Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Team Lockhart (2) leeds More Racing in the rein atRoebling Road Raceway; Lockhart lCored its fifth win of 1986. New Haven Suzuki (15) leads Taylor Road Racing (69) and Schwing Road Racing (126) in early action from Roebling Road. AMA!MofoWorl Round 11 u.s. Endurance series: Team Lockhart s~ ashes to Roebling Road victory By Randy Marrs FAULKVILLE, CA, AUC. 29-30 Riding in a downpour that fell from the drop of the green to the waving of the checkered flag, Team Lockhart's Larry Shorts, Lynn Miller and Stuart Edenfield rode the team's Suzuki GSXRllOO to their fifth win of the year. They 'l . h 500 k covered t e l o~eters 10 four hours at Roebling Road 12 Raceway, beating runner-up Team New Haven Suzuki by just29 seconds with both teams covering 135 laps. Third overall went to the johnson & Wood Yamaha FZ750 with the Front Row Racing Yamaha Z600 of CregCoulding and Chip Terrell taking the CT win. The race turned out to beoneof the best of this year' series with several ridns turni'n~ in their best rides of the season i~ th(' tom'ntial downpour. Only SIX of the 26 teams that started the race failed 10 finish. jam-Up Racing's Donnie Rowe may have summed up best why so many riders had a smart, trouble-free and consistent race: "As most of the ridns out there did. I was forced to concentrate more on my riding and anually ended up running a bettn race because of the rain." The rain, which had started two days prior to the event. produced a track with standing water covering almost the entire course. At the green it was Shorts laking the lead on the Lockhart/U.S. Suzuki/Dunlop/Shoei/N D/Performa nce Machine Wheels/Kal-Card/Cam-2 C XRllOOclosely followed by Kevin Rentzell on the New Haven Suzuki CSXR 1100 and Nigel Cale riding the johnson & Woods FZ750 Yamaha. Cale, who has been in the hunt all year for the lead but was hampered by mechanical problems, was one of the riders who would turn in his best ride of the year. Rentzell, starting the race on the New Haven Suzuki, had gone with Michelin High- ports, thinking the rain would stop before the race progressed too far; this wrong choi e of tires would hurt their chances throughout the day. Cale soon got around Rentzell and headed after Shorts. The CTU battle had the Front Row Racing/ Kerker/Michelin Yamaha FZ600 out front. Out & Out Racing, Team Maryland, jam-Up Racing, Team Sunset and Team Up were all fighting for the CT lead and all running up with the CTO machinery; almost on equal footing with the bigger bikes due 10 the rain. just before the first half hour of the race had ended, Cale got around Shorts on the Dunlop/Dyna-jet/DoclOr johns Frames/Hollywood Kawasaki & Yamaha FZ750 and then began 10 put dislance on Shorts. Movin~ imo the CTO fray was Roy Hare of Caban: Racing and the Schwing Racing Yamaha FZ750 of Bill Kelly and Bryan Schwing. Cale soon had an eight-second lead on Shorts, and increased it 10 14 seconds three laps later. While Cale and Shorts were racing for the lead, third place was being swapped between Remzell, on the Cosworth/Spectro/Vance & Hines/ Shoei/Street &Competition/Dunlop/ RSC 1100 Suzuki, and the Schwing Racing/C&C Racing FZ750. Cale continu(·d to lead Shorts as Hare joined the battle between the front-runners in fifth. As the first hour neared an end, Cale went down after hittin~ a puddle of water and gave the lead back to Shorts. Cale was up and had the Yamaha runnin~ almost immediately, only to pit IWO laps later and drop a lap behind the leaders. Shorts pitted after an hour and a h,l1f of ridin~ to turn the Lockh:1I'I Suzuki ()\'('r to Miller. Miller. still suff<-rin~ from injuries Ill' sustained at Mid-Ohio. was only able 10 do a 25-minule stim before going by Lockhart's pits pointing 10 his arm. On Ihe next lap Miller pitted, lurning Ihe bike over to Edenfield. Team regular Wendell Phillips was unable to attend round II due 10 a previous com m itment a nd had crew ch ief Kei I h Perry look for a replacement. Edenfield, whost' home track is Roebling Road, had never ridden in the rain before loday, but handled the Lockhart Suzuki wilh skill and a cool head for the next hour, keeping them in the lead. Miller said, "I went out in my first practice session this morning and was really sore, but my second session went a lot smoother. When I went out in the race I couldn't fling the bike like I should be able to. This rain and the cold are really affecting me, I'm real stiff." As the race neared the halfway point, Lockhart continued to lead second place johnson & Woods and third place New Haven Suzuki; all three were on the same lap. Cale's partner on the j&W FZ also had no experience riding in the rain so most of the riding had fallen on Cale, who had got the lost lap back and held second. New Haven's wrong tire choice continued to hurt them as the rain was coming down even harder at this point and they couldn't lose any time changing to full rains. The CTU race had Front Row Racing continuing their flag-to-flag lead. California's Team Sunset had moved imo second with the Out & Out Racing Yamaha FZ600 of Marc Lautenhizer and Rick Burnett running third in class. It would be a tough day for the CTU team in the hunt for the overall title as Paul Smith Racing retired with water in their ignition, and jam-Up Racing and Stockline Racing suffered from early crashes. Taylor Racing, with Dave Schlosser and Dean wims (another rider having a good day of racing), had pitted LO change their rains which had begun to go away; the ensuing pit SLOp dashed all chances Taylor would have of going to the front also. "Dave (Schlosser) came in early from his stint. The tires were going away and he didn't want me LO go out on something unsafe. [t took us about 10 minutes LO change the tires, which cost us any chance we had of a win. Then I got called in a lap later LO check the caliper pins, costing us even more time," said Swims. The rain continued to come down, putting more water on the track and causing the racing lines to change each lap. Schwing Racing's charge ended when the bike went by running very rough; they had slarted the race running air filters, which caused the FZ750's motor to run too rich. A pit stop 10 chan~e to velocity stacks dropped them from the running, and later a loose coil wire lost more time. Cobare's Hare cominued his charge with the from-runners and would eventually end up riding three and one-half of the four hours as his partner, Kathleen Coburn, did not have much rain experience. Hare began to go after Cale, who had fallen to third. Even with the wrong choice of tire, Rentzell and partner jeff Atwell were running a great race, staying on the same lap with Lockhart, no marl' than 40 seconds 0([ the pace. Front Row Racing briefly lost the CTl1 lead to Team Sunset's Peter Carrol and Don Canet when tlwy pitIed. Coulding wasted little time in nllchin~ and then passing Sunset for the lead. A loose exhaust collar on Sunset's Kawasaki Ninja 600 finally dropped them from second in class (Continued t~ page 32)

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