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/126539
~. ~. e 00 O'l ~ ~ $.0 ll.l ..c ... O-t ll.l ll.l V) .., (Top left) Mike Baker flew high. winning both the 175 and 250cc-Expert classes. (Above) Tom Kelly parts the water with his Open Expert class winning ride. (Left) Jimmy "The Jammer" Weinert turned 30 and promptly got his first win in Vets class racing. Baker's double at 23rd annual Dirt Diggers GP By Dale Brown VALENCIA, CA, SEPT. 5-6 Yamaha-mounted Mike Baker scored two wins in less than three hours, copping the 175 and 250cc Expert wins in the Dirt Diggers M.e. Hopetown GP held at Indian Dunes. Over 600 riders competed in the two-day event, run over a '1' 2 . . m~ e course t h at utllze d t h e 5 '1 Dunes Shadow Glen motocross 8 circuit, the sandwash and Santa Clarita river, and a brief pavement stretch in the rear of the park. All races ran 45 minutes plus one lap. Baker's first victory came early Sunday morning in the l75cc Amateur/ Expert race. He took the lead off the start, pursued by desert specialist Kevin Hopkins (Yam). YaII\aha rider Doug Gentry, an MX regular at the Dunes, soon passed Hopkins to take up the chase on Baker, but on the thIrd lap he bailed and.when Hopkins also laid it down, second was given to Donnie Morrison, also Yamaha-mounted. From fourth, Gentry began to charge back up the ladder, passing Hopkins and then overtaking Morrison for the runner-up spot with four laps remaining. Almost immediately he made up ground on Baker until he had a front row seat on the leader's rear fender. The battle was on for the lead and it went down to the bitter end. "He (Gentry) caught up to me," said Baker later, "and he passed me, but then l' cut him off in the next comer and that was the end." So Baker took the win with Gentry second and Morrison and Hopkins a distant third and fourth. Jeff Pahlgre,n was the first Amateur. Baker's next race was an hour later in the 250cc Amateur/Expert clash. There he got a 10th place start as Yamaha-mounted Brad McLeod got out front first ahead of Dan Ashcraft (Hus) and Jimmy Weinert (Kaw).The Jammer went from third to first at the beginning of the second lap, but then , apparently seized his machine and was out of the running. M.cLeod resumed the lead and Baker was already up to second ahead of Ashcraft. The third lap saw Baker take the lead, but McLeod got around to lead for one more lap before Baker took off for goOd. When he took off, he built his lead up to about 1g seconds, but he did run into trouble later in the race, although it did not aff~ct the outcome. "I started building up a lead, but then 1 fell and screwed up my knee - the knee 1 screwed up last week - but the race ended." Although limping in the pits afterward, Baker had two wins and he thanked sponsors Dallas Baker Products (Mike is Dallas' son), Orange County Cycle, Pro-Tee, Hallman, Total Packaging and ATK. While Baker was in control of the lead, the battIe for second was being - waged seriously. Baker's foe in the 175cc race, Gentry, cut through the pack to overtake McLeod and run second as Ashcraft was suffering broken exhaust pipe that robbed power. Towards the end of the race Yamaha's Larry Roeseler moved into the action. As Gentry and McLeod began to drop back, Ashcraft and Roeseler moved up to take over second and third. Ashcraft held second to the end as Roeseler, who was challenging for the runner-up spot, ran out of gas on the last lap and dropped to eighth. That moved McLeod back up to third with Larry Thomson taking fourth after Gentry dropped out with undisclosed troubles. Randy Morales took the first of two ,6.mateur wins on the day as he finished ninth overall. In Sunday's Open Amateur/Expert class the win went to Husqvarna/Mal'colm Smith-backed Tom Kelly, but in _ the early stages of the race it did not appear that he would playa role up front after being well back' from a . third row start and a first lap crash. Up front was Mark Nation on a Maico with Honda riders Morgan Malocco and Jeff Kaplan hounding him. Malocco dropped back and Ashcraft moved up to third as the second lap got underway. Larry Roeseler was on the move and soon took over third. displacing Ashcraft. Two laps later Ashcraft was out of the race as an unfortunate encounter involving an unseen bump and the rear of his gas tank left him a pained soprano for awhile. By that time Kelly was up with the leaders and he took over fourth. .