ra n t h ree laps. The Powder Puffs we nt only two laps and th e lo ne finisher was Sandra Anthony (Hon). Hayd is took an early lead in t o the firs t check point, 10 miles across the flat, sandy co urse . Kir k Ko ntilis (250 Hus) was running a close second with Dave Mille r (Hus) holding do wn third. Somewhere between the first and second checkp o in ts Kontilis found his opportunity and got around Haydis to take' over the lead. For the better part of the first three loops Kontilis and Haydis ran . unchallenged while third place moved to Rex Harelson (250 Yam) in the second lap after Miller had some bike problems. On the second lap, Haydis crashed hard into an unforgiving railroad trestle abutment and just abo u t quit , but he soon recovered and restarted without lo sing his position . Kontilis was still running strong, stretching his lead while Haydis was down but on the th ird lap , jus t short of homecheck , Haydis got his break when Kontilis' bike she d its chain twice with in a brief period. T he second ti me arou nd he wa s unab le to res ta rt his mo un t af te r replacing t he chain and became a dropout statistic as Hayd is regained t he le ad . Harelson mo ved into second, Will Barri er (Yam) 'slid fro m . fo urth . to th ird and Marty Haak (250 Hus ) moved in to fourt h. The to p fo ur stayed in o rde r th rough th e finish. Earl Roeseler (125 H. D) picked up first 125 Expert and fifth overall . !\Iiller workedhis prob lems out and r ode to a sixth ovc.. II, second Open Expert behind Barrier. Ted Fields (Ya m ) look seventh overa ll and third Open Expert. Dan Peloso (DDe) ra n eighth. J im Ha rsha (I7 5 Hu s) an d Dave Dean (Hus ) rounded o ut ninth · an d te n th . Ha rsha also t o o k fir st 175 Ex pert. Only 12 riders o ut of th e field of about 50 Experts were able to co m p lete the race. It was pretty evenly d i vi d e d between m e c h an ic a l breakdowns along the hot, sandy course and those done in by the heat. The top overall Amateur ride was lo gged by Clyde Stewart (Suz), who also grabbed first Open Amateur. Gary Baily (125 Yam) pushed to second overall and first 125 Amateur. Grover Ward (Hus) was third overall and second Open Amateur. An unofficial award should have gone to George Brent (350 Hon) · for maintaining that tuff old desert rider facade under even the most trying circumstances. Shortly after the start, Bre nt center-punched a fallen rider and survived an endo to continue the race af te r his bike appeared to have made i through the experience u nscathed. Three mil es short of ho m echeck the bi ke ca ug ht fire, Brent bailed off, and wa tched as his m achin e sen t a very expensive smo ke signal to the sweep-riders. UNot everything 's lost ," sa id Brent. " I sti ll have 36 pre t ty good alu m inum spo kes on t he rear wheel." , In sp ite of the heat at this year's race, rid ers in last year's Gila .Bend co mpetition said there's been an improvement in th e co urse . Officials of . last year's ra ce discovered, a s did many of the riders, t hat it's hard on bodies and bikes to start over 300 riders o n a 90 mile per hour through town stretch that funnels in to a series of narrow underpasses a n d tunn els . -