Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126913
The Pro Stock final came down to "Superbike Mike" Keyte (closest to cameral and "Pizza John" Mataro; Mataro won. "Pizza John" Mataro nm hard with his Vance & Hines/Web-Cam Suzuki GS1100 to win the Pro Stock race at Warner Robbins. IDBA Drag Racing Championship'Series: Round 2 Mafaro tops Pro Stock in Georgia By George Hoffman WARN ER-ROBINS, GA, MAY 17-18 "Pizza John" Mafaro grabbed up the top honors in Pro Stock as he out-drove new mph record-holderSuperbike Mike Keyte. Arecord setting but broken Bobby Baker handed the Funnybike win to the very fast Keith Lynn. Steve Drake jumped out on napping John Sachs Jr. to take the Pro Comp 24 money at the IDBA's first quartermile race of the 1986 season, Learning to drive was the order of the weekend, Racers were confronted with a left lane that became very bumpy on the big eqd, and an abundance of rubber on the track turned into round balls behind the big Pro bikes as they clawed for traction on , the starting line. This is best illustrated in the fact that only one Pro elapsed time record was set while four mph records were equaled or bettered; the horsepower was there but just wasn't being put to the ground. Most of the racers took out a little power here or a little clutch there to minimize the effects Qf the limited traction, which left the racing close and made the word of the weekend finesse. Without it, you were going to do some very impressive wheel spins, Saturday's qualifying got off to a slow start but by the close of the day most of the teams seemed to have a good hold ·on the track, Funnybike had qualified 15 bikes with 14 locked in position, The top four had qualified under 7,50and there wasa spread of only 0.04 seconds between them. Bobby Baker led the field with a 7.458; eventual winner Keith Lynn was a close second with a 7.472. Pro Comp qualifiers had one man to beat, Jim Cooper, who flew down the track to the tune of 7.785 on his large-displacement, nitrous-injected Kawasaki. That would have been a competitive funny bike time last year. Because this was' the inaugural quarter-mile race for Cooper's sub-, class B/GN, the record was open. Before the end of qualifying Cooper was able to back up his 7.785 and set the new record at 7.785 seconds and 166.87 mph. Steve Drake the second-fastest qualifier, was in a similar situation. He, too, was entered in a new class designed to take up some of the slack created by the new-found horsepower in the big, injected Harley-Davidsons and would close qualifying with a new class record of 8.020 seconds, and 166.97 mph. Pro Stock saw Springnational winner George Babor qualify fastest on Saturday with an 8.391 and be the only Pro Stocker to get below 8.40. Baker was the first to make a pass in eliminations on Sunday, earning a bye run because he was fast qualifier and the ladder contained only 15 bikes. As he had done a month ago in round one of the IDBA poims chase, Baker put it to good use by taking a little longer to get off the line than you could in a regular pass against a competitor and blistered the track with a record-setting 7.412 and 183,29. Jon Baugh, Larry Reynolds, Keith Lynn, Charles Israel and Ron Ayers advanced to the next round when their competition broke. Mark Miller got out first on Rusty Quesenberry as he' blew away the old mph record of Terry Kizer at 183.29 with a 185.18 mph pass. Gary Falta reacted first against Steve Tracy but drifted left and let the big Suzuki of Tracy make up some of the ground lost from a big dose of wheel spin on the start combined with the wrestling match that Tracy has been having with the very powerful ex-championship mount of of George Bryce to pass Falta on the big end. The next round of competition would showcase the fastest pass in Funnybike history. Baker and Orient Express' Jon Baugh were the principle players in a duel that saw Baugh react fiFst and get a lead on Baker, whose tire whisped smoke; Baugh eased out of it and was able to get by further up the track. The numbers tell the story. Baker had a 0.535second reaction time combined with a 7.458 at 183.329, while Baugh had a reaction time of 0.523 and a track time of 7.47 at 175.81. Larry Reynolds' supercharged Kawasaki Funnybike went out next when it broke its transmission and allowed Steve Tracy to advance to the next round. Lynn faced Israel for the third pass of the round and the two came out of the hole like one piece, Lynn's 0.508 reaction time got the better of Israel's 0.514 and Israel's 7.696 at 175.09 couldn'tcateh Lynn's 7.550at 174.41. Mark Miller backed, up his recordsetting 185.18 mph pass with an identical 185.18 against Ron Ayers on the next pass. The semi·finals put Baker against Tracy. Baker reacted first with a 0.557 to Tracy's 0.592 then Tracy got a little out of shape. The race was over as Baker crossed the finish line first and blew a motor. Mark Miller jumped oUlon Lynn but as has happened so many times before, Miller's tire went up in smoke and Lynn rolled to the win. Baker couldn't make the 45-minute call to the final as race officials hur· ried the program to beat an impending rainstorm and Lynn made an uncontested pass for the win. The Pro Comp show began with the fast qualifier redJlighting himself out of competition and allowing John Sachs J r. to advance to the next round, The interesting thing was that Cooper didn't jump the start but instead accidently backed out of the lights. Once you're in those beams, you're in, Jim Dodich holed four pis'tons on Saturday and had to drive eight hours down to Orlando, Florida to get another set, then return and put the motor back together. He didn't sleep Saturday night. Then he came to the track Sunday morning and qualified seventh with an 8.0,1. But, all this would be for naught as the traction would let him down and tire ,spin would completely .lake away any chance of Dodich catching the rested reflexes of Neal Lane, whose 0.513 reaction time put the sleepless Dodich at an immediate disadvantage. Dodich's respectable 8.058 was no match for Lane's 7.833. Steve Drake and Willie Foster would glide by trouble-plagued Floyd HunlZ and Harold Windham respectively. John Sachs JT. and Steve Drake would have an easy time of it in the semis as Neal Lane's transmission went away for Sachs and Willie Foster red-lighted Drake into the final. But neither Drake nor Sachs could afford to take it easy; the fastest pass would get lane choice and either one of them would have liked to banish the other to the left lane for the final. Drake won the battle for the right' lane by turnin!1; an 8.041 to Sachs' 8.170. The only thing not taken into consideration was reaction time. It raised its head in the final as Drake's winning 8.19 at 166.66 compared to Sachs' losing 8.12 at 158.45. Drake and his Kendall/Suzuki of L.A.lStar Racing-Suzuki were on their way to the bank with a 0.397 reaction time to Sachs' 0.613. The last round of qualifying on Sunday was the beginning of what had to be the best weekend of racing for superbike Mike Keyte in a year. It was in that round that Keyte finally broke the 8.30 barrier, and in a big way. Keyte blew down the gates with the fastest pass of his career, an 8.29 at 161.87; it would bea new mph record if he could back it up. The first round saw fast qualifier Babor knock off Terry Ausmus while Dave SchullZ rolled past a left-drifting Russ Nyberg. Keyte wheel-spun his way back into the 8.405 but beat Lance Boyer and Marty Blades ,trail· ered Dave Newton. Jerry Meyers woke up from ,his 0.796-second nap to run down Stuart Hamby and Bryce took his Star Racingentry and smoked Wendell Daniel. Dick Speed and P.]. Mafaro got by Donald DeTurck and the broken Lester Jenkins III, respectively. , The nextround caught Schultz out early on the tire-spinning Babor. Schultz's 8.471 at 159.01 was enough to send Babor's8.413at 159.01 back to Clearwater, Florida. Marty Blades was very aware of Keyte's 8.29 and wanted to hang around for a couple more rounds so he tried cutting the tree down on Keyte but he did too good a job and red-lighted; Keyte flew to the other end with an 8.386 at 160.14. Meyers got an easy win off Bryce at midtrack when the ignition on Bryce's Suzuki malfunctioned and Mafaro pulled together six years of Pro Stock experience and drove his LAW/Wiseco/VHRSuzuki toan8.31 at 161.57 to equal the old mph record, and beat Speed. Schultz ran Keyte next in the semis,