Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

RWIDlicr~~~_~ _'~_:R_OO_~_lO _e_~ e ... c-r .... v ..0 o .., u o Raymond Roch e (1) gets the jump on Fabrizio Pirovan o (2), Step haneMertens (3) an d the rest of the pack in Germany: Texan Doug Polen leads Roche in their race one battle; Polen took the win. Polen, Roche split wins in Germany By Bruce Newton P h o tos by Joh an Van dekerckhove 16 HOCKENHElM, GERMANY, SEPT. 15 he two fast est riders in the championship, Fast By Ferracci's Doug Polen and Ducati's Raymond Roche, shared the wins and seconds T in ano ther Ducati romp as the series ventured to Hockenheim . The battle for the lead in th e first race was a tense, slipstreamer until Polen took command with two laps to go, averaging 120.490 mph in the process. The second race was rather dull , until Polen 's runaway lead was sna tched away by an oil leak which he battled with successfully to earn 17 points for his slippery troubles. Roche had branded himself lucky to win race two, but he was even luckier just to star t both races. For some reason, unknown on race day, his factory Ducati 888 lapsed onto one cylinder o n the warm-up laps for both races. Miraculously, it cleared itself each tim e. Third place on the rostrum both times was taken by Du ca ti riders, Davide Tardozzi and Giancarlo Falappa. In both cases they just nipped T eam Kawasaki's Rob Phillis. Aussi e Phillis was head and sho ulders above any other rider on a Class B (i.e. japan ese) ma chine, but not good enough to run wi th Roche and Polen , who do minated the meeting throughout. Polen now leads the championship . by 108 points, whi le defending champ Roche has closed to within fou r points of Ph ill is for second. Further back, Fabrizio Pir o van o remains in fourth desp ite a crash in the first race on the last la p while ba ttling for fifth. Afterw ards he was fined 5000 Swi ss fran cs for assa ult ing a marshall wh o interfered with hi s a ttem pts to restart. That was just one incident on a da y wh ere th e 4l,000-strong cro wd, up by 6000 o n last year's record attendance at th e Hockenheimring, had plenty to excla im abo ut and acclaim. Qua lifyin g If ever there was proof required of the potency of the Polen /Ducati combination it came at Hockenheim, where they qualified on pole almost exactly threeseconds under the superbike lap record. But also here was proof that Roche's Mala ysian foray was a precursor to co ntin ued strong efforts rather than j us t a solitary day in the sun. He was just .27-of-a-second behind Polen at the end of the day. Both circulated the _ 4.223-mile track in the two -minute, fo ur-second range, with Po le n at 2:04.40 (122.209 mph) and Roche at 2:04.67 (121.944). Roche had actually been the fastest after the morning session, but failed to improve, spending a lot of time in traffic. Both riders claimed they were on even faster laps when the checkered flag came out. Roche had been the more troubled of the two during the weekend, com pl aining typ icall y of his suspensio n on Friday: " I have no sus pension," he said. But to co unte r that he was also talking enth us iastica ll y a bo u t the power and set u p of hi s V -twin. T o emphasize the gulf between these two and the rest, the ga p back to third was 1.42 seconds. The man there was none o ther th an Fred Merk el. After the disappointments of the Asian swing the Rumi/RCM rider was right back on form a t a circuit for which he has fond memories, making up for the Honda's lack of torque with som e aggressive riding through the chicanes, the Ostkurve and the stadium. By Saturday, both of Merkel's bikes bore twin pipes and he set his fastest time on the standa rd -E7D 1991 motor rather than the modified "Bergamo Bomber" that was being attributed to the former's lighter crankshaft which suited Hockenheim better. Merkel was also testing the carbon/steel front disc set up for the first time. "This is my chance to get on the rostrum," he had enthused on Saturday. The Byrd Yamaha of Fabrizio Pirovano was fourth fastest. his front row spot on th e grid reflecting how important power is here. Pirovano tested twin carbon discs on the front for the first time and elected to stick with them for the race. Grottini Ducati rider Tardozzi had been third fastest and right on the pac e Friday, but could only improve in fractions . Primed for a big effort Saturday afteroon, it came to nothing when the engine began to lose revs because of a fail ing head gasket. The spare al ready had an electrical problem so the outside of the front row was his best. Phillis was six th and still in the mental hole that engulfed him in Ma laysia. He was fourth afte r the first session and failed to improve after going the wrong wa y on suspension setu p. Phillis had no comp lain ts about horsepower this weekend, the japanese supp lyi ng a new un it for Germany: " It's the best yet," he sa id. The team was also usi ng telemetry for the first time. Terry Rymer put in h is best performance for a wh ile o n th e Locri te Yamah a to q ualify seventh, an engine swa p bet ween sessions and a good draft from Mert en s helping him to lop two seconds off his previou s best. Mertens , ironically, was next in line after having his steering damper mounting bolt break while he was on his fastest lap. That caused a couple of hairy moments before he realized what was happening and backed off. Giancarlo Falappa rounded out row two despite gear selection dramas and Peter Rubatto was the first of the Germans on the Laaks Yamaha and the first man to qualify outside of Merkel's two-minute, 7.37,second lap record. Rob McElnea was 12th ("I'm no t into ii at all. " ), Carl Fogarty 20th after encountering his traditional suspension prob lems. He'd tried the twin pipes for the first time and fo und the m better but then th e engine seized, forcing him to switch to his spare for . race day - albeit one which jean D'Hollander had spent some time with.

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