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/126277
Jack Johnson 1 21gets the second moto holeshot with Gerig 111 beside him. . ' Jim Fishback 1131leads the pursuit. Johnson, Jennings, Taylor' do the SCOREing By Dale Brown RIVERSIDE, CA, AUG. 28 (Abovel Fishback leads Roeseler.IBelowl Dave Taylor moves in on Scot Hardin (68I, IBottom l Jeff Jennings went , -, in the crowded 250 class. IO -JackJohnson (390 Hus), Jeff Jennings (250 Suz) and David Taylor (125 DG Hus) won their respective classes at the B.F. Goodrich/SCORE Off Road World Championship at Riverside Raceway. The event. the fourt h since Mickey Thompson founded . it. saw th e ru les changed for motorcycles. Instead of - one timed race. there were two motos and the olympic scoring system was used. All three winners took. both motes. The classes ran at the same time with staggered starts. Open bikes. or Class 22. left the line first . La rry Roeseler (590 Hus). a heavy pre-race favorite, grabbed the lead with Jim Fishback .(400 Yam) breathing down his pipe. Fishback passed Roeseler coming out of the fourth tum. Fishback was still leading as the bikes reappeared in front of Riv erside's turn six bleachers. A possible contender. Tom Brooks. was already out. with a seizure on his KTM . "I seized my bike in practice and it never ran right after that ," said Brooks. Roeseler passed Fishback going down th e short asphalt straight minutes later. tand johnson also got by shortly thereafter. Meanwhile Jeff Jennings had gotten the Class 21 (250cc) holeshot and worked up an incredible lead in the first few minutes. Terry Clark , riding a ' factory green and go ld Kawasaki . started in sixth , but sliced his way through the pack to secondv ahead of Bob Rutten (250 H ·D). -Da vid Taylor and Bobby Jones ( 125 Suz) ran away from Class 20 . They battled in the early laps . until Jones pulled about an eight -second lead toward the middle of the race . • ~.;), 4 ...... ' _ '. . ~ 01 .., .. ~ W it h on ly two laps to go , Roeseler's le a d seemed qu ite secure. Bu t . head ing into a corner his front wheel caught a bump and flipped him over the high side. His shou lder ba nged up . Roeseler rode lO the finis h , letting Joh nso n lap him just before the flag. While the other classes had no significant changes other than Roeseler's tumble . the Class 20 battle tightened in 'the last two la ps. Taylor's bike had been suffering gas starvation over high speed bumps. " I found out that you couldn't hold the throttle wide open , You had to ba ck off. Once I adjusted to it . I. started catching him ," said Taylor . With one lap to go . th ey were sid e by side. Taylor pulled it out and won by a few yards . The white flag was displayed twic e by SCORE offi cials. causing some confusion . Bob Balentine pulled off ()n the second flag. but got back on the track. The results were taken from the seventh rather than the eigbth lap . T he change produced no difference among the leaders. . The second moto was lO run ten laps. Changing fro m the first moto, the three starts were within seco nds of each ot her. Johnson took th e lead in the open . class. followed by David Gerig (370 Suz) , who had cras hed in the first round and finished fifth . Fishback and Roeseler. Jennings again took the 250 ho leshot , but Clark had a much better start and was running .second. Taylor and Jones again left the 12? R~~~~. , . r