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/126070
r; ~~~~~~~~~~~~II~~~~~~~~ ~~~~I~t~~~~tt~~~~t ~~~~t~~~~~~t~~~tI~t~tt~ttt~~~~t~~t ~~;~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ;t~tttttttttttt~~~~ttt~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~;~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~;~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~;~~~~~;~~~~~~~~~~~~~;~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~t~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~t~t~~~;;;~~;~~~~ I: Desert hotline ~t~~~~ ~ t (Abo ve) ORA Team Race gets off to a roaring start. (Below) To m Broo ks and Bob Balentine joined fo rces and eventually lapped all but th e fint nine positions. They won. Brooks/Balentine decimate DRA Team Race ' By Dale Brown CALIFORNIA CITY, CAL., OCT. 17 .T orn Brooks and Bob Balentine teamed up on a pair of 400 KTMs to totally dominate the DRA ISO-mile Team Race. Finishing 22 with a six -minute lead over Cordis Brooks and Tom Kelly, they lapped all but the first nine teams. ' Tom Brooks started for the duo and outpowered Tom Kelly (250 KTM) in the uphill trail just p ast the smokebomb, Brooks then opened up a · two-minute lead by the end of the first loop. Kelly held second by a wide margin over Morgan Malocco (4 00 Yam). Open Am at eur Lee Scheffers (4 00 KTl\1) held fourth. Balentine rode the second loop for .the team, already startin g t o lap other riders. Cordis Bro o ks (250 Bu l) too k over fo r Kelly and stayed fairly dose to Balentine's p ace . Wayne Garrett , riding with Malocco, crashed Morgan 's 500 th umper on a ro ad crossing. The rear tire too k quite a bit of skin from Wayne's leg, so they retired, moving Sh effer 's partner Ron Irby (36 0 Hus ) up to third. Tom Brooks had a rel atively quiet third loop, stretching out the lead. Kell y and Scheffers maintained their positions, though Lee was now sever al minutes behind the first two te ams. Lee Wilson III and Scott Broussard (17 5 KTM/Yam) were rrunning well .when Scott unloaded on the se cond loop . He brought the bike in , riding with a severely bruised shoulder. With a hundred miles left to go, Lee went out to finish the race, running in fourth. The same road co rssing that Wayne Garrett hit cause trouble for Balentine. Running o ff the marked co urse, in six th gear , as he tried to get by several lapped riders, he didn't see the road crossing in time. Thinking to himself, " 111 wheelie over it," he lofted the front end but set it down a little too early and crashed. He was unhurt and the bike suffered only bent handlebars. He came into the pits goggleless , but still in the lead. Brooks had a trouble-free loop, but re ceived a bit of a shock when he cam e in. Balentine 's bike had been in the process of losing a lower-end bearing, so when Tom cam e into t h e p its, he was boo st ed off the bik e, gas w as add ed and Balentine took o ff on Tom 's bike. Bob didn't run in to anything on th e last loop, lapped the tenth place team less th an a mil e from t h e fini sh, an d too k the ch ec kere d flag. Cordis BrookS rode the last loop fo r his team a nd came .in about six minutes later. After Cordis rode in , it was ab o u t a 15 minute wa it before the third-place te am, Scheffers and Irby, finished . They go t first Amateur honors. After ridin g 125 miles himself, Lee Wilson was in so o n aft er the th ird-place team . He and Broussard were first sm all-bores, Van ce Schmid (ri din g his first ra ce in three months) and Dennis Mc Lau ghlin (250 YamjHus] were fifth OA an d second 250 Expert . The third 250 Ex pert te am, Monte Lee and Tony Steffins (Yam ) were right behind in six th. Howard McCasland, who was t rying to get u sed t o a 400 KTM, and Do ug Hurt (Ya m) , rid in g for the first tim e as an Amateur, teamed t o fin ish seve nth. Tim Plant and Rick Muller ( 175 DMG ) were t he runner-up small bo re team, eig ht h O A. The last te am to go six loops was th at of Dean Kirk an d Ralp Gri f fin , wh o rode Dean's 250 Husky all t he way to fir st 25 0 Amateur. Mit chell Sm ile y an d Ed Mundy (250 CZ /Suz) were lapped less than a m ile from the fmish ; t he y took tenth . Nex t in w as the second Open Am ate ur tea m , Tony Harris and Steve Clu gston (4 00 Yam ). At 13 th , just behind th e firs t Novice, Brett Round and Tony Stuart ( 125 Yam) go t first small-bore Amateur. The firs t No vice te am wa s Rile y Duncan and John Speakman (3 70 Suz/400 Yam). They met at sign -u p on race morning; a chance en counter that worked out well for both of them. Randy Wilson and . Brad Denham (3 60 /4 0 0 Hu s) rode together t o take second. Rich ard Zaji c and Mark Moullet (25 0 CZ /KTM ) were third, taking first 25 0 . It was a good day for t he Dun can family. Scott Duncan (R iley 's bro ther) te amed with Larry Devine . The pair, ridin g a 25 0 Suzu ki and a Yam ah a, w on the Beginner race. The pu rsuit w as led b): Darrell Hutchins and Carl Davis (125 Hon/Bull and the Jeff Hill/Mike Spano ( 175 KTM /Yam) team. The Sen iors were led by Gus Paull and John Klug (400 Yam /410 Hon). John's wife Leslie was teamed with Michele Griffin on Leslie's 250 Honda quadrastroke, They appeared to have the Powder Puff win lo cked up when Lesl ie left for the fifth and final loop. No other Powder Puff team went five loops, but neither did Michele and Leslie. A condenser went, taking the spark with it. Jolene Payne and Susan Goade (175 Yam/KTM) ended up the winners. Kell y Kline and Alan Dryden (Yam /Hon) teamed for the Mini win, virtually assuring Kell y of the Number One plate in the new class. • Results in Re sults Section. Vipers' Challenge Hare Scrambles By J im You ree LUCERNE, CAL., OCT.17 Recent rains did such a number on th e entrance ro ads that just to get t o the race site was deserving of a finisher pin, eventhou gn . the Vipers had marked the ro ad just as well as they did the race course. On display in a sealed co n ta iner at the Viper sign up we re their mascots, Scern oore an d Samantha Viper, a co uple of " cute " little sidewinder rattlesnakes, bu t there were no takers of the Vipers open invitation to take their leashes and give them a walk. At 10 a .m .; and one second, the b an ner dropped on a co urse well prepared with alt ernat in g "Work hard for a while" and then "relax-for a" while" sections. Overall winner Mitch Maye's described th e even t as a "fine co urse , good ride" , other more colorfu l expressions such as " bit chin n came out of Ogilvie and Wallings ford who came in second and third overall. Mayes was fir st at the bomb with a two second lead over Ogilv ie, which grew to seven seconds by the end of the first 40 mile loop, and to 11 seconds by ra ce end. It took the smooth riding Mayes just one hour and 50 minutes to zap th e 80 miles. It wa s felt this kind of time was brought about by the fa ct that he didn't like Ogilvie's breath on his exhaust pipe. n sixth place overall came "sizzling Suzuki Art" for first Amateur and first Senior.· In I 6th overall cam e Jim Owens for second Amateur. Trudy Beck, who described the co urse as "awwrigghhttt " , came in first girl and 34th overall. To all the Experts and Arnareurs Who cam e in behind T ru d y, it is rumored th at for a nominal fee she will give you some riding lessons on how to di al it on. The great weather and well organized Vipers, . who seem to hav e thought of everything, offered one of the better desert races of the entire year to those who attended their event. • Results pending.