Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Bast and Penhall frosted the cake with a sweep to hand the Sharks a 49-29 defeat. The Handicap Semi almost became a circus as several riders held up the start for being caught rolling off the line. The time wasted and three restarts probably cost Mike Bast a win . Mike got the holeshot on a good start, led for three laps, th en had his engin e blow up. The Main had its share of lengthy del ays before the race finally began. Kevin MacDonald got himself a good lead, but with Dan Becker, Bobby Schwartz, and Mark Cherf pushing their wa y through traffic to apply some pressure. That didn't last long as Becker's, Schwartz 's, and Cherf's bikes all blew simultaneously like a string of fire crackers. MacDonald was left with a wide open win followed by Dave Sims and Rick Farro n. More fireworks erup ted off-stage in a reaction to last week's crash. The most excitement in the pits was caused by Schwartz, who was upset over the injury of Brian Short and two spectators. This was closely followed in intensity by one individual who objected to last week's report, for which this reporter has nothing to apologise for. Costa Mesa, Aug. 20 By Dennis Greene Dave Sims/Sonny Nu~r ride formation (above). Dennis Stewart wears a pained expression (below). .. The San Bernardino Sizzlers got raked over the coals Friday night by the Orange County Eagles. The Eagles had not won a match on their home track in four weeks, prior to this win. Two clean sweeps in a row put the Eagles out in front by eight points. One more sweep in the fourth event gave the Eagles a 10 point edge. The Sizzlers weren't about to give up, as Larry Shaw and Ron Preston go t the first sweep of the night for their team in Event Six. Dean Forman and Jim Fishback got them one more, as they chipped away at the Eagles ' lead. Mark Cherry and Dennis Sigalos brought in the third Sizzler sweep, dropping the difference to just four points. The final race, for high point riders o n ly, was taken by Sizzler Mark Cherry for three points. His teammate Larry . Shaw was righ t there at the finish line fo r what most people thought was ;. second pl ace finish, bu t so was Bill Cody. The referee saw it as a dead heat; but the official scorers gave it to Cody and th e Eagles won by just two points, 40 to 38. Select Vans again added $20 0 to the Handicap Main, giving the check to Ron Rose, who just barely beat out Brad Oxley. More Select money went to Warren Goodwine for his first in Division Two. Bakersfield, Aug. 21 By Denn is Greene four at Irwindale and then fin al chances are at Costa Mesa on September 24, one night after Irwindale's. . San Bernardino , Aug. 18 By Rex Reese Ventura, Aug. 17 By Dennis Greene The first round of qualifying for the U.S. National Speedway title got underway Tuesday night at Ventura. There are only six spots open for the Nationals, The top ten riders in team points have already been seated. In this first round, Danny . 40 Becker turned in high score with 12 points. Randy Marsh got II, but the surprise of the night was Rookie Ron Preston who tied Dave -Sims and-Steve . Columbo with ten points each. . The nex t round is at San Bernardino, then on September 4 at Bakersfield is round three. Two weeks later is round San Bernardino featured the second round of National qualifying. As could be expected, the hometown riders had the upper hand in the proceedings as the hot got hotter when Ron Preston scored 10 points the previous night in Ventura and then pulled in another 14 tonight as he put away almost everybody who rode against him. The almost factor was Dennis Sigalos who won ou t over Ron in the hotly contested 19th round of the 20 scratch heats. Dennis got himself 11 points, and Ron was one from perfection. • . Behind Preston and ahead of Sigalos (tied even at 13 points each) , Gene Woods and Larry Shaw put on an equally entertraining performance. Both riders scored three wins and two seconds. The S econd Division Scratch Main proved to be better than a two dollar thrill as Kurt Strommer and Stan Flanders had a showdown in a ti ght race that went from wire to wire and wall to wall. Flanders got the best over Kurt at the finish, but not by much. T ~k promoter John La Doucer put out $100 of his own for a match race of . the top four poin t men. A challenge went out for the grandstands to match the C-note, and an extra $387 was taken in from crazy fans. Ron, Larry, Dennis, and Gene dropped the hammer and boogied like there was no tomorrow as everybody went for it like a pack of mad dogs. Sigalos faded and Preston tried desperately to get around Woods who was trying to get at Shaw. Larry went on to become instantly rich as Gene, Ron , and Dennis followed him in. Irwindale , Aug. 19 By Rex Reese L.A. once again pinched Ventura in the fins as the Sprockets, led by Mike Bast, dealt a crushing blow to the Sharks. L.A. was at first a little slow in scoring, but later came out in full force. Bast and Bruce Penhall were the top scorers for their team , with Mike going all the way for 15 points. The dynamic duo went on to the team final to shut out Bobby Schwartz cold after Shark teammate Randy Marsh eliminated himself by breaking the starting tape. ,. With Brian Short still in the hospital from the last time Bakersfield and Irwindale met, the tension was high. • The Bakersfield Bandits are the top team in the National Speedway League and Brian did more than his share to get them there; so the team wasn't abou t to let all his hard work go to waste. The Sprockets only won one race all night. The first three even ts they split with the Bandits. Dubb Ferrell got the ball rolling for the home team in Event Four with a clean sweep, then team captain Jeff Sexton and his / n ew teammate, Jim Gresham, pulled off their second sweep and again Ferrell and Dan Toomey got the third. In all seven events were split even and at the end of .the 13 events, the Bandits put one more in the record books, 46 to 32. Bryan Buffington won the Handicap Main . This race has always been called the big money race of the night, but Jeff Sexton had a better idea. J eff missed his chance to ride the Main, so as he lined up for the consolation race it was apparent that he was going to try for some back yardage money. This is a bonus paid if a rider wins fro m the 40 or 50 or 60 or ? yard line. So with tongue in cheek, Jeff lined up on the 120 yard line. He was closing fast, wh en front-runner Bobby Hill crashed and everyone laid it down to miss him. Everyone but Jeff, who coasted wide and slowed way down to cross the finish line, grinning as he thought about all the money he had just won! • Results in Results Section. r ,

• Cover