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/127182
A pace car. ala NASCAR stock ca r racing. was used for the first time during the Daytona 200. Here it paces the field early in the race. Florida's John Ashmead rode conservatively to his first-ever Daytona 200 victory on his three-year-old. privateer Honda VFR750 Superbike. AMA National Championship sUlJerbike Series: Round 1 Ashmead,wins Daytona .200 'By Brian Catterson ' Photos by Daytona International Speedway and Bert Shephard . DAYTONA BEACH, FL , MAR . 12 John Ashmead became the first p rivateer to , win the Daytona 200 by Arai sin ce the late Dale Singleton did so in 1981 at Daytona International Speedway. Ash mead, riding a 6 three-year-old Honda VFR750 Interceptor backed by Peter I Brady, survivedseven different a race of attrition that saw leaders on four different brands of machinery. Ashmead, 25, inherited th e lead when th e seemingly surewinner, Yoshimura Suzuki rider Jamie James, made an unscheduled pit stop late in the race. In fact, Ashmead's win took him by surprise: "I thought I was in \ second," he said shortly after posting the win. "I saw my number on top of the scoreboard but I thought they must have made a mistake." Ashmead averaged 96.323 mph to win by a margin of 22.66 seconds and was awarded $12,785 of the $ 175,000 purse. Second place and $10,820 went to Lo uisianan James with third place a nd $7460 going to T ennessean Kevin Rentzell on a Supersport-spec Suzuki that was rebuilt to Superbike specifi cations Saturday afte rn oo n before th e race. Former Grand National Champion Jay Springsteen recovered from a heat -race crash to finish ninth o vera ll on a n o ld Super Team Yamaha FZ750, winning the $5000 winner 's share of th e Dirt Track Ach ievement Awards , a race within a race th at involved top 20 ranked , dirt trackers who ent ered the 200. The 57-lap fin al e to Camel Cycle Week was held under , clear, sunny skies after week-long rains and high winds. Ashmead's victory kept , alive a Yamaha losing streak that began in 1986 when Freddie Spencer's win on a Honda ended Yamaha's l3-year stranglehold on this event. Wayne Rainey made it two-in-a-row for Honda when he won the first-ever 200 feat uring Superbikes (rather than F- l machines) in '87, and Kevin Schwantz ~ave Suzuki its first win on a Yoshimura-prepared machine in '88. '1 Early predictions, indeed indications, favored a Suzuki repeat victory in the hands of Yoshimura teamsters James, Scott Russell or especially Doug Polen, but things didn 't work as planned. R ussell was involved in a start line collision th at brought out the red flag and Polen retired while leading with mechanical problems. James finished second after leading mu ch of the race, but brought the bike home with less than a full compliment of working cylinders. This year Honda's hopes rested on th e shoulders of Canadian National Superbike Champion Rueben McMurter, who was loaned Bubba Shobert's '88 U.S. Ch ampionshipwinning Ho nda VFR750 . But the vapor lock problem that stranded