Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

; ROAD RACE World Cham~ionshi~_Ro_ad_R_ace_Se_rie_s: _Ro_un_d2 ~ Texan Kevin Schwantz finished fourth on the Suzuki after getting the best of his new teammate Doug Chandler. Carlos Cardus (3) and Luca Cadalora (1) battled for the entire 250cc GP, but it was Cadalora taking the win. 12 As usual, nothing was as simple as it seemed. Schwantz afterwards blamed a number of little problems on the bike, and particularly the rear suspension. "It felt like a pogo stick after six or eight laps," he said. But there was another level to this story as well one leg was going numb as the result of inflammation in his spine, probably the result of some over-enthusiastic gym work. The same thing had happened the day before, when he had suspected too-tight leathers. But the quick fix to them hadn't cured the problem, and he required medication after the race. Chandler had his own problems. "T'rn real happy, considering the problems we had in practice. But the bike still wasn't right - the front was diving too quickly and when Kevin went by there was nothing I could do to catch him." Some distance behind, Lawson was riding to a lonely sixth. "The Dunlops were real good, and though my bike lacked bottom end it is good at the top. I spent too long early in the race stuck with Randy. If I'd wok en up earlier, I may have been abl e to run with the Suzukis." After this, the final results on ly bear a vague resemblance to what happened on the track. In fact, the last three riders on the same lap nearly didn't finish. As Criville, Garriga and Mamola crossed the line at the end of lap 29, the flagman was already showing the checkered flag in preparation for the imminent arrival of Doohan. They all slowed, then discovered when marshals waved them on that they still had a lap to go. Criville had been moving through th e field steadily all the way from a bad start in 17th place, and had gone past and broken free from the almost race-long Garriga/Mamola battle on _ the 22nd lap. Now all three of them backed off and were touring. Mamola and Garriga got going first , and finally crossed the line in that order, but Criville had lost two places by the - time he really did finish the race. His team manager Sito Pons protested, which was upheld, and five hours after the race fresh results were issued (wi thou t race finishing times) that put this trio in the order Criville, Marnola, Garriga. It ma y have seemed fairer simply to take results from the lap before , but this would have affected some other finishers - notably Miguel DuHamel, who finished 10th to take his first World Championship point. He passed both the Cagiva of Barros and Peter Goddard's ROC-Yamaha on the last gallop to the flag , much to Goddard's chagrin. He had been lining up Barros for a last-lap move , but hadn't been aware of the threat from DuHamel because he hadn't been ab le to see his pit signals. The team 's strategy for the next race is to get a bigger pit board. Thierry Crine's ROC Yamaha was l Sth, with Catalan o 's similar bike ano ther 20 seconds adrift. Behind him, Dominique Sarron 's ROC Yamaha triumphed over a race-long dice with Arakaki 's ROC and Cees Doorakkers' Harris. Among six non-finishers was Niall Mackenzie, after all his carbure tor main jets fell ou t, and Sepp Doppler, who crashed. It had been a good clean race, marred by muddle over the results. 250cc GP Cadalora leapt into the lead from his front-row start, heading Cardus, the remarkable Capirossi, and Chili. And pole starter Bradl? He had bogged his engine on the line, and had to wait for it to pick up again. By the time it had, he was well down, and in spite of taking risks to regain lost ground in the first lap, he was only in ISth place at the end of it. At least he had escaped involvement in a four-bike pile-up a little further back, which substantially reshuffled the lower orders. It happened in tum two , when Frenchman Fred Protat fell and collected Australian wild-card rider Stephen Whitehouse, Italian Renzo Colleoni and Spaniard Luis d'Antin, Ironically, Whitehouse and Colleoni were involved in a turn one crash in last year 's GP. While Bradl picked his way through the field, there was a thrilling battle up front. Cardus led the first and second laps, and for the next two they were swapping back and forth . When Cadalora did get ahead, it was only narrowly, and the Spanish rider racing with a plated collarbone that had been operated on only 12 days before - was in ultra-close attendance. Then, six laps from the end, Cardus was ahead again, and even appeared capable of breaking away a little. But his ragged riding showed he was close to the edge, and Cadalora was merely playing his frequent, rather contemptuous waiting game. He pounced decisively at the start of the last lap, and as Cardus again slid close to the edge of disaster at least once, he stayed in front to win by less than a quarter of a second. "After the start I set about trying to get a good lead because I was worried about Bradl," said Cadalora. "Then I got the message he was way down but I was surprised to see Carlos right on my tail. He gave me a hard race, and he didn 't seem to get tired and slow as I expected. He forced me to ride a lot harder than I had planned. I waved

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