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/126336
l!") CN I-. V ..c o ... u o Bob "Hurricane" Hannah stormed to another two-mota sweep in the Trans-AMA. Hannah has won seven of the eight motos held so far. Trans-AMA·MX Series - Round four Hannah clean-sweeps LakeSuga By Jim Gianatsis AXTON , VA , OCT. 15 Roger DeCoster may have styled for awhile at Unadilla last week, but when the Trans-AMA Series returned to Lake Sugar Tree Raceway, a more typical one-line American track, Bob Hannah once again had his Yamaha back in the winner's circle. This was the third time tha t the Hurricane and the ow- 6 38 prepared by Keith McCa rt y have clean ed hous e in both mot os with come- f ro m- behi nd charg es Hannah's trademark on tracks which his competition labels "im possible to pass on ." Collecting second overall in th e 500cc Internat ional class was Husqvarna's Chuck Sun after nearly holding off Hannah's passing attempts in both motos in a clash for the overa ll victor y. The acknowledged g ra nd master of motocross, Roger DeCoster , had to acce pt third for the da y on his works Suzuki. T wo get offs on the slick wet clay track in th e opening moto d ropped Roger from first to sixth position . Team Yamaha did n't stop with the In tern a t ional class as N a tio na l Champion Broc Glover collected hi; first 250cc Support class win of the series with his 1979 model Yamaha YZ-250F production bike prepared by J im Felt . Once aga in T eam Honda provided t he top contenders as Warren Reid and Steve Wise took second and third , respectively, with the ir CR -250R stockers. 500cc International It Was DeCoster who dialed the start to perfection in the opening mota with a new experimental RN-420 works Suzuk i, but hot on his knobbies was Jim Pomeroy, then Gary Semics, Chu ck Sun , Rex Staten , Darrell Shultz, Pierre Ka rsmakers, Danny La Porte , Denny Swartz and Bob Ha nnah . When a slick section of th e well-wa tered course spun Roger out on the th ird la p . Pomeroy took to the front as Sun blas ted Semics' Can-Am fo r second place . . DeCost er th en regrouped for th ird ah ead of Sem ics. Pomeroy was looking good in his second race on the works Honda since rejoining the circuit after his shoulder injury, and he quickly began to pull away from the rest of the pack with the breakneck speed he had exhibited last weekend at Unadilla - this time without crashing . Jim bu ilt up a huge lead at the I5 -minute mark. only to see it disappear when he stalled the RC-450 in a tum. Sun and DeCoster closed the distance. "T he bike was handling funny , and I was riding too hard to compensate for it. That's why I kept stalling," explained Pomeroy. "T he forks were bottoming terribly over the jum ps. When I got back to the pits after the race I saw one of my fork caps was missing and the other was about to fall off. All the oil had blown out and the whole front end was about to collapse!" . After pressing Pomeroy hard for a number of laps , Chuck Sun finally got past the ill-handling Honda to secure the lead mid -point in th e race . DeCoster dropped ba ck to seventh plac e when he stuck his front wheel in a soft berm and got pitched over the bars. Hannah , meanwhile, had moved up to fourth place, but was balked for a number of laps in trying to get past Semics on the tight course. Once Bob' made it clear, Pomeroy's ailing bike was no problem, and the Hurricane moved quickly into second place and closed on Sun. r LaPorte went down on the sliclt stuff also , and dropped out of the top 10. The order at the 4O-minute point was Sun, Hannah , Sernics, Kent Howerton, DeCoster and Shultz. Pierre Karsmakers skidded his way sideways off a double jump and collected a free ride to the hospital. He later returned sore but uninjured. The closing laps had Hannan roasting Sun 's rear fender and the crowd screaming themselves hoarse. . "We got the white flag. There was a slower rider in front of me on the offcamber sweeper tum which forced me down into the soft outside line. Hannah stayed high on the hard inside line and got me ," Chuck explained losing his lead. "Coming down from the signaling area , I squared the tum off, stayed up . tight and got Chuck. Then I slowed up to make sure he wouldn't cut back over. on me , but he lost his momentum on the uphill which followed. " Hannah h~d taken the lead calculatingly ltd win. r Darrell Shu ltz put on a steady drive to move into fourth past Pomeroy on J