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Bubba Shobert was fourth on the track. second in scoring. ~MA Camel Pro Road Race Series: Round 2 Merkel cla'ims controversial Sears Point win (Above) Rainey (6) lead. Kocinski (30), Shobert (67), Gray (57), Schwantz (34), Merkel (1) and Lance (167) off the start. (Below) Gray va. Merkel. By Farren Williams Photos by John Ulrich, Mike Pons and Williams SONOMA, CA, MAY 18 Defending National Champion Fred Merkel was credited with a controversial Superbike win today at Sears Point International Raceway, while Merkel's Honda teammate, Wayne Rainey, and U.S. Suzuki's Kevin Schwanlz - bOlh of whom were penalized one lap for passing under a waving yellow flag - filed protests with the AMA. Merkel came across the line in front of defending Grand National Champion Bubba Shobert and Texan Ollis Lance, but everyone in the winning trio took the checkered flag well behind Rainey and Schwantz, who bauled for the top spot for most of the race. OHicials brought out the waving yellow £lags on lap II when Scou Gray crashed on oil leaking from his Vance &: Hines Suzuki GSXR750 while running fourth overall, top privateer, and hit the haybales hard in turn nine, scanering hay through the corner. The race was red-flagged and restarted approximately 30 minutes later. Rainey and Schwantz were docked one lap each when the two frontrunners elected LO pass lapped riders under waving yellow flags in the back esses on lap II in order to' avoid possible collisions with the backrunners. Both Rainey and Schwanu indicated that the lapped riders were traveling much slower than their own race speed, and the two factory riders fell it was safer to pass the back markers than LO lock up their brakes. "Those guys were going 50 mph slower than us," said a disappointed Rainey after the race. "1£ we'd tried to slow down, we would have run into the back of them. IL was unsafe LO try to slow down. It was either that (passing under the yellow), or crashing into a guy while trying LO SLOp." "We saw it but we were just going t~ _~\ jf}~, J~~p.~.,ight," said Schwantz. "We were dodging those guys. We werejust going way LOO fast to try LO not pass them. IL would have been unsafe LO suddenly try LO follow a guy who's going so much slower." Schwantz and Rainey each immediately filed protests with AMA referee Rick Hutchins, but Hutchins denied the protests on the grounds that both riders willingly disregarded the AMA's waving yellow flag rule, which was instituted at Daytona last March. Under the new waving yellow rule. riders may not pass any rider on the course -including lapped riders - or they will earn a one-lap penally. Hutchins said the waving yellow rule should not be confused with the standing yellow rule; a standing yellow £lag indicates caution because there is some hazard on the track, but riders on the course still may pass. "Both riders had been through the incident one time, and both passed under the waving yellow at turn eight-A after being through the incident once," said Hutchins. "There was a waving yellow £lag at turn eight. They had every opportunity to see it and know what was going on. Both riders knew the track was not clear. We went over the waving yellow rule Saturday morning at the riders meeting." The two riders have appealed Hutchins' protest ruling, and an appeals board will be appointed by AMA Vice President of Professional Competition, Bill Amick. The appeals could be heard as soon as the next Camel Pro Series road race in Brainerd, Minnesota, on May 31. In the meantime, neither points nor payo£( will be awarded for the Sears Point National. ,~}J~,~cW,l:;"t''l'11jq _c9Jlf~~'~l{" the end of the race that Shobert asked "What place did I get?" as he climbed into the winner's circle to take secondplace honors. Lance was aSLOunded that he was in the winner's circle at all. "I wasn't sure what was going on," he said. "I wasn't even sure I got third. I just don't know how I ended up third at all. " Merkel seemed to take the turn of events in stride. "I've had my share of bad luck, too," he said. "I knew going into the second start that they got docked a lap." , Rainey jumped from third to first LO lead the initial go-around of the 25-lap Superbike main event, followed by Gray and Team Yamaha's John Kocinski. By lap two, Schwantz (sponsored by U.S. Suzuki/Yoshimura/Arai/Dunlop/O'NeaIlKushirani/Fox) had moved inLO third, Merkel followed in fourth, and Kocinski tried to hang onto fifth, just in front of sixth-running Shobert (Vetter/Bell). Kosar Racing's Lance (on a Yamaha sponsored by Bates/Bel-Ray/ Dunlop/Shoei) was leading a ballie for seventh place, dicing in the corners with Malcolm Hill and Gray's Vance &: Hines teammate, Doug Toland. Schwantz, anxious to reel in Rainey, took second from Gray, (who said before the race that he'd run as hard as he could for the first few laps, then ride conservatively LO finish) early during the fourth lap with an outside pass in tum one, and before thl{ ·llIP ~as, QV~TI M~f~.1 fll~ ~ by" Gray to take over third. On the next lap, Rainey turned a time of I :49 flat (83.33 mph), leading a well-spreadout group made up of Schwamz, Merkel, Gray, Kocinski, Shobert, Lance, Hill and Dale Quarterly of Massachusetts. Hill crashed in turn nine on the seventh lap, and slid all the way into turn 10, forcing Goodfellow to rake evasive action on the dirt apron. Three laps later, with 10 laps down, Rainey held a four-second lead over Schwantz, and the Yoshimura Suzuki pilot couldn't gain any ground on his Honda rival. Schwantz couldn't run as fast a's he did in his heat race Saturday, which he won breaking into the 1:48 lap time bracket, beating Rainey. Schwanu had decided between the heat and the final to run a different rear tire that turned out to not work when pushed faster than I :49s; Rainey was going faster than he did in the heat race, and would later explain that he and his crew discovered that his bike's forks had been overfilled with oil before the heat race and that the bike turned and handled much better without an extra four ounces of oil per leg. Merkel was running all alone in third place, while Gray, Kocinski. Shobert and Lance contested fourth. Goodfellow was running eighth, with Toland ninth, and John Ashmead of Florida rounded out the top lOon Peter Brady's Honda.