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/127215
.... Cl) ..0 8 Cl) ;> o Z Dave Bertram (left) hogs the champagne from teammate Randy Hawkins (right). who clinched his second straight Enduro Championship. Kawasaki-mounted Fred Hoess f in ished one point beh ind' New Eng lander Bert Guerrette for third overall ; Hoess dropped 42 points. AMA National Championship Enduro Series: Round 11 Hawkins clinches Championship.with Rhody win By Paul Clipper/Trail Rider Magazine W. GREENWICH, RI , OCT. 15 Although he was expected by all to j ust hang back and finish, T ea m Suzu ki rider, R andy H awkins pulled out all the stops at the Rhody Rovers ' L ittle R hody Nation al an d finished his second championship season with a convincing . . d d WIn. Hawkll~s nee e exactly one more pomt to ma thema t- 6 ically sew up the AMA National Championship Enduro, going into th e Rhode Island run, and he knew th at KTM 's Kevin H ines, hi s closest competition, would hav e to win th e overall , while Hawkins finis hed no better than 12th. Doing no worse than 12th wo ul d be simple for Haw kins, since he seems to be in capable of finis hi ng less than second these da ys, but he didn't hold back for a nything. "T his is fun riding!" he was hea rd to say at the first gas stop. "T he best end uro this year! " He proceeded to shave seconds off of each section, doing a point or better than everyone else, i ~ seemed, and finish~d up with 39 pomts a~d th e overal} in th e bag. If Hawkins was havin g th e best ride of hi s career in Rh ode Island, Hineswas having hi s wor st. Aching from a case of the flu pi cked up just two da ys ea rl ier, and hurting from a na sty practi ce cra sh o n Saturday, KTM 's ace 250cc pil ot co uld n' t get up to speed in th e early sections of th e run , and th en fad ed bad ly towards the finish. He wound up finishing 24th overall for the day, out of th e po ints and with no cha nce of cha lle ng ing Hawkins at the las t round in California. Hines wi ll have to work to stay ahead of Yamaha 's Jeff R ussell in Ca lifornia, who fini shed fourth overa ll (42 points) in Rhode Island and is now within striking range of second place for the season. . " I don't think I dummied up, I was just trying to shave as many seconds as I could," Russell said, in defense of the two burned chec ks that moved him down to fourth for th e day. " I will say th at th e Rhody Rovers put on a grea t Nati onal th is year. La st year it was a kill er, but this yea r th ey did a 180-degree turnaround a nd reall y surprised me. I was im pressed." T rail Boss Bill H aas, of the Rh ody Rovers, had assembled th e course, hoping to tak e 15 to 20 points from th e National AA rid ers. At th e sam e ti me, he d idn't want to knock everybody else o ut, so pl enty of resets were added to th e day . The route shee t was 150 mil es long, with 50 miles of resets; leaving 100 miles of rideable trail. It would have been a perfect weekend; temperatures were up to 70 degrees on Saturday , a beautiful , clear da y, but on Saturday ni ght all hell broke loose. " We had to aba ndo n ship abou t midnight!" said one of the unlucky tent ca m pers in the start field, aft er they were driven ins ide by the ra in. One a nd one-half inches fell between 10 p.m and dawn , ensuring that .there'd be pl enty of slippery rocks and mud sections alon g th e way. L ocal riders do best in those famil iar conditions, and NETRA Champion Bert Guerrette proved th e rul e, once again, at the wet Rhody, dropping 4 1 points a nd n earl y steal ing Hawkins' thunder. H owever, Guerrette had his own bad lu ck to contend with. He was beating H a wkin s by tw o p o ints, when , comi ng into th e second gas sto p. hi s KTM started running badl y. After a few frantic minutes of work, he di scovered that most of th e backing pl a te screws .on his ignition had backed o u t, yet he still managed to find a mag puller a nd screw it a ll back together. Then, in th e last po in ts-taking sectio n, he broke hi s odo me te r ca b le and wrapped it around his front hub, putting him over the bars a nd forcing another minute of repairs. Guerrette wound up losing six and 14 points in the last two checks, compared to Hawki ns' four a nd 12. When asked abo ut it, all G uerrette co uld say was "Weird th ings, weird things." Fast Freddie Hoess was one point beh ind Gu errette, muscli ng his Ka wa saki just seconds a head of Russell 's Yamaha. Both had lost 42 points on the course, with Ru ssell co llecting just 68 seconds more in emergency points. Fifth overall was local ECEA rid er Danny Nen sti el ; a very fast Honda rider from Pennsylvania. Nenstiel was tied for points with Alan Gravi tt, w ho co m p la i ne d about getting tangled up with hi s handguards on hi s KTM during a short trip over the bars, a nd fini shing up with a broken wrist and 43 po ints . Gravitt said to Hawkins aft erwards. " If you hadn't come by and hit me with your wh eel, I was happy to just lay there and tak e it easy for a while!" But Randy shamed him into getting back on th e bike, and he fini shed hurting, but in sixth pl ace. Joey Hopkins, from Aiken Motorcycle Sales in Aiken , South Carolina, piloted hi s Kawasaki into seventh place overall, and felt lu cky to be there after burning the two "easy" checks of the day. " I just got too exci ted, and was pushing too hard into those checks," he said. P lenty of riders had the same trouble wit h early checks. Eig hth overall was South Jersey's Jack Laffert y j r., four-time ECEA Champion , and working on his fifth time for this seaso n. Lafferty, riding a Yamaha YZ250, is locked in a local battle with KTM rider Ken Yan kowski for th e ECEA laurels, and Yankowski fini shed 10th overall at Rhody, just two . p laces behind his rival. Ro u nd ing o u t th e top 10 was Suzuki 's Dave Bertram, who finished in ninth for th e da y, aft er arriving with hi s left hand in a brace (sche duled for surge ry on Tuesday, he admitted ), a nd a motorcycle badly in need o f maintenance a fter being n egl ect ed during th e Six Days.Bertram wasn 't going to ride, but was bitten by th e competition bug la te Saturday, and overnight he and Hawkins' mechanic fixed up th e RMX's linkage and put in a good showi ng on Sunday. "It looked like too much fun to sit and spectate!" said Bertram. Winning th e High Po int A trophy was Dave Niemiec, a New England KT M pilot who is Guerrette's closest riva l in the NETRA Series . Penns ylvania rider Bill Atkinso n won the H igh Poin t B a ward, a nd Paol o .La ndrin l won the H igh Poi nt C trophy. a repeat of his perfor ma nce at the Speedsville Natio nal earlier in the year. This win gave Hawkins a mathematically-guaranteed Ch ampionsh ip win, with 261 poi nts to Hines' 197, unofficia lly , and defi-