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/127563
BwnRcr~s~~cl~_m_ro_ss_sm_'~_:R_OU_~_7__~ _ e Damon Bradshaw (8) flew to his third-straight Atlanta Supercross win; and his second win of the '93 series. Mike Kiedrowski (3) and Mike Craig (24) were third and fifth, respectively. ra s aw's ac wit tanta win By, Henny Ray Abrams ATLANTA, GA, FEB.20 arely, if ever, has Yamaha's Damon Bradshaw had more motivation for winning a race than he had at the Atlanta Supercross. He had watched Honda's Jeremy McGrath win four races m a row and had resented some of what McGrath said in Cycle Nws last week. (McGrath mentioned that Bradshaw had a hard time dealing with lapped traffic). He was racing for his third Atlanta win in a row before friends and fami! y. There was $7000 in Coors Silver Bullet Showdown money up for grabs. And his mechanic, Brian Lunniss, was in the hospital after breaking his arm in a freak accident in the team's transporter the day before the race. So the 20-year-old North Carolinian went out and won the faster of the two heats, then took the lead on the fifth of 20 laps in the Coors Light Challenge and rode away to his second win of the season in front of 44,524 highly partisan fans in the Georgia Dome. "I had to ride a hell of a lot harder to stay up there," Bradshaw said after beating Honda's Jeff Stanton to the line by about three seconds. Kawasaki's Mike Kiedrowski finished 'third, one better than McGra th, R 4 who was somewhat relieved to see his winning streak come to an end. '1 just got tensed up," McGrath, who maintained his championship points lead, said. "Finally, I'm glad I didn't win. Now I get to go racing again." McGrath leads Bradshaw in the Camel Supercross Series point standings, 152-141, after seven of 16 rounds. Kiedrowski is third with one more point than Stanton, 135-134. In addition to the $7000 in Coors money, Bradshaw won $5000 from the $35,000 250cc purse posted. by the event's promoter, World Sports. Stanton pocketed $3500 and Kiedrowski $2000. Bradshaw thanked mechanic Bob Oliver who was drafted to work with him after the Lunniss accident. Yamaha's team manager Keith McCarty explained that Lunniss hit his head on a bulkhead while jumping down from an eleva ted area in the team's new semi. He fell backwards about six feet, limding on his right side and breaking his right humerus (upper arm bone). "He had an operation and they put plates and screws in his arm. He may get out of the hospital tomorrow (Sunday) Bob Oliver is working with Damon tonight. We'll see what to do down the stretch," McCarty said. For the third race in a row, the 12Sec Eastern Regional Series crowned a new winner, this time Honda's Doug Henry. Henry took over the lead on the second of 15 laps and held off a determined challenge from Team Suzuki's Ezra Lusk, a native of Bainbridge, Georgia, who was clearly the crowd favorit~. "I rode smooth and just tried to do the jumps right every lap," Henry said. "I could tell when Lusk passed Chad (Pederson), but tried to concentrate on my own race." DGY Racing's Pederson finished a distant third. With his first win of the series, Henry stretched his championship lead over Lusk to six points, 89 to 83 after the fourth of 10 Eastern Regional races. Pederson is third with 78. Henry also earned $2000 from the $10,000 125cc purse, with Lusk getting $1000 and Pederson $750. 250 Heats After four years in Atlanta's Fulton County Stadium, supercross moved indoors in Atlanta, taking over the Georgia Dome on a night when temper- atures hovered around 35 degrees outdoors. The move seemed successful with the crowd only down a few hundred from last year's Atlanta best. And as soon as the first of two eight-lap heats was green-lighted, those on hand were glad they came. Kawasaki's Kiedrowski got the jump at the start in front of Suzuki's Jeff Matiasevich, with Matasievich taking the lead by the end of the first lap ahead of Kawasaki's Michael Craig. Kiedrowski was back to third in front of KTM-mounted Mark Musselman and the charging Bradshaw. On the third lap, Bradshaw moved up on the leading group, and the order began to shuffle. With a midair pass, Bradshaw was up to third, then second when Matiasevich bobbled in the lefthander following the start straight. The error also allowed Kiedrowski to move into second. At the end of three laps it was Bradshaw, Kiedrowski, Matiasevich, Craig, then a gap to Suzuki-mounted Mike Jones, Pro-Circuit's Buddy Antunez, and Honda's Steve Lamson. Craig moved up a spot on the next lap, as did Lamson, and at the halfway