Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

~ ROAD RACE AMA 250cc Grand Prix Series: Round 6 e Al Salaverria (22) raced wi th Doug Brauneck (46) and Jon Cornwell (49) in th e 250cc Grand Prix class final at Mid-Ohio. In the end. they fin ished in this order. Salaverria makes it two in arow By Brian Cauerson Photo by Larry Lawrence LEXINGTON, OH, AUG. 5 I Salaverria took advantage of the A 8 absence of 250cc Grand Prix Series points leader Chris D'Aluisio to take his seco nd win of the year a nd seco nd succe ssive a t the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Co urse. Salaverria emerged the vietor from a race-long, thr ee-way ba ttle for the lead wh ich also involved Dou g Brauneck and j on Cornwell. It was the veteran Bra uneck who led the mos t la ps. but you ngster Sa laverria led when it counted. Canadian Nationa l Dirt Track Champion Cornwell never actually led the race, but he led each of the ot her two riders at various points and made his presence felt througho ut The 20 points Salaverria earned for the win moved him into a tie for the series points lead with D'Aluisio, both riders now ha ving 79 po ints. Brauneck currently lies third, a mere five points behi nd with 74. . D'Aluisio was forced to miss MidOhio following a crash in a Canadian Nationa l Championship round a t Shannon ville , Ontario, the previous weekend. D'Aluisio crashed his DavHar Racing Yamaha TZ250 in practice there, breaking his right wrist in a cou p le of pl aces. According to his bro ther Gary (who was present at MidOhio to contest the 600cc Supersport race), Chris now has the han d in a tractio n device, but hopes to be able to compete in the nex t U.S. Nationa l Championship round at Heartland Pa rk Topeka, September 8-9..D'Alui sio brok e his left wrist in 1989. Much as he d id when he too k his first wi n a t the pr evious series round in Miami, Salaverria showed ea rly in the weekend tha t he was a force to be rec ko ne d wi th. Sa lav erria defeated Brauneck to take the win in the first of Saturday afternoon's two, five-la p heat races held to determine starti ng positions for Sunday 's final. Salaverria led the heat virtuall y start to finish , with Brauneck taking the lead just o nce on lap four when he used the significant po wer of his Hasty Racing Yamaha to d raft by o n the front stra ightaway. Salaverria then p layed the hand which wou ld ulti mately win him Su nday's fin al , outbraki ng Brauneck a t the end of the long back straight to reta ke the lead and clai m the heat race wm . K&P Racing's j eH Farmer finished a lonel y third in the heat, followed by Insula te Industries' Mike Sullivan and Willi am Him melsbach , the top five all rid ing Yarnahas. Heat race two saw a break in the typi ca l American rider/japa ne se motorcycle parade as a trio of Canadians , two of them aboard Rotax-po wered machines, fin ished in the top five. Ridi ng his Mototech Yamaha, Cornwell outdistanced Apri lia-m ounted Steve Crevier to take the win by nearl y five seco nds, while Darrell Cooney finished fourth on his Brutune Racing Spo ndo n/ Ro tax. Former class cha m p Donnie Greene ran third behind Cornwell and Crevier early in the race on his new rid e, the ex-Rick Kirk OTS Yam ah a TZ, but he was swallowed up by Cycle Sport Yamaha-mounted Dale Franklin and Cooney. Franklin fini shed third in the heat wit h Cooney the aforementioned fourth and Greene winding up fifth . In a real departure from the nor m , O hio resident Peter Kight entered a Wood -Rota x in the 250cc G P class, but he was sadly off the pace, fini shing 15th in his hea t a nd 29th in the final. Nevertheless, it was interesting to hear the th unde ring sound of a 600cc fourstro ke single a midst the buzzin g 250cc two-stroke twins. Salaverria's th ree-second faster heat race tim e earned him the pol e for Sunday aftern oon's final , plus a $50 bonus. At the drop of the green flag, Salaverr ia used his po le pos ition to advantage and led the 32-rider 250cc GP final field under the bridge and through lefthand turn one. Cornwell initiall y held second, but Brauneck cou ldn't take a cha nce on lett ing Salav erria get away and by the time the leaders reached the esses, he was up to second. Cooney held the fourth positi on, and as Brauneck and Cornwell traded second place back and forth, Cooney rod e the wh eels off his o utclassed machine just to keep up. Cooney ran close for a number of laps, but eventually lost sigh t of the leaders. Nevertheless, he would never have his position cha llenged and wo uld fin ish a' solid fourth. Further back in the field, Sullivan a nd his traveling companion Franklin were disputing fifth place. T he two Washi ng ton-based friends stayed close unti l about lap six, when Franklin fina lly got past Sullivan a nd began to pull away . Franklin was happy just to fini sh si nce he'd had a cyli n der "exp lode" during Thursday's practice. Sullivan then fell into Crevier's gras p, but Crevier retired his Aprilia (which he said had been " in mothb all s" ) on lap nine with drive train problems. " I burned up the clutch at the start and lost first gear o n the first lap," said Crevier, who was mak in g his first U.S. appeara nce since being sacked by Yoshimura last month. Back in seven th p lace, Greene led a coming-fro m-behind Lee Shierts until lap four when Shierts got by. Sh ierts had started his heat race with a new clutch , bogging it and ending up sixth, and then nearl y loo ped his bike at the start of the final. He was also handicapped by a used front tire. Without a Michelin support truck at the race, Shiens has to rely on findi ng som eone willing to mount his Michelin tires, and with the weather in doubt right u p to the star t of the race, no one had tim e to cha nge the tire for him. Nevert hl ess, itworked fine and he finis hed sevent h. Greene was unhappy wit h the way his new ride performed, a nd his eightp lace fini sh, saying, " I th ink he (Kirk) did something to it when he cras hed it a t Road America. It just wouldn 't accelera te." The team suspected problems on Saturday, a nd had cha nged the cra nk overn ight, but Gr eene was still unha ppy; whether he'll ride the bike in Kansas has not yet been decided. After fini shing a resounding th ird in his heat race, Farmer got off to a poor start in the fin al a nd had forced his way past G reene into ninth place when mechanical proble ms sidel ined him on lap 10. Back at the fro nt , Brauneck got by Salav erria (albeit briefly) for the first tim e on la p five, and by lap eigh t had moved into a dominant lead. Although he never put any distance on Salaverria and Corn well , it wa s th e vet era n Brauneck who .was in cont ro l of the race, ridi ng fast yet smoo th ly, and taking few cha nces. However, the two younger cha rgers refused to be dominated, and repeatedly passed Brau neck under braking only to be promptly repa ssed. Sa lav erria's tacti cs were particu la rly aggressive, wit h Cornw ell calling the 20-year-old Californian a "bra king an ima l" and Salaverria sta ting that late brak in g is his " favorite part of raci ng." In fact, Sa la verria's lat e . bra ki ng nearly got him into big trouble on la p 16 when, approachi ng turn nine, he hit a pavement tra nsi tio n whi le lean ed over under braking and had 10 stand the bik e up a nd run it out to the edge of the track to get it back under cont ro l. Salaverria was leading a t the tim e, a nd the mistake allowed both Brauneck and Co rnwell to pass. " It all came down to the last lap ," said Cornwell later. And it did . On the fina l go-round, Brauneck was leadi ng dow n the back stra ight (where he had an apparent horsepower advan tage) when Salaverria used the same move that he did in the heat race, a demon outb raking man euver at the end of the following com er to take the lead. Once past, Sa laverria rode the la p of his life to ho ld Brauneck and Cornwell a t bay, and when Brauneck was balk ed by a backmarker briefly in turn eig ht his fru stration was obvious as he performed a n imm ense wheelie dow n the hill ' whi le darting pas t Salaverria won by .690 of a second over Brauneck, wi th Corn well just as close in th ird. "Brauneck's bi ke was so fast, he'd pull me five or .six bike-len gths down the backstraight," said Salaverria after the race. " [ couldn' t draft him so I had to outbra ke him . That front tire won the race for me. Doug had th is track wired, bu t th is was my first time here." Oddly, Salaverria used the same Dunlop front tire here that he won on in Miami. Not the same type - the same tire. " We scu ffed in a new o ne t his morn in g, but it had a pinhole in it and we co uld n't find anything better," explai ned Salaverria, who won $3255 of the $17,000 purse. Salaverria's tuner, Dave Ray, agreed with Salaverria 's findings, saying, " 0 1' Brauneck can j ust teach do wn into his shoe and pull out another mi le an hour, -V can't he?" Bra u neck, ho wever, denied this proclaimi ng , " Yeah , my bike was a linl bit faster, but it was reall y j ust m getti ng better drives." Brauneck rode 0 Micheli n tires. Brauneck was unhappy wi th hi performan ce, a nd felt that he shoul per haps have ridde n more aggressively " I feel [ rode the best race, and whe they did stuff thei r way pas t I cou l almost always get rig ht back by becaus they'd blow the next tu rn. " It 's fun ny," Brauneck continued "When I sta rted raci ng, if the guy i front of yo u was faster you 'd follo w him It does n 't seem to be tha t wa a nymo re." .. Results HEAT I: I. AI Salaverria (Yam ); 2. Do ug Brauneck (Yam); 3. Jell Farmer (Ya m); 4. Mike Su llivan (Yam); 5. Wi lliam H im melsbach (Yam) ; 6. Andrew T revit (Yam) ; 7. Man in Miller (Yam); 8. Brad LoW<' (Ya m); 9. Mark LonK (Yam); 10. Mlchad Laval lee (Yam) I I. Stephen WI!.hindy (Yam); 12. Timo th y O'Conno (Yam ); 13. David Avery (Yam); Ii . Jo hn Fra n« (Hoo ) 15. Richard Inman (Yam) ; 16. Jim Bonner (Yam). 0 T ime: 8 min.• 3.800 sec. Discana: 5 laps. 12 milo AV mlJ!' SJ>«d: 89.293 mph Margtn of Via ory: .260 SK. HEAT 2: I. Jonathan Co rn well (Yam ); 2. Sin Crevier (Apr ); j . Dale Franklin (Yam); i . Dane! Cooney (RlX); S. Don Gn-ene (Yam) ; 6. Lee Shi (Ya m ); 7. R id Tripodi (Ya m); 8. T om Paris (Yam) 9. Brad Sawyer (Yam ); 10. Steve Lombardo (H oo \ I J. Mark Sch ubert (Yam ); 12. G r

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