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/126973
will be sidelined for the rest of the '87 season . The Tuf Racingl Motorcycle Stuff Racing Teamsponsored rider won the recent Montreal Supercross. Cards and letters can be sent to King,clo Tuf Rac ing, 2727 Sycamore Rd. , DeKalb, IL 60115. 1 Kevin Hines (KTM) was the overall winner of the July 5 AMA National Championship Enduro Series round held in the Wayne National Forest near Logan, Ohio. Hines turned in a score of 37 to top Randy Hawkins (Hus), who finished with 41 and Kevin Brown (Hon) who logged a 42. Team Suzuki (Suz) won the July 4 WERAIEBC National Endurance Road Race Series round at Grattan, Michigan . Team Suzuki's Mike ' Harth and Tom Stevens logged 222 laps, finishing two laps ahead of second placed Human Race Team (Yam) in the six -hour race . Dreyer Racing (Hon) fin ished third. Californians Kelly Moran, Sam Ermolenko and John Cook finished in the top nine .at the O verseas Speedway Final at Bradford, England, to qualify for the July 26 InterContinen tal Speedway Final in Denmark. Moran and Ermolenko finished tied for th ird with 10 points each, while Cook scored eight points to advance. Mitch Shirra of New Zealand and J erem y Doncaster of England finished in the top two spots. Shirra scored 12 poin ts and Doncaster I I. Americans Mike Faria and Robert P fetzing failed to qualify for the InterContinental meet . The shock of the meeting was the elimination of Kelvin Tatum. The British rider had won two previous qualifying rounds. Motocrosser Alan King underwent knee surgery last week and NAMED: Parkhurst Communications, by Cagiva North America as their advertising agency; Parkhurst rep laces After Hours Design; Chris Wimpey Studios of San Diego will prepare all advertising, videos and a new series of TV commercials for dealer use. NAMED: Gene Romero, vice president of marketing by Agajanian Enterprises; the 1970 Grand National Champion's first project was to boost attendance at the weekly Thursday night speedway program at Ascot's South Bay Stadium in Gardena, California; a standing room-only crowd of over 5000 fans turned out for the July 2 speedway races; Ascot's speedway races are being telecast on ESPN ; Speedway America airs on Friday night in the Pac ific t ime zone and early Saturday morning in the east. Team Kawasaki 's Ro n Lech ien crashed during a practice session at the AMA Na tional Championship 500cc MX Series in Bucha nan , Michigan, July 5, and was taken to the hospital with what was first thought to be a broken shoulder. But X-rays taken-Monday, July 6, proved. ne~ ative. "He's feeling a lot better," said Dick Lechien, Ron's father. "He'll race next week in Axton, Virginia, (July 12) if he feels up to it." Lechien's teammate Jeff Ward, the 1 9 87 Supercross Champion, was also inj ured at the Red Bud National during a practice crash. Ward went on to fi nish second in the f irst moto, but a second-turn spill in the second round put him out for the day. A phone conver- sation with a close personal friend of Ward 's, said that Jeff is back at his Mission Viejo, California, home resting with separated ribs and a cracked tailbone. It is . unknown at this time, however, whether or not Ward will ride the next Axton, Virginia, round on July 12. Belgium's Erik Geboers (Hon) captured the overall victory at the World Championship 250cc MX G P in I££endics J uillet, France, July 5, via a 1-2 tally. American Bo b Hannah (Suz) took second overall with a 5- . I score, while Great Britian's Rob Herring (Yam) and Sweden's Jorgen Ni lsson (Hon) rounded o ut the top four. H annah was leading the first moto before crashing. Geboers maintains his series points lead over Finland's Pekka Vehkonen (Cag), 255-237. Nilsson is third with 203 points followed by Italy's Michele Rinaldi (Suz). Cable TV 's The Nashville Network (TNN) will telecastthe '87 Golden State MX Nationals, sponsored in part by U.S. Suzuki, on Sunday, July 19, at 12 noon, 4:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m . PDT. The 90minute shows will feature racing from last w inter's California . series. Bel-Ray's J.J. H andfield tells us he's retired Big Blue, his 1976 Dod ge van. Handfield says B i~ Blue's odometer showed 587,000 miles but no records were kept to show how many cans or bot tles of Bel-Ray products were passed out through Big Blu e's doors in its years of traveling to races across the country. " Big Blue cost $5562.92 in 1976," said Handfield. "I guess you can say Big Blue was worth every penny we paid for her ." Is Big Blue's mi leage a record? Can your vehicle top it? Let us know. During its regular meeting July 14, the Anaheim (California) City Council may award an exclusive (Continued to page 59) MAD MAX ROBERTS : Three-time World Champion Kenny Roberts hasn't lost the dirt track touch that twice won him the AMA Grand National Championship; here Roberts slides a Yamaha V-Max at his Hickman, California, ranc h. Check out next week's issue and spend .. ~ day w ith the King." . Helmet bill founders in California By Farren Williams SACRAMENTO, CA, JUNE 30 Only six members of the Ca lifornia Senate Transportation Co m mittee bo thered to vote today on a proposed manda- 2 tory helmet law, effectively tab ling the bill until the 1988 legislative , session and perhaps killing it altogether. Committee members voted 4-2 to pass AB36, but the measure needed seven yes votes to clear the 13member Transportation Committee.Seven senators either abstained or were not present. Assemblyman R ichard Floyd (DGardena), who introduced AB36 and who pushed it through the assembly last month, immediately asked that the bill be reconsidered. Bu t even if the committee approves reconsideration at its next hearing on July 7, the proposal will not come before the Senate Transportation Committee again until January a t the earliest, acco rdi ng to Co mm ittee Chairman Wadie Dedde h (D-Ch ula Vista). If the senate commi ttee votes no t to reconsider AB36, the bill will be dead unless it is reintroduced. Floyd has said he will not reintroduce the measure if it fails to clear the California Legislature. According to Ded deh , w ho abstained, the yes votes came fro m Quentin Kopp (I-San Francisco), Gary Hart (D-Sailta Barbara), Marian Bergeson (R-Newport Beach ), . and Becky Morgan (R-Los Alt os). Deddeh said Rober t Beverly (RManhattan Beach ) and Jim Ell is (RSan Diego) voted against th e bill. The action came following a 2l2hour hearing attended by scores of bikers who jammed into the committee room. They let loose with shouts of victory following the vote. Repeated attempts to introduce mandatory helmet law s have been defeated in California for the past 20 years. • ee WRITf'R Whew! That was close. California hatlaw bill passes Assembly by 1 vote. finally killed in Senate O ne more time recently, for the 22nd year in a row, California's lawmakers rejected the specious argu ments for a helmet law, and thus one more light stays shining bright in America. . The contest was closer this year than any I've seen since 1969. AB36, the helmet legislative bill, passed the Assemb ly by just one vote . T h e Honora ble R ich ard 'Floyd , w h o sponsored AB36, is a likable guy. I suppose he deserved having his bill squeak through his house as a courtesy. Thankfully, the Senate Transportation Committee owed no such favors, and they voted by abstention to kil l Mr. Floyd's bill for this session. This ridiculous helmet law idea reminds me of the movie "Bananas." Even Woody Allen realized that the new dictator had gone crazy when he made up a law that all citizens of Bananaland must henceforth wear clean underwear (another good idea Mr. Floyd?). "And," he decreed, "They must wear it outside their clothes so we can check!" What strikes me funny about the helmet law obsession is, like that dictator in the movie, some politicians ta ke a good thing (clean underwear, helmets, desert protection, ATVs, etc.) and blow it by exercising too much control. Where safety is concerned, it is not so much what bikers wear on the outside, but what is in their heads that matters. Thanks to the wisdom of the Ca lifornia Senate, the state has one more year of freedom. I hope that this sport and industry will work harder to teach safer riding and alert the other drivers to our road rights, so that our underwear stays unblemished and we can continue wearing "Crash Hats" with pride becau se there's something in the re to protect, Next year, no doubt, somethi ng like AB36 will be back in the Sacramento bill mill, with a new number and new,. 1988 arguments why motorcycle riders need to be ma de to wear a hat. We will be wa tching for it. . Chuck Clayton