Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

~ ~ S UZ\JK\ 0 en en .......04 ~ co >.... ro ~ c ro i--; Racer lest: suzuki RGv500_GaDlDla XR15 ev·n's cannon By Alan Cathcart Photos by Kel Edge h e 1989 500cc World Ch amPions .hip may have finall y gon e to Eddi e Lawson and H onda, but there isn't much doubt . which was the dominant co mbina tio n in the class for most of the year: Kevin Schwantz and the Pepsi Suzuki RG V500. To p ut it bl untly, when Revvin ' Kevin and his revamped V4 Suzuki stayed upright and didn't break down , he invariably won. Discounting th e Spa d eb acl e (wh ere h e cras hed out o f th e lead of th e third leg, o n ly to end up with half points for second place overall wh en that leg was di scounted from th e resu lts), he won every time he fini shed, excep t twice. Those, a pa ir o f second pl aces to Wa yne Rainey in the U.S. a nd Lawson in France, were th e on ly times th e brill ia nt you ng T exa n with the extro vert riding style was ever headed a t the checkered flag, a ll 15race season lorig. But to finish firs t, you must first fin ish , as the o ld racing axiom goes, a nd in sp ite or' winning six G Ps tw ice as many as eithe r event ua l cha m p io n Law so n or ru n ner-up Ra iney - Schwa nt z could fini sh no better than fourt h in th e final World Cha mp io ns hip ta ble, just behind th e ever-co ns iste nt Chr istia n Sarron, who fai led to win a si ng le G P in 1989. . If th at tends to support th ose wh o clai m the curre nt points sco ring syste m favors regula r finishe rs li ke Sarro n, ra the r th an brilliant-b u terra tic .race-win ners like Schwantz, well , that 's cert ai nly tru e, bu t even und er th e o ld 15- 12-1 0 sys te m , Schwa ntz would o n ly have been th ird overa ll a t th e en d o f the season, in sp ite o f a ll those victori es. The reason is sim p le, a nd two fo ld. Schwan tz fai led to fini sh no less than five races in 1989, th ro ugh a com - [f] T 40 binati on of rider error and mechanica l unreli ability. He won th e first GP o f th e year in J apan in brilliant style, a nd the n took pol e po sition for the next in Austra lia, but crashed o n the firs t lap . After a seco nd-p lace finis h in the U.S., Kevin mad e his most spec tac ula r m istake of th e year, crashing near the end of the Spa nis h G P a t J erez whi le mi les in the lead. To th e cynics, th is was confirma tio n o f Schwan tz's un canny tal ent for plucking defea t from th e jaw s of victory through u nfo rced error. But ind eed from then on (allowing for the Spa accident in the wet which ulti mately d idn 't cou nt agai ns t him ), Kevin clea ned up h is riding a ct, ridi ng flawlessly for the rest of the year a nd winni ng five o f the nine rem aining races. He would lik el y have won more, excep t for th ree breakdowns whi ch even if th ey di dn't cost h im the title, wo uld su rely have left him closer than 65.5 po ints adrift of Champion Law son in the fina l tab le. At Hock en heim, Kevin was cha lleng ing for th e lead when a cra n ksha ft bearing failed , th ou gh .he ad m itted af ter tha t he " m ig h t have been over-revving it a bit to stay with Eddi e and Wayne" in a three-bike battle for th e win. No suc h explana tio n for th e next failu re a t Assen , when the Suzuki exploded to a halt one a nd a half laps fro m the end of th e Dutch TT with a -Ala n C.theart _ _pled Kevin Sehwantz' Smr:ukl RGV500 at EngI_d'. Snetterton clre_t and fonnd It to he tile heat of the current crop of ISO-pl•• horaepower GP race hlkea. seemi ng ly secure lead. A piston had brok en up, send ing a con nec ting rod th rough th e cra n kcases (this was lat er traced to a fau lty ign itio n unit). Next tim e th ou gh, it really was a fa ulty pis to n wh ich broke m idw ay th rough the Swed ish GP, just as Schwan tz was cha llenging even tua l win ner Lawson . Gi ven th e a maz ing reliability -of current GP race bikes - all th e more stagge ring wh en you consider the razo r-edge development needed to extract over 160 horsepower from a 500cc two- stroke engine - what in former day s wou ld hav e _been dismissed as a typi ca l " luck of the draw" tri o o f retirem ents becam e a n offseason bone o f contention betw een rider a nd factory, which clouded negotiati ons for the 1990 co nt ract year. All thi s tends to o bsc u re o ne unden iabl e fact: th e RGV500 Suzuki in its latest '89 speci fication (factor y code number XR7 5) won more 500cc GP races th an a n y o the r bike in 1989. T ha t a lone mad e it wort h trying to get a ride on " Kevin 's can non" a t the end of the seaso n, but having tri ed un successfull y to p ersua de Suzuki's a ffable race bo ss Mitsu o Ito h to let me get m y leg over eithe r o f its predecesso rs in th e V4 Gamma line since th e factory returned to G P racin g in 1987, I d idn ' t have much ho pe. " Wait till we win the Wor ld ti tle!" had always been Itc h-sa n 's jocula r response, but in th e sp irit of neversay-d ie- I had a not her go a t him at Do ning ton this year , more in ri tual hope tha n serious expectat ion. _ " Yo u r interest in our bik e is a lways appreciated," he sa id . " May be this tim e I thi nk a test is possib le. Please expec t contact a fter Brazil GP." In ot he r wor ds - do n 't call us, we'll ca ll you ... excep t that this time, they d id ! So that's how Nu m ber 34's fina l track a p pea ra nce befor e being sh ip ped back to J apan and a pl ace in th e Su zuk i factory museum

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