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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126790
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Bubbe Shobert (77) blasts off the line ahead of Mike Baldwin (43). Randy Renfrow (96) and Jimmy Adamo.
MfA Grand Nati. .1Championship/Camel Pro
Series: R0IIIIfI3J
Shobert slides to
Mid-Ohio victory
By Henny Ray Abrams
LEXINGTON, OH, SEPT. 30
In what was easily the most shocking result·
of this or the past several Camel Pro seasons,
Honda's Bubba Shobert, in only his fourth
road race, dominated a field of asphalt
"experts" to take the Formula
One win in the final National
road race of the year' at MidOhio Sports Car Course. And
lO
what makes the win even more
impressive is that he rode his Honda
750 Interceptor-based machine with
an 860cc endurance motor on a rainslickened track which wreaked havoc
with the established pavement star~.
Honda's Mike Baldwin, the U.S. Road
Race Champion of 1982-84, fell in
turn seven, as did Wes Cooley. Also
going down were Doug Chandler,
Rich Oliver, Terry Hampton and
Randy Renfrow. Renfrow remounted
to finish sixth.
Second to Shobert was Jimmy
Adamo on the Reno Leoni Cagiva
square-four two-stroke, and in his
best finish ever was Ricky Orlando in
third on the MPC Sur-Tech Honda
Interceptor-based Superbike.
Besides the ra€e to win, the other
weekend battle was for the series
point fund money and final point
standings. Richard Schlachter, Renfrow and Cooley held their 2-3-4
positions, respectively, with none able
to improve. Schlachter lost the front
end of his Honda RS500 on the opening lap of the National and although
he remained upright, he fell to the
back of the pack and finished eighth,
two spots behind Renfrow and good
for the $6,000 second place Camel
point fund money. .
The morning's timed qualifying
was the day's first surprise. Baldwin
was fast from the start and took his
place on the pole with a I minute,
40.55 second lap that saw him hit 153
.Nph(qn th~ backstrjl~g,!t.lT~n ~as
no surprise. The surprise was that
Shobert was second at 1:40.77. "Practice is one thing, but it's not like the
race," said Shobert.
,Renfrow, Cooley and Adamo filled
out the front row, all in the I :4I's.
Just behind them were McDonald,
Schlachter, Art Robbins, Reuben McMurter and Chandler.
About an hour before the start it
started to rain, but not heavily. At
first the choice for tires was for intermediates, but the rain picked up and
the choice was for full rain tires.
Several warm-up laps were run
with a few riders falling, including
Baldwin, who then came in to change
his rear sprocket, shifting linkage
and lower fairings.
The rain 'was falling lightly, but
steadily as the green flag fell and
Shobert used the tractability of the
four-suoke to rocket into the lead.
Baldwin was second, Renfrow third,
with Cooley, Adamo and Oliver
following.
'
Schlachter was moving up but
going into the first right hand sweeper
he slid the front wheel under and had
to put his foot down to remain upright
while sliding on the edge of the grass.
After the sweeper is a long downhill straight followed by the right
hand turn seven. Cooley was the first
to go down when he seized entering
that corner. The impact cracked his
three-cylinder Honda's tank, laying
down more gas on the corner's
slippery approach.
"Cooley and Mike (Baldwin) hit
it," Adamo later explained, "but I
could see it (the gas). The track was
OKA"c;e(~qu gpt u~ 10 ~t"; \ I rr I
The second' lap saw Dave Roper
slide off two turns later in turn nine,
the same corner that would trouble
Renfrow.
On the fifth of 31 lap'S, Baldwin
passed his teammate,Shobert down
the front straight and began to pull
away with Adamo third. Renfrow,
Rich Oliver and Orlando were battling for fourth with Chandler moving up on the trio. Gregg Smrz led
McDonald and Chivington in eighth.
Cutting laps in the 2:00 range
Baldwin was pulling away when he
got into a nasty slide after his crew
had told him to slow down on the
lOth lap when he had a 23 second
lead. Oliver and Hampton both went
down in turn seven on the same lap.
One more tour and Baldwin's day
was done. as was Chandler's. "Oil or
gas got spilled on the road," Baldwin
began. "I locked up the front wheel
and it spit me off. It's a disadvantage
to ride a light bike in the rain compared to the four-stroke. I was hoping the master cylinder wouldn't be
broken off so I could continue, but
when I got on the bike I saw no master cylinder."
Chandler said, "I was doing the
same thing lap after lap and it went
out from under me when I was in
fifth place."
Having inherited the lead when
Baldwin went down, Shobert's gap
over Adamo on the 13th lap was 12
seconds. Adamo had 20 seconds on
Renfrow and Orlando, who were 40
seconds up on the fifth place battle
involving Smrz, McDonald and Chivington.
But Renfrow went down in turn
nine, although he remounted in seventh place. "Coming off the hill I
grabbed too much front brake. I ruined
the rear brake lever and the footpeg
was folded suaight up."
Ricky Orlando was behind Renfrow at the time and noticed that
"there was mud across the track just
before the corner and I think it stayed.
on the tire when Randy went in."
At the halfway mark Shobert wasn't
backing aU, lapping Schlachter and
holding a 13-second cushion on
Adamo. Orlando was 21 seconds behind Adamo's Cagiva, but almost a
minute up on Chivington. Srmz was
feeling McDonald's heat in fifth. "I
got up to fifth