Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Team TIde's Guy Cooper took third in both nights of a Montreal Supercross double header attended by 87,880 people. Ross Pederson won the Friday-night supercross in Montreal and finished second in Saturday-night action, riding for Yamaha Motor Canada. Le Su~rMotocross laurentide Pederson, Dyck split Montreal double header By Marc Lachapelle Photos by Allen Mcinnis MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA, MAY 23-24 Alberta's Ross Pederson and Allan Dyck, hailing from British Columbia, each took a win and a second place finish in the first supercross double header to be held in Canada. Oklahoma's Guy Cooper, a regular on the AMA National .. .. 1~5cc CIrcu.It, had l~entlcal mghts of racmg. Both urnes, he 26 placed a strong third, after wins in the first semi of both the Friday and Saturday program. The reason for turning "Le SuperMotocross" into a twin event was to celebrate its 10th anniversary (the • first was held in 1977) but also to accommodate more people. Montrea!'s Olympic Stadium had been jam-J;lacked with some 62,000 spectators In 1985 and some 10,000 had allegedly been turned away at the ticket booths. No such situation this year: as 87,880 people came to see the racing, some 35,000 Friday and 52,000 on Saturday. True to the formula it pioneered in 1980, theSuperMotocross brought together supercross riders and Class 10 autocross cars (racing buggies) on Saturday, but this year, combined four-wheel ATVsand Class 7 pickups with the motorcycles for the Friday program. Both nights of racing submitted the riders to the added exertion of having to master a very difficult track. It rained almost constantly the days prior to the event. With the removable top not yet installed over the Montreal stadium, mud and ruts were the order of both days during practice and preliminary events. The layout had riders raving but the wet, clay-filled surface had them thinking otherwise. There was hope when the track started todryoutat the conclusion of Friday's racing, but it was di"luted by heavy showers Saturday afternoon, prompting the organizers to cutout a heavily whooped section for the races. Friday Yamaha Motor Canada's Ross Pederson made it clear from the stan of his qualifier (the second of the night) that he had all intentions of stretching his record of Montreal wins to four. With three victories in a row (1983-1984-1985) he was tied with former U.S. Champion Mark Barnett (1980-1981-19112). Pederson plain ran away with that race, leaving secondplace man Glen Nicholson, from Ontario, more than 20 seconds behind at the flag. Third was Team Tide's Andy Stacy, from Depew, ew York and fourth Ontario's Scott Wilson. Ohio's Tom Carson, also riding for Team Tide, had earlier taken the first qualifier, after snatching the lead from hometown hero Serge Gregoire. Alberta's Steve Visser and Ontario rider Shane Drew followed them to the flag and directly to the final. The third qualifier went to smoothriding Allan Dyck, chased by Quebec's Arnaud Bernard, another Team Tide rider, Oxford, Michigan's Mark McLaren and Montrealer Richard Sirois. The fourth, finally, was 'all Doug Hoover's. The Ontario rider led Ontario's Brad King and Jeff Sutherland (one more for Team Tide) and Massachusetts rider David Rudnicki over the finish-line jump. Guy Cooper, yet another of the Team TidecoDlingent (Proctor & Gamble is backing the team to promote a new unscented version of its best-seller soap) was a heavy favorite in this heal. He took a poor start, was sixth on the first lap and rode up to second on the third, only to fall and be relegated to seventh. Cooper finished sixth and had to go to a semi. He promptly won that after taking over from early leader Jeff Surwall, an Illinois-born Ontario rider. An excellent battle developed behind the two, between Ontario's Mike Burr, Barry Ferguson and T.J. Bryk. The nod, and spots in the final, went to Ferguson and Bryk. The second semi, another thriller, went to Ted Van Nest, over fellow Ontarian Dave Beany, Connecticut rider Jos Waddington and young Scott Wilson, also from Ontario. The final semi was all Brent Shury's, the Saskatchewan rider leading Quebecers Richard Sirois and Carl Vaillancourt and Ontarian Doug Brown to the final. Last in the final was Glen Hoar, from New Brunswick. Hoar, who also won the ATV event, bumped past consolation leader Mario Paquette in the last corner. Allan Dyck holeshot the start of the IS-lap final and held on to first place for nine of those laps, chased by Ross Pederson. At that point, he lost the front end shortly coming out of the heavily rutted horseshoe section, handing the lead to Pederson, who then proceeded uneventfully to the flag to his record fourth win. In a last-lap move. Guy Cooper regained third place from Doug Hoover. He had done so on the fifth lap, only to take another of his many falls both nights. Cooper was, by far, the crowd's favorite for his constant charges and spectacu lar sty Ie. Also among the top 10 were Tom Carson (fifth), Andy Stacy (seventh) and Jos Waddington (10th). Saturday In Saturday's qualifying action, Glen Nicholson was first into the night'S final after winning a dice with Jeff Surwall. They were followed in by Jos Waddington and Quebec's Stl!phane Alarie. Ontario rider Lino Zecca quickly displaced Rochester, New York's Michael Robinson in leading the second qualifier, and was passed himself by Doug

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