Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Kenny Roberts rode EddieUlwson's VZR600 to win the Imola 200 despite colliding with teemmete Virginio Ferreri in practice. Teem Kenny Roberts/Merlboro's Weyne Reiney hesn't mestered deedengine sterts end finished 1Oth in the Imole 260cc rece. Roberts wins ImoiaZOO By Alan Cathcart IMOLA,ITALY. APR. I Kenny Roberts bade successful farewell to Continental Europe by dominating the two legs of the Imola 200. Riding the latest Yamaha OW80 V-4500 which Eddie Lawson had won the South African GP on a week before, King Kenny trounced a field of mainly Italian riders headed by former World Cham- 18 pion Franco Uncini on the Team Gallina HB Suzuki, and Uncini's teammate, Swiss rider Sergio Pellandini, who qualified third behind Roberts and Uncini. Kenny's qualifying time of one minute, 55.74 seconds was no less than 1.75 seconds faster than Uncini, as well as an amazing five seconds faster than Marlboro Yamaha teammate Virginio Ferrari on an identical bike. "The bike needs to be set up the way I like it," said Kenny afterward, "and we're going to get new triple-clamps made before I ride il in Ihe Malch Races so we can alter the trail and stufr. But the engine's quite a bit better: only thing I don't like are the throtl1es, which are push-pull round-slide instead of the square-slide we had lasI year, and aren't so responsive. But it's a good bike." Thanks to a bizarre accident in Ihe final stages of qualifying, though, Roberts almosldidn't get to race at all. The oext lap after setting his fastest time, Kenny chopped the engine com· ing through the final chicane leading into pit lane, and in doing so collided with Ferrari. "It was my fault," said Roberts. "I got my plug chop, but I just didn't anticipate Ferrari being there or going as slow as he was to make the comer. I was going so much faster with a dead engine, then suddenly I found I couldn't miss hitting him. I blame myself for it, but at the same time it's a dangerous pit entrance and I've almost been hit there a time or two myself. I came up the inside of the track, he was on the outside going much slower, then swung in to make the tum: I'd made my chop, stuck my leg out then suddenly I was right on top of him. I nailed him ~." The impact stove in the front of Roberts' bike, sending Roberts £lipping over the top of the bars and landing on his side before rolling over and ending up on his feet. Ferrari incredibly survived the collision and stayed upright, but with the rear of his Yamaha badly bent. Both bikes were repaired in time for the race with the help of a local alloy welder. Roberts' injuries were confined to a bruised hip, twisted ankle and a couple of skinned fingers. Another pre·race drama saw one of the other big n"mes OUI of the Imola 200, however, when Marco Lucchinelli. who had qualified his faclory Cagiva 500 in a disappointing eighth posilion behind several privaleers, refused to ride unless the organizers came up with an increased start money offer. Even wilh Ihe intervention of the boss of the Cagiva firm, Gianfranco Castiglione, no deal was struck, and the disconsolate mechanics had 10 pack away the four bikes which Ihey had brought for LucchineJli and his friend. U.S.-based Venezuelan Roberto Pietri. Pietri was only 19th in qualifying. bUI Ihe loss of Lucchinelli from Ihe lisl of starters was greeted with prediclable fury and catcalls from Ihe 3O.000o-owd. well down on prt'\'ious years. When the flag fell for Ihe sIan of Ihe first leg in dry bUI o\,erGISI condil ions. Suzuki privaleer Waltt'r i\li~liorali scorched into an immt'dialt' It'ad from the second row. Iracked b,' l'Jl(·ini. anolher Suzuki in Ihe hands' of fOnlwr European champion Leandm Bt·dw· roni, and Roberts, who was no dOllbl Ihankful for the Daylona-slylt' dllldl starl, ralher Ihan tht' GP-Iypt' pllsh starts normally favort'tl i!! ElImpt·. Uncini took the lead on lap IWO. with Roberts passing Bt't'ht'l'OlIi jllsl before Ihe Italian fell off at lilt' Piralelia, withoul injury. Meamimt', Pellandini, nimh on Ihe firsl lap afler a slow start, had passed Ferrari and was founh. Roberts passed Migliorati on lap two to close up on Uncini, and for the nexl 20 laps the crowd was treated to a great duel bet~een the, two former World Champions, who passed and repassed each other litera1ly dozens of times all the way around the scenic 3.U mile track, built on the side of a hill in a river valley on what were, until recentlv, public roads. Up front, Roberts was having 10 deal with four-stroke mounted back· markers every bit as slow as the ones he had complained so bitterly of after winning at Daytona, and depending who was in frontal the lime and where Ihe mobile chicanes were encountered, either he or Uncini would pull out a IDO-yard lead on the other. only for the positions 10 be reversed shortly afler. Suspicions thaI Roberts was al leasl partly sandbagging in order to make a race of it for the crowd seemed to be confirmed when on lap 20 he suddenly speeded up and opened a gap of four seconds in one lap, becoming 9.5 seconds the next. BUI all was not well with Uncini. On lap 22 bolh Ihe leaders pitted for fuel. the Yamaha crew sending Roberts out again in only 6.8 seconds, while after a long push down pit lane Uncini's Suzuki rdused lore- start and he was OUI of the race. That left Roberts almost a minute ahead of the second man, now Lorenzo GhiseIli on his privateer Suzuki; Ferrari's Yamaha had spluttered coming out of the pit chicane on lap 16, then coasted to a halt the other side of the pit wall. A race of attrilion had left only 14 bikes slill running out of the 32 start· ers, and as Roberts reeled off the lasl few laps to the checkered flag, he lapped all bUI second man Ghiselli. With only an hour before Ihe start of the second leg, Gallina's mechanics were unable to trace the problem with Uncini's Suzuki. Fast-starting Migliorati led again from the line, but this time Roberts was· not disposed 10 hang about, and by the firsl comer he was in Ihe lead, tracked by teammate Ferrari. Behind, there was drama on the first lap when Fabio Biliotti overbraked for the tight right-hander on his RS Honda while trying to squeeze inside Migliorati for third. The result was that both riders went down, and while Biliotti lay prostrate on the ground with what transpired to be a broken collarbone, the irate Migliorati pulled his helmet oH, rushed over to him and started beating the daylights out o£.him in full view of a large section of the crowd and the TV cameras! Eventually restrained by the carabinieri, Migliorati was only slightly penitenl afterward: "Biliotti's always doing stupid things like that, and this time he cost me a lot of money and a good placing. My bike is destroyed, I don't have a lire in the bank, and with all the sponsors he has I figure he should pay for what he did. I'm sorry I got carried away and hit him, but it was in the heat of the moment. If he sends me a bill for what I did to him, I'll send him one for what he did to my bike!" Such was the story of the only real excitement in a lack-luster race, which saw the IWO Yamahas pull ever further away together from Ihe rest of Ihe field, with Roberts lapping at his leammate's slower times until he slepped up the pace on lap 13 and starled taking three seconds a lap out of him Ihereafter. An even fasler pil stop in 5.7 seconds on lap 22 left him securely in front, and an appointment wilh the checkered flag jusl15 minules before it began 10 rain. Ferrari was second, 22 seconds down, wilh Pellandini's Suzuki Ihe only other bike on the same lap as Roberts allhe end. "I'm sure glad Ihal's ove..... said a We-dl)' Robens aher Ihe rdCt'. ''I'm li..ed, I'm hurting and I wanl to go home." The £ollowing day King Kenny jellt'd back 10 C.alifornia, perhaps never 10 relurn 10 the cOnlinenl of Eu..ope as a racer. He'll be missed. Saturday's 250cc 100·miler was run in sunny condilions aher IWO days of weI qualifying which resulted in a curious-looking grid. With many bikes still on their way back 10 Europe afler tht' Soulh African GP Ihe week bdore, the field consisled mainly of Italian 1000dis and Ihe less well-known European privateers who couldn't afford the Irip to Soulh A£rica. However, the Te-dm Roberts Marlboro duo of Alan Carter and Wayne Rainey were there on Carter's '83 bikes. both Yamaha Kmodel TZ250s which Ihe British youngsler claimed to be quite a bit faster al presenl than Ihe leam's new L-models with the faclory tuning kit. BUI with wet practice and a dry race, the team had to take a guess al jetting and gear· ing on the bikes. The race was billed as a c1ulch start with engines running, like Ihe 200, bUI when Ihe riders gOI 10 Ihe line they were shown a 'Stop engines' board, the Italian organizers having peremplorily changed to a push start al the last moment. This pleased Rainey not a

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