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Dave Thorpe spent both motos dicing w ith Erik Geboers. Thorpe won.
World Championship 500cc MX
Series: Round 5
Thorpe supreme
in Italy
By Neil Webster
MONTEVARCHI , IT ALY , J U NE 2
Californian Danny Chandler bl ew his chan ces of becoming WorId Cha m pion w hen h e
crashed out of the Italian GP in a big way .
The KTM man lost control o ver a big downh ill ski jump when he h eld
.
.
.
.
th u d In th e fir st m oto , la nding
h eavily o n the ro ck-hard track
. .
at Montevarchi
In
th e heart 01
"
th e Chianti wine co untry . Cha ndler
was tak en to th e hospital wi th a sus pected bro ken jaw , but was la ter
round to be OK .
By not fin ish in g ei ther moto, he
dropped to fifth in the series, 63
p oints beh ind leader Dave T horpe .
with no rea listi c chance of ca tchi ng
up.
H onda 's Thorpe. 22. h eld o ff teamma te Erik G eb oers in bo th legs to
grab a pai r o f wins, but h e was n't
w itho ut h is sha re o f hair y m om ents.
Reig n ing World Ch am pi on Andre
Malherb e lost co ntro l o r hi s H onda
goin g into th e fir st turn or mo to o ne
an d fell in to th e p ack, almost pu lling
T horpe down .
" He was o n m y back an d 1 th ought
I wa s goi ng d own ," sa id Briton
T h o rp e. " I had to pull th e bike up
a nd gav e it a bit m or e power a nd got
away with it."
Malherbe was less lucky. H e ende d
a ~ the bottom o r!1 pile of rid ers, with
his ex haust bu rmng through the Hesh
of hi s in side left th igh . leaving him
with th ird degree burns. ~e pu lled
o u t of the race, but proved Jus t what
it takes to be champion when he went
out in moto two and took second
despite tremendous pain.
" It hur t so much I cried when I got
back to my transporter after the race,"
admitted the 29-yea r-o ld Belg ian .
Wh ile Malh erb e went bac k to the
paddock to lick h is wounds in moto
o ne . H onda tea m ma tes Th orpe an d
Geboers were p u rring o n a terrific
show for th e su n- baked, 25,OOO-stro ng
crowd . T horpe looked "to have th e
win under co n tro l a s h e held a si xsecond lead a t halfway, but su dden ly
Geb oers ha d closed th e ga p a nd was
p us hi ng h ard . Soo n h e was in
T horpe 's tire tracks a n d it was a nybody's race .
T horpe kept hi s cool. how ever.
never p u rring a foo t wrong a nd lea vin g Geboers to do a ll the wo rk. Finall y
it paid o ff, when G eboers got a bad
line ge lli ng by a ba ckmarker a n d lost
a vita l seco nd, just two laps from
(Con tin ued to page 31)
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