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Rodi l C up Supercross c hampio n J immy Holley accepts the series c up.
Ho lley le d going int o t he final round in L.A ., where he fin ished fifth .
Kawas a ki's Jeff Wa rd s a nd ba gged in the heat race, but came back t o w in
the m a in after being chas ed the w hole w ay by Johnny O 'Ma ra .
Rodil Trophy Supercross Championship
Finals: Round 3
Ward's win, Holley's
championship
By Kit Palmer
LOS ANGELES, CA. NOV. 9
T h e Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum was
the site for the final round of th e three-race
R odil Trophy Supercross Championship
Series matching some of Europe's best supercross racers against America's
best. When i t was all over,
American riders ruled.
Ka wasaki's Jeff Wa rd won
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th e FIM / AMA-sa nctioned, Cherry
Coke-sponsored event after a racelo n g due l with H onda 's j o hn n y
O ' Mara in the si ngle, 20-lap main ,
but privateer jim H olley capt ured
the series championship .over L.A.'s
top European finisher, H o lla n d 's
j o n van den Berk. H o lley placed
fifth in the main, whi le van den Berk
fin ished seventh. " It feels reall y great
to wi n it ," said H olley, " especia ll y in
my home town, The p ressure is fina lly
off and now I ca n rela x a nd finish
wor king on my house."
" Fin ish ing second is rea lly never
good ," said van den Berk, " bu t fo r me
it's good a nd I'm happy. jim was five
points before me going into th e race,
and it was a lmost im possible to make
up those points, because tha t is three
pl aces difference. My onl y cha nce is if
he made some kind of mistak e or had
some p rob lems."
Ward 's win , h owever , was marred
. ~y .c~,ntrov~~y in,vo.lvin g three of the I
heat winners: O 'Mara, Kawasaki's
Ro n Lechien and Ward. T he co ntroversy stemmed from the event's
ne w fo rm at using a staggered start in
the ma in . T o qual ify for the ma in
th ere were four heat races, two semis,
a Last Cha nce . Qual ifier a nd th e
ma in . In the fo ur heat races, th e first
and second-place finis hers went directl y to the mai n but had to sta rt on a
second ga te that wou ld drop approxima tely five seconds after the firs t
gate dropped. The idea was to putthe
fa stest Am eri can riders in the second
wave and give the less-experienced
European su percross riders a head
start, ass u ming the European riders
fin ished third or worse in the hea t
races . Nice idea ma ybe, but the who le
sche me bac kfi red in a big wa y. After
th e four heat races, there were four
Europea ns starti ng on the second
row, whi le O 'Mara, Lechie n and Ward
purposel y sandbagged to start on the
first row.
Heats
It a ll began with th e fir st heat race,
which featured between -contractsprivat eer . R icky j ohnson, riding. a
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very tri ck-looking In n ova tio n Sport
Yamah a , Belg i u m 's form er 250cc
World Champion G eorges jobe,
Suzuki's Erik Keh oe and Yamaha
rider All ey Sema r. j obe a nd h is Kawasa ki cap tu red the holeshot but were
passed by johnson by th e en d of th e
first la p. j ohnson, wh o is cu rre ntly
in limbo between contracts with Honda and Yamah a, easily p u lled a way
from j obe, wh ile cu rre nt 125cc World
Champion from Finland Pek ka Vehkonen (Cag), Yamaha rider Alley
Semar and Kehoe followed. Kehoe
sta yed in fo urt h for th e first half of
th e eigh t-lap race, th en sn uc k by
Sema r, then pa ssed Vehkonen . Shortl y
a fter, Semar al so slipped by Vehkonen for third. johnson enjoyed a
huge lead a n d won th e rac e ah ead of
a n d Sem ar . This meant that both
America n johnson and European
jobe wou ld start o n th e second wave
in the main.
In the seco nd hea t, O ' Mara and h is
prod uction Honda shot into th e lead
ahead o f Yama ha- mo u nted Sco tt
Burnworth, Belgium 's two-time 125cc
Wor ld Champion Eric Geboers (Hon),
Kawasaki rider Terry Fowler and
Suzu k i's A,j . Wh i ti n g . O ' Ma ra
jumped to a co m ma nding lead over
Burnworth, who he ld a large advantage over Geboers. By the halfway
point, Bu rn wort h had dropped to
fourth , handing Geboers and Whiting second a nd third. A lap la ter,
Whiting moved into second, but was
more than five seconds behind the
leader on th e fina l lap. Kno win g a
hea t win would put h im o n the
second row in th e ma in , O 'M ara
began to slow co nsi dera bly while
lookin g over h is sho ulder. A few
tu rn s before taki ng the chec kere d
flag, O 'M ara a lmost ca me to a stop,
letting bo th Wh itin g and Geboers by.
Whiting wou nd u p taking the win,
Geboers second, a nd O 'Mara finished
third and picked up a first-wave start
in the main. Now the situation had
two Europeans (Jobe a nd Geboers )
starting o n the second wave and one
top American on th e first . O 'Ma ra 's
move went by a lmost unnoticed; when
he crossed the checkered flag, ha rd ly
a nybody rea lized he ha d a ctuall y
p laced th ird, and he was p u lled ove r
a nd interviewed followi ng th e race as
thoug h he had wo n, even though
Wh iti ng had actua lly won. The spectators were ge tting con fused , while
back in th e pits, johnson was gett ing
furious.
Heat three featured Lechien , Holley a nd van den Berk. Lech ien j um ped
into th e ea rly lead a head of van de n
Berk, Luxembourg's j an Van Poppel
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(Ya m) a nd Kawasaki rid er Phil Larso n . Holley, however , bumped th e
gate at th e start, then was involved in
a fir st-la p p ile-u p . " I was runni ng
fourth, " sa id Hollev. " A bunch of
g uys cras hed righ t after th e doubles. I
don 't know what in the heck they
wer e do ing, but everybody piled in
a nd cras hed into each other. I went
down and bro ke my front brake cable."
Meanwhile, Lech ien had a huge
lea d over van den Berk and Larson.
On the fina l lap, Lechien ca me to a
sto p two turns before th e fini sh and
pretended to sta ll his bik e. He restarte d his mount, checked out the
situation and waited for van den Berk
and Larson to pass him. As soo n as
they went by, Lech ien re-entered the
race, but van den Berk kn ew what
was going on so he, too , sto pped to
let Larson by - a ll thi s happeni ng
less th an 100 feet from th e chec kered
flag. Nobody wanted to win the race!
They a ll stopped, then Larson finally
went for it a nd took the wi n, wh ile
both Lechien and van den Berk wa ited
a n d let Van Poppel by. Lech ien took
th ird , van den Berk fourth . Once
again, another Eu ro pea n rider would
sta rt the ma in on the second wave
and it was n ow obvio us wha t was
going on. T he crowd didn 't like it
a nd sta rt ed booing Lechi en, whi le
johnson was now raging mad.
johnson sto rme d down to the a nno uncer on the infield; gr abbed the
microphone and said to the 45,724
spectators in attendance, " I just want
to tell yo u I came here to night to win
and that's wha t I'm going to do , and I
kno w yo u came here to watch us race.
You 're seeing a bunch o f unpro fessional race rs afraid to sta rt on the
seco nd row in the main, bu t I' m not ."
T hi s made j ohnson an ins tant crowd
favorite.
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Wa rd completely dominated the
fourth and final heat race righ t from
th e start, followed by japan 's Yasuo
Tofukuji (H on) a nd Kawasaki ride r
Ricky Ryan . Durin g the fourth lap
Rya n shot by T ofu k uji an d took over
seco nd. By this time, Ward was lon g
gone, but one ques tion rema ined wo u ld Ward pull over an d let Ryan
and Honda's David Ba iley, who had
ea rlier passed Tofu kuji, by? On the
fin al lap, th e questio n was answered.
Ward head ed u p the Coliseum peri tyle and stop ped, out of th e view o f
the crowd. Down th e o ther side of the
peristyle ca me new- leader Rya n , and
Bail ey in seco n d. Ward fin allv came
o u t o f th e pe ristyle in thi rd : Ryan
took the win a head of Bail ey a nd
Ward . " O h yeah , I saw j eff stop ped
upjhere.v.said Bailey. " He had one leg
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