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/127147
,f-j Sh.ell MOET Oils B ~ •• OET The new King of Eng land, Wayne Rainey (left). celebrat es his British Grand Prix win w ith Wayne Gardner and Christ ian Sarron . World Championship Road Race series: Round 12 . Rainey reigns in England . , By Hanny Ray Abrams DO NI NGTO N PARK, ENGLAND, AUG:7 Team Lucky Strike Roberts ' Wayne Rainey won -h is first 500cc G rand Prix beating Roth mans Horidas World Champion Wayne Gardner by seven seconds to clinch ,. ,the British Motorcycle G P in front of 65 000 people at Don. 'k mgton Par .Rainey, who used new AP 14 Lockheed "carbon" brakes and a bias-ply front Dunlop tire to correct a persistent front end chatter, led from the first corner on and was never cha llenged. He finished the 30lap, 75"mile race in 48:33.67 minutes (92.66 mph average), over one and . . a half ~mutes . faster t!tan Eddie Lawso'! s race ,:"mnmg ume for the sa~e dls~nces 10 1987. . " .T he t~res"played.a ~aJo! part, Ra m ey said. They didn t spm at all. I just sat on top of the bi ~e. It was doing all the work for me. Fo llowing Gardner in third place was Gauloises Blo n des Yamaha's ChristianSarron with HB Honda's Niall Ma ckenzie fourth a nd Rainey's teammate Kevin M~gee fi~th. . World Charnpionsh ip porn ts leader Eddie L awson , of T eam ' Marlboro Agostini Yamaha, complained of engine and tire probl ems and finished sixth, losing s~ven points to Gardner. The standings rea.d: Lawson-195 , Gardner-175, .Ram ey-163, Sat:0n-123, l\;l,agee-ll~. Team P ep SI SUZ':lk.I s KeVIn Schwantz .was. a non -fmIsher , today after runmng into Elf Honda s Ron Hasla m in the esses and crashing on the first lap. Schwantz, who needed five stitches to close a cut in his left knee, later said, " I went in and got on the brakes the same as Haslam. But I had a new set of pads for the race and they weren't broken in. I wasn't trying to outbrake him." Randy Mamola managed to bring the Team Cagiva mount h om e in 11th after suffering a failure on the first lap. Two spots behind Mamola was first privateer Mike Baldwin riding the same Team Samurai Honda RS500 that he'd used to make the movie "American Built." Baldwin said that the movie's producers have agreed to back him for the rest of the season. Team Marlboro Agostini Yamaha's Luca Cadalora wo n his second 250cc GP of the year, bea tin g Roth.rnans Honda's Dominique Sarron by 3.5 seconds after leading the entire 26-lap, 65-mile distance. Third went to Ducados Yamaha's juan Garriga who gained a few valuable points on the fourth-place finisher, Campsa Honda's Sito Pons. Pons leads Garriga 179 to 173 wi th four races to go. Parisienne Honda's jacques Cornu, seventh today , is third with 151. Team Servisco Honda's Ezio Gianola beat Derbi's jor~e Martinez to win the 24-lap, 60-ml1e l25cc race. Domenico Brigaglia was third on the Gazzaniga Rotax. With Just two l25cc rounds left, Martinez leads Gianola, 157 to 140. In the Sidecar GP, Rolf Biland and Kurt Waltisperg's hopes for a perfect season came to an end at Donington Park as they were beaten by just over two seconds by the British team of Stev e Webster and Tony Hewitt. Alain Michel and j ea n -Marc Frese were third. Biland-Waltisperg are 21 points ahead of Webster-Hewitt, 137-116 with Michel-Frese third at 69.' 500cc qualifying Donington Park's 2.5 mi le-long track has lo n g been cri ticized as being too slippery, some attributing it to jet fue l bein g dropped fro m planes using nearby East Midlands Airport. However, before the start of the season the track was resurfaced and, according to the riders, the traction was the best they h ad raced on all year. Their beliefs were immediately confirmed in the first practice session on Friday when II riders went faster than Gardner's 1987, pole-setting time of 1:38.29. . Gardner led the pack with a 1:35.09 (94.64 rnphjva mark he wouldn' t improve upon.ibut which would be good enough to keep him on the pole. Trying to better his time on Saturday morning, he crashed on h is fift h la p, injuring h is rig ht ankle and ending any h ope he h ad of going faster. . "I was try ing to get around some slow riders," Gardner said of his crash in the hairpin, " G o d da rd Corner," which leads onto th e front straightaway. "The a n kle's a little stiff at the moment, but when the flag drops you forget about it. I did a low 37 (actually a I :36.89) in the last session. I though t I could go faster if I had a clear run and the ankle was good. I couldn't do that pace in the race, for sure." Gardner said that because of the new surface, " It takes a good three laps to warm the tires up. That's a big problem here. They don't seem to scrub up as well as at other tracks. A good start is important. If you have to come from behind there are two or three places to pass the good guys." Although he wouldn't confirm it Gardner was believed to be using yet - another new frame at Don ing ton. Next to Gardner on the front row was second-fastest Lawson. H is tim e , of 1:35.64 (94.10) came in th e th ird session and, like a ll riders, he was u n abl e to better it in the fourth session due to oil and ceme nt d ust in the fin al corner. Still, that was n 't his main concern. ' "My shoulder is my m a in concern," Lawson said. "It's about 80 percent. When I go down the h ill (through Craner Curves) a nd try to change direction I'm way off lin e. I'm too far off to the right and can't