Wes Cooley came from the back row to win at Road Atlanta. He now trails Superbike point leader Eddie Lawson 121-108 with one race left.
AMA Superblke Championship Series:
Round 9
ing. Starting on the last row of
the grid. Cooley swept through
the starting field and by the fifth
lap of the 15-lap race had taken
the lead for good.
Cooley keeps title
hopes alive with
Road Atlanta win
Finishing second behind Cooley's
Vetter-sponsored Yoshimura Suzuki
was Team Kawasaki's Eddie Lawson.
A win for Lawson at Road Atlanta
would have clinched the Superbike
title , but now th e battle win go down
to the final race of the series which will
be held at Daytona on Oct. 5. Lawson
leads Cooley by IS points , 121-108 .
Third place finisher for the second
straight weekend was Team Honda's
Mike Baldwin. "You never forget how
to race, " said Baldwin after the race,
referring to his 14·month layoff due to
a june, 1979 crash at Loudon. "But it
takes awhile to get that razor's edge
back."
But there wasn't much celebration
in the Honda pits over Baldwin's third
place finish , for the Road Atlanta race
stamped "finished" on Team Honda's
attempt to win the AMA Superbike
By Jack Mangus
Photos by Cameron Christoffersen and Bob Lenk
BRASLETON, GA, AUG . 24
"My father told me to never give up," said Wes
Cooley after he came back from a heat race
crash to win the Superbike portion of Road
10 Atlanta's Mello Yello Pro-Am road race meet-
championship via a mega-buck effort.
Honda's hopes rested on the shoulders
of young Freddie Spencer, wli~
entered the meeting 10 points behind
Lawson on the points table, 105·95.
Spencer DNF his heat race when his
bike's engine let go on the last lap"A.
hurried engine change prior to the
main took place, but after working tiiS
way up to fifth from a back row stan,
Spencer pitted on the fifth lap for
som e quick mechanical attention and
then returned to the race only to finish
out of the points and out of the
championship hunt in 15th place. DDS
Two heat races were run to
determine starting positions for the
Superbike main and in the first ant; if
was Kawasaki teammates Eddie
Lawson and David Aldana finishing 12 .with Chuck Parme taking third t o
make it a sweep for Team Green. UOl
Heat number two saw Cooley ani!
Spencer hook up for a four-lap dice a
good distance ahead of Baldwin, but
then Spencer dropped out when
mechanical gremlins struck again and
moments later Cooley unloaded.
