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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126915
ayne Rainey 161 leads Fred Merkel 11 I. Dan Chivington and Bubba Shobert on the first lap of the Superbike race. They finished in that order. ~ lMA Camel Pro Road radng Series: Round 4 ~ainey wins ~uperbike at toad America John Ulrich by Jim Quinn Ot05 KHART LAKE, WI, JUNE 7 "earn Honda's Wayne Rainey ~at teammate Fred Merkel by bout seven seconds to win the uperbike final at Road Arnerin record time; both Rainey and erkel rode Honda VFR750Fs. Priteer Dan ChivingLOn was third on Yamaha FZ750 with Bubba ShoTt fourth. uzuki's Kevin Schwantz sat out e race with a broken collarbone suf'ed at last weeks' race in Brainerd, 'nnesota. Team Yamaha failed to ow up with team riders John Kocini and Jimmy Filice, skipping anher race to work on the connecting tl breakage problems encountered iSears Point last month. Rainey's winning time of 36 min, ,24.702 seconds and average speed 98.869 mph broke the Road Amerrecords set by Eddie Lawson in Ion a 1025cc Kawasaki. Lawson's md was 36 minutes, 41.939 seconds an average speed of 98.095 mph. Rainey's win moved him four !nts closer to Merkel in Superbike Int standings, Merkel leading the Iy with 65 points LO Rainey's 51, us the 49-31 spread after Brainerd. he Superbike standings are al1st moor, since the AMA has said it I not req~gnizea Superbike chamn in 1996, instead using Superle and Formula One points LO wn a single AMA Camel Pro SerRoad Racing Champion. Yet the IA continues LO compile and issue perbike points.) [here never was any actual wheelwheel racing pitting 1983 Cham- I pion Rainey against 1984 and 1985 Champion Merkel. Rainey controlled the entire race despite slowing when his bike's hydraulic clutch system lost its fluid and sLOpped functioning, dumping oil on Rainey's left footpeg. Rainey ran away with the fastest five-lap heat race of the day, winning by 31.495 seconds with ChivingLOn second and Rueben McMurter third on his Yamaha. Rainey's fastest lap during the heat race, which determined grid posi tion for the final, was a 2:23.60, compared to ChivingLOn's 2:29.60 and l\!.1cMurter's 2:30.12. Merkel also dominated his heat race, winning by 19.052 seconds ahead of Shobert and privateer Gary Goodfellow on a Suzuki GSXR750. Merkel's fastest lap was a 2:25.07, compared LO Shobert's best of 2:28.95 and Goodfellow' best of 2:28.56, as timed on a bank of watches by former racer and current DunJop tire technician Jim Allen. Rainey's heat-race best lap set a new course motorcycle lap record. There were 15 entries in the Superbike class,. and the LOp 15 riders in .each heat race made the main. Five others would transfer out of the fivelap Last Chance Qualifier. Two-time AFM (California) Champion Walt Nitto won the LCQon his Yamaha, beating Brian French and Paul Noble. Merkel gridded for the final with Dunlop bias-ply tires on his Mike Velasco/Mer1'yn Plumlee-prepared Honda, a 17-inch 639 soft compound up front and an 18-inch 407 intermediate compound in the rear. Merkel's bike was fitted with a SuperTrapp lailsection and mufner. Rainey's Rob Muzzy/Sparky Edmonston-prepared Honda used a 17inch 1627C soft-compound Michelin bias-ply front tire and an 18-inch S 1145D soft-compound Michelin biasply rear tire. Rainey's bike ran a Kerker exhaust system. Shobert ran a mixture of bias-ply Dunlop and Michelin tires on his Skip Ai~en-prepared VF750F, a 17- Former Formula Two champion Randy Renfrow leads reigning class champion Don Greene in the final. both on RS250 Hondas . inch 639 Dunlop front and an 18inch S0423 Michelin rear. ChivingLOn ran bias-ply Michelins, a 17-inch front and an 18-inch rear on his GeeVee Performance Yamaha. (Radial slicks as seen in the Formula One class are not used in Superbike racing due to rule-set limitations on wheel widths and a requirement that tires used in Superbike must be readily available for sale LO competiLOrs. At Elknan Lake. riders chose softer compounds LO suit the non-abrasive, slightly slick track surface.) . Rainey immediately jumped into the lead orr the starting grid, with Merkel second and Chivinglon and Shoben battling over third. Goodfellow ran fourth just ahead of Texas Hyperformance's Doug Polen on h'is Suzuki GSXR750, Super Team's Lance Jones on a Yamaha FZ750, Peter Brady Racing's John Ashmead on his 1985 Honda VF750F and McMurrer. . Rainey had three seconds on Mer. kel on the third lap; on the fourth lap, Rainey's adyanta~e grew LO four seconds with Merkel about one second ahead of Chivington and Shobert; Shobert's bike was faster than Chivington's on rhe straights, especially on the long, uphill front straight, but Chivington ran it in hard in the infield sections. Polen passed Goodfellow after severallaps of running nose-LO-tail, and Jones pulled off the straight onto the grass with a blown engine spewing oil. Another lap and Chivington had a second on Shobert and Polen had a second on Goodfellow, with Ashmead leading McMurter. ChivingLOn's advantage over Shobert and Polen's advantage over Goodfellow both grew to two seconds, and it looked like the race would end being a parade, Rainey long gone ahead of Merkel and Merkel far ahead of ChivingLOn. Rainey was pulling Merkel at a second or half a second a lap in those early stages, Allen's clock SLOpping Rainey at 2:24.92 LO Merkel's 2:25.99 on the second lap, 2:25.18 to 2:25.62 on the third, 2:24.64 to 2:25.45 on the fourth. Chivin ton was a solid third 9