Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

y Lane Campbell O LD BAR, WASH., J ULY 25 artin Lampkin (Bul), on a bike that others said "is so stockj r's sickening," made the Worl d Trials Championship a three-way race ' toward year's end by winnin g this seco nd ru nning of the Wagn er up; and Marland Whal ey ,' riding w ha t m ay so me day be you r basic 19 78 (or 1979 , o r .. . ) Hon da p ro duc t io n trialer , h me within six poin ts o f ma kin g hist o ry . "I took a co u ple of reall y stu pi d five s, in 13 and 14, o n the se cond loop ," Marland said. "And what 's worse , it was right in the easy parts, wHile m y mi nd was co nc en tr atin g on the ro ugh stuff ahead. " But for th ose two blemishes on an o therwise ste llar ride, he would have been the first American ever to win a world championship trials. Lampkin 's win gives him two wins, two seconds, two thirds to early points leader Malc olm Rathmell's three wins, one third an d Yrjo Vesterinen's two wins, a second and a third. As aU the riders begin , casting off th eir worst performances : in the net, or championship determining points totals, it is, at th is point, wide open. The setting for this American round is unmatched an ywhere in the world, except possibly for th e footings of the Swiss Alps, which th e area around Gold Bar resembles to a start lin g degree. The little town, yo u r classic "wide spot in the road ," ne stles in the skirts of one , towering dark-gree n m ountain wi th the tiny white slash of Wall ac e Falls winking o ut at yo u as you approach up U.S. Hwy . 2 , Beyo nd, lookin g so close' yo u could touch th e m, sp iky snow-covered crags rake the sky. It is h igh summer in the valleys below. rich and green wi t h runoff and o ccasional sn o w-melt su m mer rain. Yrjo Vest erinen cal led th is the best trial of th e entire 1976 seaso n , and not just for the scenery. ' The 23-mile loop (to be ridden twice) was a bit lopsided with sections in one area, be cause a private landowner had reneged on access permission, forcing the entire tri al onto sta te land. But the sections themselves were outstanding in their variety. totally natural, many of them quite wide with a multiplicity of possible lines. Their o vera ll difficulty produced a points 'spread fr om Lampkin 's winning 25 to over 200. High point for many spectators was Se ction Eight. a climb and traverse of a giant tilted rock ' face, and nearby Section Nine, a natural rock staircase wi th the "rise n and "tread" of each step being a bo u t six feet, ave rage. Eight wa s exacting and a little espe cial ly dangerous. with a crucial right tum in the face of the great rock slah that left little margin between a perfect tum and a 75 -foot drop, as Don Sweet almost found when the front end of his Cota 348 go t away from hi m, momentarily. A desperate five, bar ely clinging to th e trail. First clean here was Yrjo Vesterinen, the th ird rider through. Lampkin dropped a one ; N igel Birket floated his trick 3 25 Su zuki's front end be autifully around only to take an instinctive "safety" dab after the tu m was co m p le ted . Mick Andrews 'caugh t the rear wheel and prodded with his right foot to cle ar aw ay; Lane Leavitt got in real t rouble but saved it with a long, p o werful prod for a one. Then a real surprise, J eff Hawkins, riding a 175 Powroll Ho nda o u t of Portland, Oregon. cleaned it wi th full co n trol all the way up. (But J eff w ould later miss . two sect io ns a fte r losin g part of th e lo o p trail, taking a ' disastrous 100 p oint penalty .] Manuel Soler. Bult o's in te llige ntly handso me grand-ne phew, floated t he t um beau t ifully fo r a clean; Rath mell also go t a de liberate'[ intensel y-concen trating clean ; arid Mar lan d Whaley, with a Herculean haul o n th e bars at th e critical point, go t his Honda ar o u nd th e tum fo r a cle an. The o th er Honda teamsters, Mark Eggar a n d J oe Gugliel m eIIi, five d it at th e tum o n the first loop. Mar k bro ke off his kickstarter during the sec o n d lo op but m anaged to finish with a slight time penalty an d a score of 6 7.1 , good for tenth. Joe . who had trucked his practice bike here in a pickup piled high with sweet onions (his main livelihood is the growing and selling of same) , got into the top t en a t seventh overall, with a vastly improved second loop ride to finish on' time. 48 poin ts, Don Sweet was -another American in to the top ten at ninth, 55.7 points. Good, bright sunlight made Eight and Nine. a magnet for photographers. but .m uch of the drama was produced by traps 14 through 20, and by Marland Whaley's ch arge through them. A jam-packed spectator gallery crowded around 14 and 15, on either side of the road bridge across May Creek. The traps were in and out of swift water with large, round, slimy bounders a-plenty. Coming out of the water in 15, Canada's Bill Sparks scattered one knot of sp ectators, alm ost looping twice on th e slick rocks but maintaining enough forward motion to save a desperate ' th ree . . And Marland, in 14, ran over several w atchers ' feet, fived, called for a re-ri de due to spectator crowding and go t a clean. Another forceful. bar-hauling clean in 15, and he was pumped. His elation and drive 'ClIrried him on up a steep water course through 16, 17 ,18,19; then to another forceful , hard-charging .clean in 20 - right up a waterfall cascade! He went on to a 13 point first loop, just one point off Lampkin 's pace. Although anticipation was high, it would be those two disastrous fives which would set Whaley back, fmishing the second loop with 18 to Lampkin 's 13. ,y esterinen , , wi th a sparkling 12-pomt second loop, was in third with a 35 point total. Rastus, acknowledging m aybe one five too many, was fourth, coming in right on his last minute, gogg les down , hanging off in the turns in a race for the finish ,"Fifth by ticks of th e clo ck was Suzuki rider John Me tcalfe , after a bit of drama and a protest. John had bro ken an axle on t1ie sec o n d loop. Borrowing a replacement c<') fr o m a spectator's bike , he-continued on .... with a course marshall in tow to check en him , for a couple of the section observer crew s had left early (having been told _ ;j th at Metcalfe was a DNF). With no way for the observer to keep up with John in th e woods, it was agreed that 30 of J o hn 's 38-minute penalty be waived due to delay. Had he been on time, he would have been tied with Rathmell, for their section scores matched exactly; cleans, ones, threes and all , Joe Guglielmelli came in sporting that much-improved second loop score to loft hi m to seventh behind French Champion Charles Coutard and ahead of former World Champ Mick Andrews. Joe said if he would pick a tough section out of this trial, it would be 25, which few saw - the fmal section of the loop in deep water with h uge rocks. No one had cleaned it that Joe knew. ' There had been much of the expected congestion and flap with hordes of spectators. many of whom inUsted on riding full-chat: on the traffic-clogged forest roads. At least three were hauled off injured. . ' AS the best trials riders in the world waited for the traffic to clear, sitting about the Gold Bar village green like so many picnickers, Rastus asked Lampkin a ft er ' a sip of OIy , "What do you think of American beer?" "A little cold, it is, but .alright," was the reply. "Here, try some of this Colorado Kool-Aid," r Just a bunch of the boys, after va perfect Sunday woods ride. • &, < Results (provisional) , 1. M ar tin La rnokln (G B ) 25 (Bul). 2. Marland Wha..,. (US~) 31 (Han). '3. V rjo Vesterlne" (Fin) 35 (Bul). 4 . Malcolm Rathrnell (GB) 43 (Mon). 5 John Metcalfe B) 43. 8 (Suz). 6. Char le• .Coutard (F) 47 B ul ). 7. Joe G u gl le lrn elll (US) 48 ( Han ). 8. Ick A ndrews (G B) 51 (Varn ). 9. D on Sweet (USA) 55.7 (Mon/. 10. Mark Egg ... (USA) 67.1 (Han). 11. N gel B l rk et (G B) 73 (Su z) . 12. Marv Heath (USAl 76 (B ul ). 13. M an uel ~ Soler (SPI 81.1 (B u l). Bel ) IBul). 9 1 4. Jean Marie LeJeune M an). 15 . Lane Leavitt (USA ) 92.5 11

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