Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Points hunting at Ascot By Dennis Greene GARDENA , CA , JUNE 29 Seven down and just t hree to go. Mike Bast's win in the Scratch Main event Thursday night at Ascot puts him just three wins IAbove! Joe Meylor in the process of breaking his little finger; (Below! The Animal. Jim Fishback. is back. Fisback back at San Bernardino By Dennis Greene SAN BER N AR DI NO , CA,JUNE28 lAbove! Mike MunteM took the Handicap Main at Ascot. then ended his Costa Mesa night in the hospital. (Below) Ron Preston roosts on Mike Bast at Costa Mesa. (Bottom! Slowly returning back to form at Ascot is Sunny Nutter. 20 When big Jim Fishback tol d the San Bern a rd ino promoter that he would be coming b ack to speedway this month, t he promoter put in a whole new set of gra ndstands , but even they we re overflowing when "T he Animal" came onto the track to a standing-room-only crowd. In his heat race . he worked his way into second place and a transfer to the Handicap Semifinal. but in that ra ce he did a 360 to keep from hitting a do wned rider. which kept hi m out of the Main Event. Fishback 's seven -month layoff , showed up in the Scratch part of the program . when he could do no better than th ird in his heat ra ce. Fishback's fans are so strong for him that they wanted to see him in a match race with Ron Preston. The race was held after the whole program had been run . and would you believe that everyone stayed late just to see Jim take his first win of the year? With Mike Bast out of the Scratch Main because he broke the tapes in his heat race, the stage was set for a new winner. Danny Becker had earned a shot along with De n nis Sigalos, Bob Schwartz and Alan Christian. The Ba tt le went wire -to -wi re between Schwartz and Christian, with the Crazy Man coming out on top for his second victory in three years at San Bern a rd ino . Up until two weeks ago , Christian had never won an event t here . Ron Pr e st o n may have b e e n destined to lose the Match Race , but there was no sweeter victory to him . tha n the H an d icap Mai n event. Ron won this Main in fro nt of the biggest crowd in history at San Berna rdi no . Eddie Lynch, in his first month of Speedway, won th e Division Three Handicap Main event . Rou nd ing out a fin e night of raci ng . Division Two honors went to Dan McNeill. putting him in the top t hree j l} P?!'!~ !'! ~~ ":t Ai~i~i!'!l~ __ _ • _ from tying the all -time record ?f consecutive Main event wins on th e big oval. Mike has racked up 91 points in the seven -week period to lead the parade by 17 points over Larry Kosta at 74. Kosta's consistency on the big ova l has him in sixth place overall and seco nd at Ascot. It's been somewhat of a slow comeback for Sonny N utter, b ut he 's on the move again . This week a t Ascot he worked his way into bo th Main events, running th ird in the Hand icap and fourth in the Scratch. Mike Muntean became the sixth rider to win the Handica p Main event a t Ascot in the past seven week s. La rry Kosta is the only rider to have won that event twice . As th e points add u p on the three NSL tracks , it becomes more apparent that if you want to earn enough points to qualify for the U .S. National, you better start winning at Ascot. Riders like Frank Adamo , Larry Kosta and others are racking up big points without riding the ot her tracks. Mike Bast is the leader with 91 points , Larry Kosta has 74 , Bob Schwartz has earned 62 , Dennis Sigalos 51 , Frank Adamo 42~ , Dave Sims 38~, T om Ferri s 37 ~ , Gene Woods 32 ~ , Sonny Nutter 32 ~ , and rounding out the top 10 is Mike Marriott at 31 . The total points earned at all three tra cks will d etermine the cut-off spot for the qualifying rounds prior to the National Cham p ionship . Preston, Bast best at Costa Mesa By Dennis Greene COST A MESA . CA . JU N E 30 Just 24 ho u rs ea rl ier, Mike Muntean walked triu mphantl y off t he track after win ni ng the H a ndicap Main event at Ascot. Tonight , he was carried from th e Costa Mesa track on a stretcher after crash ing into th e wall on the front straightaway. It was learned later that he had a badly broken femur , or thigh bone . It was pinned , and he will be in traction at lea st two weeks before work can be started to repair it. About 20 minutes after arriving at the hospital , Mike got a visitor. Da ve Galvin had hit the wall in just about the same place. Dave had a large cut on his chin and a badly burned a rm and was being checked out for possi ble internal inj uries. J u st a bo u t the time the last race was ending at the track, J oe Meylor wal ked in to the hosp ita l with a broken little finger of ' the left hand , suffered when he went down in the Secon d Division Mai n event . It's a ro ugh way to start a story about a good n ight of Speedway raci ng. but believe it or not the competition was fu rious. The Ha nd icap Ma in event was started th ree times becau se of pil e-ups in turn one (everyone tryi ng to win th e rac e in the first lap). T he Ma in fin ally went to Ron Preston just in ches ahead of Ala n Ch ristia n . The Scra tch Main was not quite as spectacu lar, bu t the ba ttl e between Schwa rt z and Bast was brought back to life. At t he very instant the st a rting gate went up. Mike Bast j u mped ou t in front of Schwartz, In fact he c'! t. ~i m

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