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/126060
Smile when you say that, ,odner Story & photos by Jody Weisel AUSTIN, T EXAS , AUGUST 8 T exas hero es are unlike those from an ywhere else. They are bigger , bolder and better than real life , as anyone who must -follow in the footsteps of Pecos Bill, Davey Cro ckett, John Wesley . Harding and Audie Murphy must be. Texas road races are unlike those found anywhere else. They are bigger, bolder and better than con temp orary road race reality could im agin e. So imagine if you will a road race course next to the State Capitol's greenest park, on its widest boulevard, around its cleanest streets with sailboats' lazing by on the Colorado river, sunbathers laying in the grass and a Texas-style bar-b-que intermingled with a run-what-ya-brung attitude. Within sight and most definitely within earshot o f the tarnished gold dome on the Texas State Capitol -200 of Texas' premier road racers and several thousand spectators celebrated America's only great st ree t race. Texas heroes have a tradition of lassoing tornadoes, going down swinging and never hurting an honest man. That is the stuff that legends are made of. And in the high powered world of Texas road racing there is a man with the courage to ride the wind with Pecos Bill, stand beside Crockett at ยท the Alamo, face death like Harding and just as berserk as Audie, His name is Paul Stephenson. As Paul Stephenson, he is a fireman in Dallas, Te xas. His legend is as 'Hogman'. As Paul 'Hogman' Stephenson he is Texas' greatest road racer, and to Texans that means the world's greatest road racer. For four straight years Stephenson has won the big bore classes at the Aqua Fest Road Races, a feat to be admired. But to say that the Hogman has won those races is to deny him his due. Stephenson has demolished his competition with a frantic display of awesome horsepower, squirming, shredding rubber, and full power broadslides, If the Hogman is scared by his heart wrenching thrusts with the 1000cc Blus Honda four, it doesn 't show. That the crowd is scared is both visib le and audible. Ooo's and ahhh's are the only things that can keep pace with him around the tight slippery Aqua Fest road race, nee ' commuter course, 1976 was no different Stephenson won both Open Cafe and Open GP on his Dave Rash and Stubblefield Honda's. His Open GP win was a little wilder than usual because he lost his brakes on the second lap and had to resort to sliding to slow down for the corners. Lesser heroes ride the same track as the Hogman, at lesser speeds, with less imagination but not with less , desire. In 125 GP Gordon Seim on a birdcage framed Can-Am took a quick lead as the Bonneville record holder was prepping before take the trek to the flats. Pursuing him was David Langley, whose small young stature made his TA125 Yamaha loom like a Munch Mammoth , and Ed Green on his single cylinder 125 Kawasaki. Last year's winner Duncan Paul -languished behind these three with a repeat of his normal terrible start. Paul quickly dispatched Green's KX 125, Langley's T A and Seim's Can-Am to pull away for the win. Langley took second.Beim third and Green fourth. 200 GP road racing has become the bread and butter Grand Prix class in Texas and the class of the class has to be three time Daytona 200 GP winner Bubba Byars. Byars quickly motored his blue and red Suzuki to an ever increasing lead over th e shrieking pack. By the end of the race Byars was a quarter lap ahead, or about two blocks and a street light beyond second and third place jamm ers Henry Brigham and Barry Bran d . as