Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

(~ve,left) Roger grits his teeth and slides on the rough 1974 Superbowl of motocross track in the Los Angeles Coliseum. (Above, rightl Even champions ' get dirty. Roger scrapes off mud between motos at a Trans-AMA race. He won the series for the third straight time in 1976. . World'Champion: Roger DeCoster Story Part IX: 'DeCo st e r Relftelftbers 500 GP of Sweden at Mottola 19 May 1968 "O ne week after my first Grand Pr ix victo ry. I achieved another m ilestone in m y career. My third place fin ish at Mottola p ut me a t the top o f th e 500cc world championship standings. I had 12 points to Bengt Ab erg's 10. As hard as he tried , battling throughout both motos , he couldn't do better thanfifth . "Bengt, however. made a really form idable im p ression on me during p ractice ~ so much so that I wou ldn't have bet against his chance of being world champion , In the race he was far from th e best riders. "Ake Jonsson and (Paul) Friedrichs wen; ahead of him, but if bad lu ck hadn't hit Friedrichs and Aberg, Ake wouldn't have had that victory: a win that I made even easier for him with my really bad start in the second moto." 500 GP of Finland at Tikkurila 26 May 1968 "Along with Jeff Smith, I flew up to the Finnish GP - the onlyway I could still race , in the International motocross at Eke , Belgium on Thursday. Lwon the 500cc class at Eke and my confidence had never been higher than at the start of that Finnish round. " "Unfortunately, that proved to be a giant self-deception by the evening of the Grand Prix. I had a ninth place and lost the lead in the World Championship standings to Jonsson. "It was true that the Finnish organizers d idn't exactly spoil the riders at the only practice period on Saturday. Practice didn't start until six p .m. and went on long after the sun had set . On top of that, winter was still happening in Finland: it froze ." 500 GP of East Germany at Apolda 9 June 1968 "Only one week had gone by since the crash at Stekene (Belgium) where I ended up , with a gash in my neck, severe burns and bruises on my arm and a concussion. Notwithstanding the warnings of the doctor, I made the trip to Apolda. During practice, the pain was intolerable. During the Grand Prix, I made three laps before I nearly passed out .. . that was it for me. I should have listened to my doctor." 500 GP of Czechoslovakia at Prerov 8 16 June 1968 "I still wasn't totally recovered, I kept having these headaches. It was hot as hell and the circuit was nothing but dust. You were riding blind. There were a lot of crashes. By John Huerter As for me, I suddenly realized too late in .the dust that the track went to the left. I ended up in a tree. I came out of it with scratches but the bike was nothing more than a pile of scrap metal ." ' 500 GP of Great Britain at Farleigh Castie 7 July 1968 "T his was definitely a dismal pe riod . Two weeks before this GP I went off a slick, mud-covered bridge in a woods race at Hoeselt, Belgium. The result was a pulled thigh muscle, Seeing as how it was muddy and slippery at Farleigh Castle, I wasn't that hopeful about m y chances, even though th is 'was the type of terrain that generally works to my favor . I was very pleased just to end up in fifth overall. It was, by contrast , a great day for Vic Eastwood: he took first overall in a Grand Prix for the first time. " 500 GP of West Germany at Beuern 14 July 1968 "Another inju ryl Coming down a narrow, steep part of the course, Vic EastwOot1lost, control of his bike. It got out of his hands and hit me full on. I was knocked onto the ground and Vic 's machine tumbled over me again. My shoulder was seriously hurt and I had no choice but to quit . • "The German timekeepers made themselves in evidence once again with their little jokes. They awarded Ake Jonsson a total time for the two motos much lower than that for Bengt Aberg. We were all completely taken aback because it was clear" to the naked eye that the distance between Aberg and Jonsson in the first moto was a great deallarger than the gapjonsson had over Aberg in the second race. Aberg protested, His protest was rejected. There was no doubt that he was henceforward a troublemaker as far as the German officials were concerned." . 500cc GP of France at Belleme 21 July 1968 "T ha t was the Belgian national holiday and I failed by just a little in taking a second Grand Prix win. In the first moto , t he fight for first place with john Banks turned out to my advantage. But the overall win went to the Englishman as a result of the second confrontation. The reason was that I was in a very bad position at the start. I was done in by Lambert Renkin - a fellow Belgian - who wouldn't let me past during the critical part of the race when I had to deliver. I wanted to see Renkin dead. It was lucky for him that I didn't run into him again that evening."

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