Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Dan Ashcraft and Randy Morales won Saturday's race atthe SoCal M.C.! Desert M .C . Dual European Scrambles; they f inished second Sunday. Morales/Ashcraft, Morris/Knapp trade desert wins By Anne & Tom Van Beveren Photos by Tom Van Beveren LUCERNE VALLEY, CA, JUNE 27-28 T eam Honda discovered you can t win them all during a fu ll weekend of h ot, du sty racin g at th e SoCal M.C.lDesert M.C. Dual Eu rop ean Scrambles , held at Co u gar I Bu ttes. :In the first day of the twoday program, Team Honda's . Dan Ashcraft/ Randy Morales 20 XR600 R combination came from behind to snatch the overall win from Kenny Parry and Brett Howell when the Yamaha/Kawasaki duo were just 50 yards from scoring a wire-to-wire victory. But the tables were turned in Sunday's race. After leading for the first half of the event, Team Honda was overcome by the hard-charging 250cc team of Suzuki-mounted Charlie Morris, Jr., and Husqvarna rider Dale Knapp, and lost the win by a margin of 400 yard s. " They ~ot the lead off th e start but we hung m ~e~e a~~ got t~em J~st ~efor~ the ftn~~h. Morns ~ald. They got the win on Saturday and we held. them off on Sun?ay. That se~ms fair to uS.,~e couldn t let them wm both races. . . ~n a change from AMA/Dlstnct 37 s regular european scr~mbl~s format , the southern Ca lifornia v clubs that organized the e. ent opted for.a weeke,nd of team racing. Rl d~rs paned?ff into t~o-man. teams.~lth the op.tlon of shanng a bike or riding one bike each, and traded off every lap, slowing just lo ng enough to switch the tc;am'~ official armband to the departing rider, Racers were enthusiastic about the unusual format and the course. The A course consisted of five and a half miles of open, roller coaster terrain, while the B loop took in eight miles of high-speed cross-grain, littered with silt and loose rocks, and a tricky off-camber section. Saturday The banner droppC;d at 9:00 a.m. on Saturday for ·the first race of the weekend and the Vet classes launched into action on th~ A course. The.Vets got m eight laps m an hour and a half,. and right from the s~art It was obvIOUS th e race was go ing to be.close. , . Mike McDonald s Kawasaki- . mounted team got the holeshot, but the Open class hopefuls had the 250!=c teams of M.ark Zoller/Lew W~lght, . on matching KTMs, and Mik e Sixberv/Wes Anderson: Jr. , mo~nted on .a Yamaha a.nd Kawasaki, respectivel y, breathing down their necks all th e way. Wright powered into the lead in lap two and the KTM team held off a determined charge from Sixbery and Anderson in lap fiv e. The Sixbery/ Anderson effort bit the dust in lap five when Sixbery derailed a chain while trying to pass a lapped rider ·in the only bottle-neck of the course. The time lost making repairs relegated the duo to third overall. Zoller and Wright took the checkered flag, while McDonald's' team finished second overall. "It was like an enduro course _ tight and fun but really dusty" Wright said. • , Teammate Zoller said he had problems with course markings. " If we can't pre-run the europeans they'll have to mark them a bit better," he said. " Wi thou t real good markings we can't go as fast as we want to." . The Vet team of Mark Zoller and Lew Wright followed Team Honda's example by w inning their class Saturday and placing second Sunday. Saturday's " main event" was ra ce two , which saw the Open and 25&c Experts lined up for the banner drop. Brett Howell got his Kawasaki off the line in record time and was out in front of the pack when he handed over to YZ250-mounted teammate Kenny Parry at the end of the first lap. The Yamaha-mounted duo of Darin Cartwrigh t/Cliff Thomas was pushing hard in second overall, with Honda's Ashcraft/Morales thundering through in third overall. Parry kept up the pace, completing the five-mile lap in 10 minutes flat to hold th e opposition at bay in the early running. 'But as the race continued, Team Honda launched a drive from behind that had them creeping closer and closer as the miles flew by. Going into lap five, the Honda team took over the number two spot and were just seven seconds behind Howell and Parry. By the time the . white flag came out, Team Honda had cut the Howell/ Parry margin to four seconds. With one lap to go, Morales was pushing th e big Honda to the limit on his way to the checkers but, try as he might. he could not make up time on Parry. " I was doing everything I cou ld but I was still behind him until right at the end," Mora les explained. "Then we came up behind a lapped rider in the sand wash with only about a mile to go. He went left and I went righ t and I got a better line. I had to really banzai it to get past. It was handstand city out there, but I got the lead about 50 yards out. Talk abo u t cutting it close. " The win gave Morales h is first overall victory ever in a District 37 desert race. " It was a fun course, " he said, thanking American Honda, Answer, Smith, Hondaline and Shoei. " It had a lot of tight stuff which made it interesting. It would've been a really neat race If you could've seen where you were going. It was so dusty you couldn't see a thing out there." Par:ry was obviously disappointed with his second place finish. " Randy (Morales) got me about 50 yards . back. He just picked a beuer line and th e Open bike had a bi t more power," he said. " I was trying to get him back but there wasn't time. "It was a good race," said Parry, whose team was sponsored by Granada Yamaha, PJI , AXO, Answer and Silkolene. "We were five seconds apart the whole time. I've never had an overall win in the desert yet, and I had to miss it by 50 feet." I Third overall went to YZ250 pilots Cartwright and Thomas, despite a-n set-back right off the start. " I got a great start but can you believe I forgot to turn the gas on," said Cartwright. " I was up in second and the bike stopped running. That's when Ashcraft and Morales caught up. I gave th em about 30 seconds by accident." Saturday's 125cc division saw Yamaha-mounted Eric Hallgath dominate the early running, but his Ironman attempt fizzled out in lap five, letting th e Brett Howell/Frank Chase, John Braasch/Ron Jennings teams duke it out for the wm. Braasch and Jennings, sponsored by Granada Yamaha/O'Neal/Kalgard/D RS / Riverside Motorcycle Center, grabbed the checkered fla g by a sl irn margin , forcing th e ' Kawasaki-mounted team of Howell r and Chase to sett le for second. "We were riding one bike so we'~ had to stop for gas," said Howell, "and that's when they caught us. It was a fun race though." The close racing continued in Saturday's Women 's division, which saw an unusually large turnout. Lori Conway (known to most desert racers under her maiden name of Farmer) teamed with Diane Holeman to edge , out the Husky/Kawasaki team of Joanna Brownell and Vicki Scott. " I caught Joanna in a tight rock ' section and passed her in the sand J wash comin~ in off lap five," said I Conway. "Diane and I were both a little nervous and tens e going into this because it 's a while since we raced. \Ve used to come out here every weekend but now we're really out of shape. " Sunday Racing got off to an 8:00 a.m. start on Sunday and provided another day of fast-paced excitement. McDonald took another shot at the e Vet honors, riding solo, but ran out of gas toward the end of the race and turned the lead over to another ironman - Team Honda's Bruce' Ogilvie. Ogilvie hung on to take the. checkered flag, with Sixbery/ Ander- son finishing in second and Zoller/ Wright taking third. J Team Honda was determined to make it two in a row when the banner dropped on the Open/250cc Expert start and looked impressive in the early running. But as the hour and

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