Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Latest Poop (Continued from page 6) ll"') 00 0") ..... Prime time: The California MoLOsport Club's Pro-TedTrick FourStroke ational and Skoal-sponsored U.S. Women's National MX Championships will be seen on the following cable television networks: USA Cable Network, 7:30 p.m. on December 20; 5:30 p.m. December 21, 11:30 p.m. on December 23; uperstation WTBS will air a show featuring the Women's Championships and the sidehad: portion of the National at 5:30 p.m. on December 22. Please note that all times are Pacific. volving a debate over the use of state OHV facilities by a gay street-rider's organization based in an Francisco. Strong reaction from concerned users and a unanimous vote of opposition by the California OffHighway Motor Vehicle Recreation Commision has motivated the U.S, Navy to abandon plans to turn 300.000 acres of prime riding areas in California's Imperial Valley into a gunnery range. The Navy plan would have eliminated several popular riding areas. including Gecko campground. Plaster City. Ocotillo Wells and other sites that have been developed or improved with" state funds. series clincher at Mid-Ohio Raceway was run virtually five-abreast for 10 full laps with Dan Chivington winning in his only Challenge appearance. The Challenge. sponsored by Kawaseki. Supertrapp and Dunlop. pits top privateers on identical GPz550 Kawasakis weighted to make all the rider/bike combinations equal; the series is expected to run again in 1985. Chris Carr, who raced away with the AJ\ilAJunior National Championship in dirt track, had a cast removed from his left wrist on December 3 after sustaining a cracked bone in a road racin~accident three weeks earlier. Plans call for Carr to continue to wear a wrist support until after Christmas. Carr has an ambitious rookie Expert season planned and is presently going over sponsorship packages for mile and half mile equipment. Carr will ride for Ron Wood, hi sponsor in 1984, on Wood-Rolax equipment in short track and IT Nationals. Selected Formula Two road races are also in the works with Carr hoping toraceat' Daytona if his time schedule during the Daytona Dirt Track Series permits. Pro motocrosser Marco Folchi, 21, of Simi Valley, California was killed in a trail riding accident in Red Rock Canyon, California on November 24. Friends have established the Marco Folchi Memorial Fund at the Bank of A. Levi. 2092 Tapa St., Simi Valley, CA 93065, 805/526-4261; funds not needed to defray funeral expenses will be donated to charity. Reliable sources say that Rothmans. a major international tobacco company is close to signing a sponsorship deal with Honda covering both road racing and motocross at World Championship level. Honda - following the lead of Suzuki and Yamaha -decided the escalating costs of fielding GP teams was worth looking for an outside backer. More television: The USA cable Network. WTBS and the ESPN sports network are scheduled to provide coverage of the CMC's 1985 Golden State Series. according to CMC Marketing .Manager Dan Skahill. Cameras are slated to roll at the first race. which will be held at Lake Madera. near Fresno. California. January fifth and sixth, Owner or pro pective owners of the 1985 Husqvarna 250 WR should be aware that the stock Nippondenso speedometer odometers - which can't be reset in tenths of a mile - will be replaced by Husqvarna free of charge as soon as updated speedometer heads with a resettable design are shipped by Nippondenso. Nice guys: The California Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Commission has decided to present former Cal ifom ia Sta te Department of Park and Recreation Deputy Director Rus Sanford with a special award of commendation. Sanford, Ii ted as "retired"· in a Commission pre s release, was actuall y forced to resign by Director William Briner in a controversy in- David Busby has bean declared the winner of the California Superbike School Challenge Series with one more point than Dale Quarterley. 60 to 59. Chris Steward wrapped up third place with 51 points in the series. which paid 517500 in purse money and was run at seven AMA road racing Nationals and Pro-Am events. The Family Racing Assn. will be giving away a 1985 Yamaha Tri-Zinger three-wheeler (courtesy of Granada Yamaha) at the February 17. Funduro Family Enduro. near Randsburg. CA. All enduro entrants will be eligible to win the drawing. Contact FRA at 714/ 777-2969 for details. Confused? Daytona International Speedway's Motorcycle Week '85 color brochure and ticket order form features three photos of Formula One bikes under the headin~ "Daytona 2001" along-with a caption thatstans "[t'sa new look for America's biggest motorcycle race in 1985 as the popular Superbikes take over the Daytona 200." A smaller photo of superbikes is printed under the heading "Formula One!" with a caption that begins "The powerful Formula One bikes move to Friday in I 985 and a .strong International field is expected for the event ,'. More information is available from the speedway at 904/ 255·5301. • Replica KlIOOOR streetbike. Both had low bars. Kerker exhausts and cutdown seats. One shifted like a racebike, i.e., down for higher gears. The other shifted like a streetbike, i.e., up for higher gears. [ rode around on the streerbike in the monfing, then parked it and went out on the racebike; did maybe 4{) laps on it that day. Then, as I staned to take off my leathers to go home, the photographer asked me to make a few more laps on the streetbike. I made it to off-camber turn six before I "upshifted" by pulling in the clutch and pushing the shift lever down with the engine at redline. As [ slid along the ground I knew my collarbone was broken and tried to get my left arm up out of the din so it wouldn't hurt so bad: and I watched in amazement as the KZIOOOR sailed over my head, maybe 10 feet in the air, the searand gas tank already gone. It hit the ground front wheel first and cartwheeled. When it finally came to a rest Ihe forks were locked and the ignition key was missing. The frame was bent at both ends, the forks were twisted, the crankcases broken, all the bodywork ruined. There was nothing to be gained by standing around in pain and crying over a crashed bike. 0 off I went to the hospital, leaving others to load the bike. It was totalled, and seeingas I worked for Cycle World at the time, Cycle World's insurance company wrote Kawasaki Motors Corp. a check for the motorcycle. I caught a Jotof flack for that crash. Some readers were outraged. None who wrote were racers. Industry illuminaries gossiped about my alleged tendency to wad up test bikes. None were r:lcers. Other magazine guys laughed and shook their heads. None were racers. I LOld Eddie Lawson about it and he told me about the time he jumped on a streetbike-shifting GPz550 at a California Superbike School session and shifted it backwards oming Out of- tur~ even at -River ide, coming within a hair's breath of crashing. David Aldana told me about the time he backshifted entering the pavement section at the Superbikers TV race - he said he got confused because dirt bikes always shift up and road racers always shift down - and crashed. Racing isn't like street riding; ridingon a race track i n'tlike riding on the treet. The fastest street speeds are slow race track speeds. Racersknow all that. It's always amusing.to see orne canyon-road yahoo show up at a race track expeClin~ to win big and instead learning those les ons. Nobody crashes on purpose, but crashes are inevitable on race tracks because humans and machines are not perfect, and if you fI ip out and cry and moan and, lament and mope in remorse after a crash, your days of riding fast are over. The best riders in the world can encounter water or oil or gasoline dropped by another bi ke or even their own bike, and crash. Their machine can lei them down, the brake lever coming into the grip instead of activating the front brakes; the tire losing air; the wheel breaking. The most capable pilot can push a little too hard; ram or be rammed by another rider doing the unexpected; misjudge omething. Crash in practice at a race and if you're not hurt you've got to go out half an hour or hour later and race, so you'd best not be worrying too much about the crash itself and instead get on with either fixing or replacing the bike in time for the main event. 1£ you cannot come to grips with the risk of crashing, you cannot ride fast on a race track, and if you cannot ride fast on a race track, you will never know everything there is to know about any given motorcycle. The key is understanding why and how you crashed; without that, you cannot fix in your mind how LO better avoid crashing. and the risk becomes too hig-h to deal with. One of the first columns J wrote for Cycle News thi year dealt with crashing and how I overcame the tel" rible mental and emotional shock of my best friend and racing partner, Bruce Hammer, turning himself into a quadriplegic on one of OUT motorcycles. Seeing as life itself is full of hazards, I'll take my chances racing, I said. In that column I qualified where I , was coming from with a paragraph of personal statistics, including number of test bikes ridden, number of career crashes, races entered, etc., and taken as a whole, the crash statistics weren't so bad. It's not like I throwaway every other bike, or every 10th bike, or even every 50th bike I ride. The reaction from racers was overwhelmingly positive; yeah, they said, that's riglu; better to wad up on the race track doing something you love than give it up for safety reasons and then get hit by a drunk driver or break your neck in a shower - both of which are popular ways to get hun in America, But a few months later I pick up a trade magazine and here's a guy blasting me for writing about my crashes. He's crashed himself, he says in his column, having been "forced to the pavement" by errant car drivers on occasion. And he's mad about mv alledged glorification of crashing. ' Well, I want to go on record as saying that in my 15 years of street riding I have never, ever been forced to crash by a car driver, and that maybe if the writer in question spent some time on the race track he'd be better equipped to take evasive action and stay on two wheels. Racing has an appeal only th?se who race can understand, and with thai appeal comes the certain knowledge that over the long run, anybody who spends time on race tracks will crash. The consequences of any crash are determined heavily by circumstance and Iuck and the race track and corner involved. Crashing is the risk one must take to ride on ra e tracks; it is a risk that street-riding critics have no right to comment on; and it i a risk that I accept. • RISK By John Ulrich Quick. arne a racer who hasn't crashed. Kenny Roberts? Eddie Lawson? Freddie Spencer? Randy Mamola? Mike Baldwin? 44 Wayne Rainey? Wes Cooley? They've all crashed many times. You say they're too well-known and racing on too high a level to count? Then how about Mike Harlow, Larry Shorts, Ralph Johnston Jr., Kenny Kopecky, Paul Van Zuyle? They've all crashed, too. Crashing is a fact of race track life, When letters show up here saying that I am a jerk for crashing a test bike on a race track, there's one thing I know before I even look at the signature. The letters aren't written by racers. The letter writers have never been on a race track or in a race. Back in 1982 [ went to Willow Springs with two bright green Kawasakis, one an Eddie Lawson Replica race bike; th ()th ran Edene Ln, on-

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