Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Ricky Graham leads Alex Jorgensen (441. Scott Parker (11 I. Randy Goss (hidden1 and Scott Parson (951 in the National. Goss moved by Parker before the checkerad flag. Graham claimed his fourth consecutive Springfield Mile to regain the top Camel Pro points position. in a tie with Goss. AMA Grand National Championship/ Camel Pro Series: Round 16 Springfield Mile toGraham • again By Gary Van Voorhis SPRINGFIELD, IL, JULY 22 Honda's Ricky Graham, with a burst of raw horsepower in a drag race to the finish line, shattered Alex Jorgensen's dream of breaking the stranglehold Graham has on the 14 Camel Pro Series Springfield Mile National. Graham edged I Jorgensen by less than two feet Harley-Davidson-mounted Gary Scott holds off Randy Goss (11 in the second heat. Scott won this heat. but settled for ninth in the main. at the flag with Harley's Randy Goss a scant three feet behind th.e pair. The Harley versus Honda battle continued for fourth with SCOtt Parker putting his orange and black Milwaukee machine ahead of the red, white and blue RS750 of Doug Chandler. For Graham, the win marked his fourth consecutive Springfield victory sinceAMA Grand National Championship racing returned to the II1inois State Fairgrounds. Despite being the top rider in time trials and winning the fastest heat with a time six seconds quicker than the winner of the second fastest heat, Graham's ational win was captured in knockdown, drag-out, barroom brawl style with as many as eight riders in contention to the halfway point. Graham's win, coupled with the third place finish of Goss, puts the two in a tie at 151 points for the lead in the point standings. Parker continues to shadow the frontrunners in third at 133. Terry Poovey was back in action for the first time since the July 7 altercation with Bubba Shobert at the St. Louis National Short Track which left Poovey with cuts to his right eye requiring 17 stitches. A close look at Poovey revealed the areas on the eyelid and below the eye where he was cut. Shobert was riding at Springfield while his $1,000 fine/45-day suspension by the AMA is under appeal. The II1inois Motorcycle Dealers Association (IMDA), organizers of the ational, breathed a collective sigh of rei ief when the races were over. The National had been rained out on May 20 and again on May 27 and 28. A crowd estimated at "around 14,000" by IMDA's Tote Gray turned out for the action and got their money's worth. Time Trials A timing clock malfunction sent a number of early qualifiers back for another shot. Graham ran three times against the clocks before getting a run to register. His 35.085 second lap was a good bit off the track record he set May 27 at 34.54. Unofficially, a number of hand held stopwatches had Graham below his record on his first ride when the clocks failed to work. Goss, with a 35.489, followed Graham. Hank Scott, Chandler and Parker rounded out the top five. Phillip Culver, at 37.708, was the 48th and final qualifier for the National field. Heats Graham wasted little time in asserting himself in the first heat. He was first off the starting line, first into turn one and long gone after that. While Graham was building up a third-of-a-mile lead by the finish of the IO-Iap heat, six riders were battling for second. That number became five when Ted Boody parked his bike on the backstretch with engine problems which were later diagnosed as a broken valve. Parker drew away from the second place battle to make \t one for third with the action narrowing itself down to a Tom Maitland versus Rich Arnaiz duel which ND/Castrol/ Hi-PointiShoei-backed Maitland won with a stronger drive off turn four on the final lap. It was the fastest heat of the program, giving Graham the pole for the National. A battle of the champions cropped up in heat two, pitting defending Camel Pro Series Champion Randy Goss against former title holder Gary SCOtt. The two, swapping the lead two and three times a lap in one of the best races of the day, carried the confrontation right to the finish line with Scott, in a draft-and-pass maneuver, edging Goss by a foot. Third position and the last direct transfer to the National went to the line also. Shobert, seventh on the stan, slowly worked his way to fifth by lap eight and then moved to fourth when Rod Farris blew an engine. Mike Garrison tried, but couldn't hold off Shobert in a dash to the finish. . Hank Scott, on the KK Motorcycle Supply/Sisemore Traveland-sponsored XR, was already on his way to a start-to-finish ride out front in heat three heading off turn two while Steve Morehead was coasting and looking down at the right side of his bike. "The shift lever fell off as I went to shift off the line on the start," said Morehead afterward. He coasted to the pits, had repairs made and got back on the track in an attempt to get into the semi. Meanwhile, Steve Eklund and his Gardner Racing Harley were looking strong in second. On lap seven, Eklund's bike's engine began running on one cylinder and he dropped quickly to fifth behind SCOtt Pearson, Dan Ingram and Pete Hames. Pearson went on to finish second behind Scott with Hames nipping Ingram at the line for third. Chandler and Jorgensen were joined by Terry Poovey in a threeway battle for the lead in heat four. The scrap lasted for five laps with Chandler then slowing with a sour engine at the same time Jimmy Filice headed to the pits with a broken primary chain. Jorgensen took command with Poovey close behind and the two ran within 10 bikelengths of each other to the finish. Jon Cornwell held third going into the final lap. Tim Mertens had other ideas and dropped Cornwell to fourth with half a lap to go to put his Belleville Honda-sponsored Harley into the

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