Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

_._.-.-._._ . _._ ._. ~._._~._._._._._._._._._._._._._._.- . _ . _ . _ . _ . _ . _._.__._-- Western hotline Mini moto men makin' the rounds at Racing World's NMA Qua lifier. 18 collision was al most au di ble above the ho wling exhausts, and bo t h rid ers' handlebars b lu rred as they struggled to m a in ta in control. Fo r a split seco nd, it looked as if third -place Smith wou ld win after all . Mc La ughlin was forced wide. across an oil slick la id down in practice , and Pr id more wobbled several feet off his usual line as well. In a tribute to their skill , neither crashed . McLaughlin recovered and re p a ssed Prid m or e halfway down the back straight to win by three lengths. . "This thing won't stop , " said Mc La ughlin later, " beca use this is the sp are 944cc GS750 and L ockheed brakes won 't fit between th e fork tube a nd front wheel. So I had to cool it into the tu rns, and here Reggie ju st goes crazy. I th ink he h as a vision p rob lem. He seems to m isjudge th ose close th ings. Wait until we fin ish ou r GSIOOO with the good brakes. Then we'll see ." "I found th er e wasn 't any brakin g over the cres t ," said Pri d more. "It wou ldn't slow down anymore th a t one time a t tu r n sev en. But Pier r e (desRoches, Pridmor e's tu ner) says this is h is m ild engine , so I' m looking forwa rd to Da ytona . We ca me here to do th e handling more th an anything today. The bike worked pretty good ." La ter , in the Open GP event , David Emde jumped into the lead on his new Mel Dinesen TZ750 , chased by Sm ith , Pridmore and McLaughlin. By th e end of the first lap , McLaughlin pulled even with Emde entering the first turn, then missed a shift and destroyed the Yoshimura engine. Tha t left Emde in front , Smith second and Pridmore third, followed by Houston dirt track Nationals winner St eve Eklund in his first TZ750 ride, Harry Klinzmann, Roberto Pietri on the Mike Clarke TZ750 , and Richard Siefried. By the fifth lap, both Emde's and Eklund's TZ750s had seized, and Pridmore had the lead for good . Klinzmann, Siefried, Pietri and Smith followed . Emde led the 250cc GP race wire-towire, finishing five seconds ahead of Ron Hlavka , who was a nother four seconds ahead of Gennedy Luibimsky, John Glover and Mark Homchick. . Some of the best racing of the day took place in the Box Stock event , with Ralph Hudson , Pete Bothwell an d Ra y Straka going back and forth consta nt ly on Ka wasaki KZ650s . Straka led the e arly la p s, only to be passed b y Hudson a nd Bothwell, then run off the tra ck at turn seven . Still tig ht ly grouped , they finished Hudson , Bothwell and Straka. AFM 55e Production Champion Larry Schultz gave a brand new Honda CX500 veetwin its ra cing baptism in the Box ' Stock class, finishi ng eight overall, sixth in the 675cc class. ~_~l!I~JI) Ke~l!I!S_S_e~~i()I). _ Mini moto men in NMARacing World qualifier By Keith Clemons TRABUCYO CYN ., CA , FEB . I I The first of two National Mini cycle Associa tion (N MA) qualifying even ts was held at Racing World . Over 300 minicycle enth usia sts fro m as far away as Fresno and Sa n Diego came to see if they co uld qual ify to race in "Cyclerama ' 78" to be he ld at Ra cin g World Ma rc h 24 ,25 , a nd 26. Eric Kehoe an d Ted Brady pulled off a hot race in the 83cc Mod ifed Expert class. The two pushed each ot he r so hard th ey left the rest of the troops fa r beh ind. Kehoe fin ally found his way home firs t but n ot without a serious challenge from Br ad y who fou ght hard. The n ext moto turn ed things around a bit as Bra dy didn't ra ce and Kehoe fell to the eighth pla ce slot , quite a' disappointment after his firs t run . Meanwhile, Chris Morey too k advantage of his own driving skill a nd powered it to win th e second mot o wh ich gave him first overa ll a nd Robby Nolin completed the ra ce by finish in g second over al l. The 50cc Junio r Cycle Modified class pull ed an unusua ll y la rg e number of entries. Paul Deni s ra n a smooth , winning race th e first moto by getting out fr ont quick and staying there. Unexpectedly , he ra ced a stock b ike in the Modified class and tho ugh he placed only second in the next round , he still went home with first overall. Rick Hemme, down from Lancaster, grabbed the lead in race number two and came in first , placing second overall. After making his name by winning on a stock bike in a modified race , Denis came back as you might expe ct to win both motos in the 50cc Stock class. Kurtie Hendrickson took second both times around for a solid seco nd overall. Mark How ell took a double win in th e 83cc Modified N ovice cla ss for th e overall victory and Kurt is Wilder followed h im to th e flag both times for second. Hard ra in had wiped ou t access to thenew "Californ ia Track" where the even t was originally sched u led, so the rac e was run on a course built just for th e day. Most of th e Min i m oto men didn 't kn o w of t he change and assumed ~hey wer e ridi ng th e Ra ci ng W orld Ca lifornia t r a ck. Eve ryone thought it was gre a t. T he next NMA Qualifyin g race will .be , he.ld.at addleback 'Par k,'.Feb, 26 . Dave "Ohlmost" Ohl is chased by eventual DeAnza 250cc Pro winner Bob Haag. Haag sweeps DeAnzaMX By Ron Lawson SUNNYMEAD , CA, FEB. 12 Bob Haag (FM F·Suz) surprised everyon e at De Anza last Sunday by coming up with a 1·1 sweep in the 250cc Pro class against some very formidabl e com petit ion . The talent t ha t was on ha nd incl uded Goa t Br eker (Norstar Hus), St eve Bauer (DG Suz ) and Dave "O hl rnost " Ohl (Re d la nds Suz). W hen th ey cla shed in the first m oto , it was Ohl who grab bed th e lead. It wasn' t long, however , until Breker put the move on h im and took the lead . The Husky pilot th en began to pull away, but it all wen t to waste on th e very next lap when he lost his ch ain . The battle for first was now a threeway confrontation between Haag, Ohl and Bauer. Haag passed Ohl and held a slight edge for the next few la ps whil e Bauer worked for secon d . Ohl and Bauer wer e trading back and forth for the position when they began to lap riders. Ohl got tangled with one of th e slower riders on the sixth lap and went down , giving Bauer a clear shot at the leader. For th e next 10 m inutes Bauer relentlessly chased Haag. The lead er was rea lly beginning to sweat wh en , wit h only four la ps to go , Ba u er d ropped out of the race wi t h mecha nical p roblems. Haag sa iled in for an easy victory with Ma rk Mc Pe rry finishing second on his Yam ah a . In round two , De.Anza's holeshot wizard did it again. Ohl shot into the lead followed by Haag and Breker, On th e seco nd lap Br eker passed Haag and set out after Ohl, For th ree laps , O h l hel d on to first , bu t Br eker fina lly took over. From there on , it looked ,llk.e... . ~ . w,!s__~r~ker)~ bjillga':ll.e:, . 1;:1: pulled a co mfortab le lea d, but lu ck just wasn't on h is si de a n d b ik e troubles forced h im ou t of the ra ce on th e ni nth la p. O hl was once aga in in t he lead , bu t H a ag was righ t on his tail. W ith on ly two laps to go , Haag took over and went on to ta ke first p lace once more , In the overall sta ndings. it was Haag on top with Mc Perry in seco n d and O hl in third . Br eker's lu ck was somewha t bett er in th e Open Pro race. He took two straight wins and went hom e with to p money in th at class. J In moto one , Breker got a bad start a nd Bauer , who was also riding two classes, sho t int o th e lead . Dou g McGowen (Wheelsmi th Mon ) chased Bauer for the first few laps, but his bike was gi ving him trouble, so he began to slack off. By the midway point, Bauer had a huge lead, but Breker was now in second and com ing on strong. Breker was riding very sm ooth and making up a little time on every lap. It was in the final laps that Breker caught and passed Bauer, wh o was th en content to remain in second. Bauer wasn 't in th e next race, and it was Breker all th e way . Second place in that moto and in the ov erall stand ings went to McGowen . The b iggest class of th e day was th e 250cc Intermediate class. As usual it was Danny Burtt who took top honors, bu t th is tim e h e h ad some competi tion. John Silva , on his new Rinc on -spons or ed Kawasaki was way back in th e pack in the first moto due to a ba d sta rt a nd a crash , bu t in ro und two , he was out in fro nt . Bu rtt , who ra ces for Redla nds Suzu ki took th e firs t moto with ea se bu t the two were really going for it in the last moto , Although Silva looked faste r and did manage to take the round. Burtt was sm oother and mor e stab le a nd tha t was wha t ne tted him first overall . Results in Results Section . . . -

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