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/126268
(Above left) Don Sweet took a third and a forth. (Above right! Marland Whaley in Saturday's section 11 - he got through with a one. (Below) Oklahoma's Greg Ruoff finished 10th in Washington. Whaley makes it lour straight in U.S. Trials Championship Oregon: Whaley by .2 i n a r ain forest By Dale Brown DIAMOND MILL , OR , JUNE 25 Marland Whaley continued his win streak in the North Am erican Trials Council! American Motorcyclist Ass. (NAT C/ AMA ) U .S. 24 T ria ls Champion sh ip , winn in g h is th ird in ' a row in O regon , and followin g it with a win in Bridge of th e Gods , Wash . the next d a y. The Oregon ro und was held in a nea r rain-forest area between Portl and a nd Tilla moo k. Section s were run primar ily through a cree k bed underneath th e th ick forest ca nopy. The Wash in gton ro und was he ld overlooking the Columbia River, nea r a quarry , a nd rock sections were a favo rite. Both even ts were orga nized by th e Pac ific N onhwest T ria ls Assn. (P NTA) , which is made up of eight separat e clubs . The Columb ia Observed Trials Assn . (COT A) did the work in the Oregon round , while the , South Washington Assn . of T rials (SW AT) organized th e W ash ington event. In the Diamond Mill round, sections three through 15 were laid out nearly nose to tail along a cr eek bed with running water. Some sections were dry, other wet sections were taking mostly threes and fives. Bern ie Schreiber, who has been so successful in the early European rounds, showed up Wednesday before the trials and the club members invited him out to look at some of the sect ions . He felt th ey were a littl e on th e easy sid e. They were changed. Sections three through five (the first three the competitors faced) were prim ar ily st raig h t runs through bowling ball -sized roc ks. Section six was one of th e most d ifficult of th e event. Starting up a brook , riders had on ly gotten 20 feet before they wer e . faced with a two -and -a -h alf-foo t-tall, wet, rock ' step . Clearing that , there were mor e slick rocks to negotiate , th en a 90 -degree tu rn a nd a climb up slick logs that mark ed th e end of t he section. " We' re callin' 'e m a little len ient in this section!" rem arked one observer. Still , the best scores wer e threes. (Six on th e first loop , seven on the second , out of 48 entrants.) On h is second time th rough, Whaley, on the 300cc short -st roke Honda prototype , was clean a fte r the roc k ste p , took two dabs in the rock t ha t ' followed and then a no the r dab to insure ge tt ing over the logs . Schreiber (Bu l) three'd it on his first try , but came to a halt short of th e mark his seco nd time around . Section seven was not too d ifficult. Coming down parallel to a three-foot diameter log , riders had to turn abruptly, go over th e log, turn again and ex it over a small rockpile . The top riders , like Whaley, Lane Leavitt , Don Sweet and Schreiber had no trouble with it. Sections nine and 10 were run together, a steep, twisting hillclimb run over loose rock. There were no cleans there ; the best score was a two . Within a hundred feet of nine and 10 was section 11. Up over another rockpile , riders splashed through a pool. A couple of feet to the left of the best line, th e wa ter was four feet deep and contained two su bmerged logs. Proceeding along, riders had to climb up a narrow stream bed with the (Continued on page 26)