Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

I Desert Hotline ~ E o 00 .... 0') .... s-. 0.. < Rlde,.1eeve the StIIrt of CRC', Tenderfoot enduro. Balentine/Clark winners at Viewfinders team race By Joyce May LUCERNE VALLEY, CA, APR. 5 After the dust cleared and the tempers calmed, the Mojave! Palmdale team of Bob Balentine and Terry Clark were declared trn: official winners of the Easter Satur- .22 day team race hosted by the Viewfinden M.C. Because of an error in judgement made earlier in the race by Chuclt Miller who had teamed up with Bruce Ogilvie in the l!50cc class, the sponsoring club was faced with a decision at the end of the race as to whether the overall winners of the race, the Ogilvie/Miller team, should be disqualified or not. Dan Smith, who had teamed with Mike Mulconery, took the lead for the first time and held it past check one. Balentine, riding the first loop, was cruising his usual, casual manner and had moved up from third or fourth at the bomb to only a short breath behind Smith. The Ken Upp/Scott Postma team (second at the bomb) was in the third spot while hard-charging Bruce Ogilvie had moved up from 10th at the bomb to fourth. The team of Randy Brown and Eldin Prine was fifth. First Ironman rider, Dan Ashcraft, was next followed by another Ironman, Bill Saltzman. Howard McCasland (who had teamed with Ed Zarp) , was in the eighth spot followed by the Chris Austin/Chuck Stearns team and Ironman Lee Scheffers. First gal through was Trudy Beck who was riding as Ironlady. The first four Novices came into first check quite close together and were led by the Murray Kapke/Steve Padilla team. Following were the Paul Baxter/P. Palmer team, the Rod Hawkins/Ken Hansing team, and the Mike Wolinger/Gary Wilson team. The first Begi n ne r team of George Travieso/Jim Pinkerton had a nice lead over the rest of the Beginners. The next Beginner team through check one was Scott Fisk/Don Bonar followed by Mike Ponn/ Andy Dale and Brian Meyette/Harold Waterfield. Off the first l!8 mile loop Balentine had moved into the first spot and had a short lead built up. Clark took over and headed out through home check, up over the hill and then hung a Idt down the whoop-dees back to the start area and out to the bomb. As Clark heali¢ .a.CJ~ . tM. (Ia~. ~o.-:a~the bomb he saw a whisp of dust ahead of him. "How can this be?" he thought to himself. As he got into a narrow wash he could see that it was Miller ahead of him. Ogilvie had come into the pits in the second spot and had turned the bandolier over to his partner. Miller headed through home check, and then. in his effort to catch the leader, did not realize that the course went up over the hill before it headed baclt past the start area and to the bomb. Instead he skirted the bottom of the hills and headed right for the bomb. Mulconery was the next through home check, followed by Ashcraft, the Braun/Prine team. Saltzman, the Austin/Stearns team and Ed Zarp of the McCasland/Zarp team. Zarp had seen Miller's dust, and 10 he too made the mistake of going around the bottom of the mountain to the start area. The C bike team of Cliff Thomas and Kevin Hopkins had now moved into the top 10. Novice Ironman Riclt Sowma had moved through the ranks from eighth Novice at the first check, to the Novice lead which he had extended to are· spectable length. The Beginner group was led by the Meyette/Waterfield team and followed by the C team of Gary Graef and Guy Gowdy and the Fisk/Bonar team. Onto the first lap of the second loop was Ogilvie, with a slight lead over Balentine. The D. Smith/Mulconery team still held the third spot while Austin and Stearns had moved into the fourth slot. Ironman Ashcraft had dropped into fifth while the Zarp/ McCasland combo took their home check in the sixth slot followed by the Thomas/Hopkins pair, who had (even though plagued with a flat) now moved into seventh overall. Rounding out the top 10 were the Upp/Postma team, Ironman Lee Scheffers, and Ironman Saltzman. The Novice lead had now moved to the Baxter/Palmer team. They had stretched their lead to where they could breathe a little easier. In the second Novice slot was the Hawkins/ Hansing team followed by the Mike BoIing(John Reed duo who had moved up to third from the eighth slot. The Ray Conway and Russ Kurisu combo had moved from seventh to fourth. Off the second turn of the first loop came the Beginners class led by the Gilpin l!50cc duo Oim and Jerry). They had moved up from fourth overall Beginners to the lead. The Traviesa/Pinkerton team (l!5Occ) earned second and were followed by the C team of Graef and Gowdy. Ironman Novice Trailbiker Robert Smith was the next to take the check· ered, followed by Beginner Ironman Tony Mauejunas (C) and the Ponn/ Dale team (l!50cc). Beginner Ironman Marc Kralik (C) was followed by three more Cs: Ironman Pat Burroughs, Ironman Jerry Kerr and the Dickson team of Scott and Brian. First Trail Beginner team to finish was Trevor Potter and Frank Chase. The first Novice gal fmisher. Lori Theel on a Trailbike, rode it as an Ironlady. The Trail Novice team of Dan Churnnex and Mike Redding also finished. On the fITSt lap of the second loop Balentine had once again taken the lead with Ogilvie c10lle behind. Because the competition was so hot and heavy between these two teams, they had pulled well out ahead of the riden in the third slot. The D. Smith/Mulconery team still led the rest of the pack, however, with the Austin/Stearns team moving into the fourth p.osition. The Zarp/ McCasland duo were in the fifth followed by the Upp/Postma pair with Ironman Ashcraft having dropped to seventh overall. Baxter and Palmer had moved into the Novice lead followed by the Hawkins/Hansing team, Bolling and - Reed, and the Conway/Kurisu team. The sister duo of Kathy and Debbie Hopkins were the next gals through. Of the third lap and into the pits for the final rider change came Balentine. He had fit:'ally managed to get a little breathing room over Ogilvie. Out on the last lap Clark's bandolier was pulled off by a bush, so, as he turned around and started looking for it. Miller got by and into the lead. The Hawkins/Hansing team, after leading the Novice Heavyweight class most of the whole race, blew their head gasket just past the fifth checlt, ending their terrific ride. Clark was not able to catch Miller after he had fmally retrieved his bandolier, so Miller (l!5Occ) took the overall lead with Clark (Hwt) taking second. The two had now pushed to a strong 10-minute lead over the rest of the riders. Needless to say, the controversy concerning the second lap began as soon as the two teams reached the finish line. The Amateur/Expert team of Dan Smith and Mike Mulconery (Hwt) held the third overall slot followed by Saltzman (Hwt) and Amateur/Expert duo Chris Austin and Chuclt Stearns (l!50cc). The Heavyweight Zarp/ McCasland team was next followed by the Amateur/Expert combo of Ken Upp and Scott Postma. The team of Kevin Hopkins and Cliff Thomas were first in their division, eighth overall. Ironman (Hwt) Lee Scheffers, only recently back from a long layoff from injuries incurred at the Rovers team race, finished ninth with the Kevin Hasten/Benny Padilla (Hwt) duo moving up into the 10 overall slot. First totally Amateur team was the duo of Jim Harris and Tom Mattox (Hwt) in the II th poSition. The next full Amateur team to finish was composed of Brett Howell and Jim Lawrence (Hwt.). The hot l!50cc Novice team of Paul Baxter and P. Palmer had stretched out well in front of the number two Novice combo of Boling and Read (l!50cc). Trudy BecIt finished !l!nd overall, covering the 1!4 miles of the race by herself. Third Novice team to finish was Ray Conway and Russ Kurisu (l!5Occ), followed by the C duo of Brian Smith and Tim Sinclair. Not far behind was Robert Finkle and Paul Hinds, earning flTSt Novice Heavyweight honors with Bradley Boelman and Ed Andrake (Hwt) in the next Novice slot. Taking seventh Novice honors was the l!5Occ combo of Michael Wolinger and Gary Wilson, followed by the heavyweight team of John Flynn and Ray Zytstra. The Hopkins sisters earned the second gal honors on their C machine. The Deanna Jenkins/Juanita Adams combo also finished. Note: This reporter must correct a statement made in a previous story. The number 06lx belongs to Dick Postma. It is Dicit that has been earning first Senior Amateur l!50cc honors for the past seven or eight races without proper recognition. Loyd leads CRC Tenderfoot By DeVore Fortney Photos by Marcel Fortney RAND MOUNTAINS, CA, MAR. !O While most of the usual front runners were down in Baja abusing their bodies in the annual Tecate enduro, everyone else was up in the Rand. Area having fun. Fun was defined in many ways this weekend but for young Jim Loyd, fun constituted his first overall win. Dodging the rocks and riding the ridges on his IT175 Jim lost only eight seconds to beat out a faster than usual Cheeseburger, who usually defines his fun as the Saturday night campfire. Cheeseburger (his actual name - says so right on his leathersl) is pushing himself up to top oYer !5 riders with finishes like this but only one second behind him was Jerry Bryan who tied with first B rider Larry Arredondo, another new contender. The fIrst Open rider was Bob Keirns, holding off DaryU Thoman who still got first Open A oYer !O. It was surprising to see the smaller bikes winning as one definite no fun factor this weekend was the treacherous wind that blew all moming. The special test section on the second loop ran along a narrow, twisting ridge which left the riders unprotected to the strong gusts hitting them from the side. It's a credit to Jim Loyd's talent that he was able to keep his lightweight upright and on time. There's a whole floclt of young riders coming into their prime this year including, Jim, Joe Anastasio, Jr., Larry Steffen, and many othen. Included in this group are Logan Casteel who took first C rider on his l!50cc and Tracy Lewis, first Open C. Both of these riders lost less than a minute which wasn't easy. Not to be outdone, two over 40 riders, Tony Anderson (l!50cc A) and Bill Jordan (Open B) also lost less than a minute to win their classes. Not to be left out of the fun, were thOlle riding the first loop. A surprisingly tough trail awaited those riders as the loop traveled down to the tortoise preserve (God bless their little protected souls), over to the east side of Government Peak, up to the top for a stunning view and then down a very triclty canyon complete with rocky dropoffs and off camber turns. Fun! Absolutely the biggest surprise was the winner, l!OOcc A Woman, Dana Bell. The fact that Dana won was not the surprise as she is a very talented rider who used to ride the men's B class. The surprise was that Dana didn't do it solo ... you see Dana is five months pregnant. Sure ShOOlS down all those macho stories about "manhandling" the bike down that canyon. Congratulations Dana (in more ways than onel). •

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