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/126276
Allan Pedelford tries out for a wishbone commercial. Some unusual riding techniques; turn angles and free-form diving were seen this week.lAbovel Brad Oxley and Robin Hood; lbelowl Phil Gagnon. Rex Appiedy and Mike Bloom; (bottoml Elliot Sheltman lin the airland Doug Skiles. firs t of the season , came back to the sport a few weeks ago and has been working his way closer to the winner's circle each week. On the rain-slicked tr ack, Tom won the Handicap Maln • event, even with a .lot of pushing and knocking around by Alan Christian. Morley's win gave him just enough points to ride in this week 's first qualifying round at Ventura. There will be , four qualifiers : Ventura on August 23, San Bernardino on August 24 and the final two will be run in September, Irwindale on the 15th and Costa Mesa on the 16th. The U .S . National Speedway Championship event in / October at Costa Mesa. Of the 37 riders who have ea rned enough points to ride the qualifie rs , Big J im Fishback came in fourth in the points race . Big J im again won th e . Scratch Ma in event, just a head of Mark Cherry. That's kind of th e long a nd short of it with Jim at . 6'2 " and Mark a bout 10" shorter. . Mike B'loom got h is thi rd straight Main event win, the firs t came in division . three and the last two in d ivision two. ~he Featu re Ma tch Ra ce , a two-l ap spnnt , went to Ge ne W oods over Bobby Schwartz . San Bernardino. Irwi ndale rained out COSTA MESA. CA. AUG. 19 Aft er two nights of no racing because of rain , the riders were very keyed up and it showed all night with one crash after an- ---:--::;---' . . . .- By Dennis Gre ene 12 V ENTURA. CA. AUG. 16 It m a y have been raini ng ev rywhe re in the Sout hla nd. but . ~ . • - - - :: . , . r Ventura stayed just dry enough to run the 24-evcnt race p ogram. Young Tom Morley . on" of several rid rs. who had been on strike at the othe r. Fortunately, no on e was hurt as a ha lf dozen or more eve nts were stopped and rest a rt ed. . Gene W oods outlasted the referee; almost every time _Woods comes 'o u t for a ride in the Handicap Main event , he is put back 10 yardsi'or jumping the starting gates. This night was n exception. Woods' regula r starting spot is on the 40 -yard lin e. but for the last several weeks most of his starts have been from the 50 ' because of pe nalt ies. In fac t , quite a few have been from th e 60 a nd 70. Even w th i the ex tra yardage , Woods won th e Handicap Main event wa y out in front of the field. When Woods came 'ou t for th e Scratch Main event. it was ob vious that he wanted to win and join the vergrowing list of rid ers who have won both th e Handicap and Scratch Main event in the same night. Mark Cherry didn't see it that wa y at a ll, more than likely he was thinkin g on e win for Woods was enough. Rig ht from the sta rt , Mark took cha rge of the Scratch Main eve nt and for four laps. never looked back until the checkered flag fell. This coming Sunday. Au gu st 28. pcedway racing will take on a new look a daytime event will be ru n at LaPlaya tadium in Santa Ba rbara. This is a benefit event to raise funds to build a new all-weather track for LaPl ya, with t e first ev-ent ge uin unde 'ay at 1 :00 p.m . (Continuedfrom pag e 9) by AMOL Precision -backed Kurt Leibmann, The pair rode Moto-Guzzis prepared by Reno Leoni. Fourth was John Long on his Longevity Racing Ducati. The action started before the green flag had a chance to wa ve as Cook Neilson's Ducati threw a chain on the warm-up lap. Daytona winner Neilson had been a pre-ra ce favorite . . Once the flag waved it was Wes Cooley and hi s Yoshimura R&D Kawasaki rocketing out in fr ont of the pack with Pridmore , Baldwin , John Bettencourt and Leibmann behind, Bettencourt swooped into second on the next go around and just as quickly went out with a blown engine , Cooley's engine then swallowed a valve and by lap three the winner's circle positions had been set. Baldwin was a safe second, but Leibmann needed a few laps to get . away from the fourth place battle that / threa tened to gobble him up. John _ Long, Kurt Lentz, John Fuchs. Erik Buell and Art Wicks rode the middle laps as one long sweeping snake with each waiting for the other to comit some 'm in or error as their power seemed to be equal. On lap 10 of the 15 lap affair Long added a little humor to the fast paced proceeding as he honked his hom to warn slower riders he was passing. You just knew he had to be smiling behind his visor , Pridmore continued to cruise along J upping the average speed of the race to just over 90 mph at the finish . Baldwin, with no hope of catching Pridmore in th e final la ps. took it easy as did tea m m a te Le ihrnann. Long conti nued on his sa fe fourth place ride wh ile Lentz held off Fuchs as Buell and W icks too k their d u el right to the flag. - Result s SUPERBIKE PRODUCTION A NALS 11 5 Prill""". LAPSi: 1. Reg 1!Caw1. 2_ MichaelBaldwin IM·Gl. 3. Kun Leibmann IM-Gl. 4, John Long IDuel, 5. KUrt Lentz fDucl. 6_Joh n FuchsIHonl. 7. Erik BuelIIDucl. 8. Arth", Wicks IHanI. 9. Arthur KowitzIKawl. 10. J erroldWood (Yam). 11. W ayne Sullivan (Lavl. 12. Robert Miller IK awl. 13_Carl Schweinshau.IBMWl_ Mark -Jones crushes NovicesBy Gar y Van Voorhis MT. POCONO , PA , AUG ,21 Mark Jones . in a repeat 'performance of his runaway heat race win , scored an im pressive victory in the 42-mile Novice finaL Jones, on a JoCo Motors-sponsored/ Bob Jones-tu ne d Ya mha led from the green flag to the checkers and won with a four second margin over selfsponsored Yamaha rider Dan Warren. C ra ig Morris , on the G r oup Four Q uaker State Yamaha , took thi rd. However , he failed to enjoy the winner's circle festivities as a scoring mix-up , when then third place runner Lance J on es cr ashed , placed Morris fou rth. ? The win was tbe second for Ma rk J ones in the last three Novice events with a second placing at Sears Point sandwiching victories at Loudon and Pocono. " I ha d plent y of powe r for this track and tha t's wha t we knew irwould take to win today," sa id Jones later. He was absolutely right. ~ It was heat race winner's Jones and John Batrencour t surrounding Dan Warren as the pack sped off the line with Jones im me dia te ly making use of ' hi s powe r as the field exited 'the infi eld portion of th e 2.8 m ile Pocon o faci lity . Co rni ng from th e very last position on tne sta rting grid to le ad t he seco nd wa -e into the infield was Lance jones who, in five laps, liced _his way to fourth place nipping Ted Boody for fC (J1I/1,7/lI cd n7/ pag» 25) ,