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/126666
l-< A measure of Yamaha's seriousness about the race was the presence of tuner Kel Carruthers, here joking with Lawson before the start of the final. o Z Defending Champ Danny Chandler looked great in winning the motocross heat race, but couldn't quite match Lawson in the final and finished second. ,I racers, and the 25-year-old Lawson 'imply ran away from the other rid.rs. By the second' lap, he was so far ap.ead that the ABC camera helicopter hovering overhead was closer to ~awson than his competitors were. Riding his talJ-geared, dirt trackdred, front-disc braked YZ with a deceptively smooth style, Lawson clocked the best heat race time and served notice that .he would be the man to beat. Steve Wise, making his first competitive appearance since a series of road racing injuries sidelined him earlier this year, looked fast and in control while placing second, although with only three weeks to get in shape he clearly was lacking the speed that had brOl-lght him two Superbikers titles. Honda's up-and~oming F-l and Superbike rider Fred Merkel, showing that 12 years of riding amateur motocross didn't go to waste, wound up third, despite riding with a cracked rib suffered in a fall during the Saturday practice ses,sion. In fourth was jim Filice, riding a dirt track-framed Can-Am four-sTroke; KTM-mounted Thad Wolff was fifth; Canadian road racing champion Michel Mercier guided his Can-Am to the sixth spot, jeff Heino managed seventh; perennial Battle of the Twins ChampIon jim Adamo, riding the event's most unusual bike, a 750cc Pantah-based Ducati dirt tracker, was next; and Dave Aldana, at 33, the oldest Superbiker, was credited with ninth after mechanical difficulties put him out while running near the leaders. Semi-final During the intermission between the heat races and the semi-unal, the pits along the front straightaway were jumping, as the Harley-Davidson team shoe-horned a spare engine and transmission into Springsteen's XR, Aldana's crew performed a top-end job on their YZ, johnson's attendants made repairs to the broken oil reservoir and the Doug.Chandler pit crew took their Honda top-end apart to repair the broken cylinder stud. Other teams with less drastic problems made final adj ustrnents and hoped for a top-three showing in the semi. Filice blasted to the holeshot at the start, but his time in front was shortlived as johnson, ShobeJ:t and Geboers soon dispatched "jimbo" to fourth place. Filice would later comment on his backwards drift, saying, "The bike was tank-slapping me a]) over the place. I was just trying to hold on." In some ofthe afternoon's bestracing, the three leaders then nose-totailed it for the remaining laps, with johnson getting the upper hand in the latter stages for the win, followed by Shobert and then Geboers. Final The make-up of the 12-rider final was evenly distributed, as four motocrossers, four dirt trackers and three road racers pushed seven two-strokes and five four-strokes to the starting grid. After the customary first-lap pushing and shoving was over, it was Lawson, one of the few competitors to wear a steel shoe in the race, pulling away to a lead that he would maintain to the checkered flag. Making very few mistakes while layrng down beautiful dirt track slides on the pavement sections, getting the most air 0[£ the TT jump and powering easily through the dirt section's varied turns, Lawson had control of the race from the second lap on. "I've waited all week for this," Lawson said after the win, Yamaha's first at the Superbikers. "All year really," he quickly added, perhaps remembering his 1981 third-place showing and his exclusion last year Rick Johnson (18land Bubba Shobert (671 lead Jimmy Filice through the chicane on their way to taking the first two places in the semi-final. because his sponsor at the time, Kawasaki, didn't have a production-based bike capable of competing. Danny Chandler looked like he might be able to make a charge, but in trying to keep up with the fleeing Lawson, he looked a bit more ragged than usual. At one point he clipped a haybale, bending his shift lever. The damage forced Chandler to take his foot 0[£ the peg and shift with his heel - not the ideal set-up on a course that was getting rougher with each passing lap. Asked after the race if he could have caught Lawson with a properly functioning lever, Magoo replied, "It's hard to say; he was riding damn fast. Plus, I got real 'slideways' a couple of times. After that, I just tried to maintain." After the initial laps, positions remained fairly constant. Honda teammates Fay and Merkel put on an interesting show in their tight battle for eighth and ninth, with the twostroke-mounted Merkel getting the best of Fay at the finish. Two-time winner Wise, a little disappointed with his unaccustomed role in midpack, tried to dart past highest-fin ish1ng dirt tracker Bubba Shobert in the chicane just before the start/finish line on the last lap, but cou'ldn't make the move stick and exploded 'Mr. Superbiker' in 1980-81, Steve Wise (21 was off the pace this year. through a haybale instead. Unimpressed by the maneuver, officials. docked Wise a lap for cutting the course, demoting him from seventh place to a next-to-Iast 11th. • Results 1. Eddie Lawson (Yam); 2. Danny Chandler(Hon); 3. Brae Glover (Yam); 4. Andre Malherbe (Hon); 5. Eric Geboers(Suz);6. Bubba Shobert(W·R); 7. Rick Johnson (Yam); 8. Fred Merkel (Hon); 9. Mickey Fay. (Hon); 10. Doug Chandler (Hon); 11. Steve Wise (Hon); 12: Alex Jorgensen (W·RI. '7