Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

percent guarenteed that I would crash if I kept trying. It just follows the path of bad luck we 've had this year." Quarterley was the first to get by the slid ing DuHamel, but James wasn't giving up and he shot by the tall redhead at the end of the backstraight on the 16th lap of the restart. It then appeared that James w a s making a break, bu t Quarterley wasn't going to let that happen. O n the 20th lap o f the restart, Quarterley snuck under James in turn 13 and then had his most anxious moment of the race when he ran wide in 14 (coming onto the fron t straight) and hit the dirt. At this time he was only fractions of a second ahead of James, who was in turn only just ahead of Polen an d Smith. Those four had pulled dear of Stevens and Edwards. " It sli d ri gh t off the race tra ck, " Quarterley explain ed . No harm, no fou l, and Q uarterley never backed off fo r an in stant. " I w as either g oi ng to crash it or win it," he admitted later. "I never go t out of it. I was going to the front and there was no thing else to it." Suddenly, Quarterley had opened a lead on his pursuers. Three laps from the end he led by 3.3 seconds. Then it went to 5.2 seconds and then 5.5 seconds at the finish. "I needed to lea d a la p through the infield - tha t's w h ere I wa s s trong," Quarterley said . " I needed to ge t thro ugh a whole lap by myself. They'd slow me on my strong points ." Two tear-filled coo l off lap s.later, an d Quarterl ey w as celebra ting his first win with his cre w . Eve n th ose w ho h e be at were happy for him. "I do n' t know if I wanted it as bad ly as Dale did." Jam es sa id. "I chose the w ron g rear (tire) and it w as slid ing around a lot. I had to settle down and get smooth. Once he (Quarterley) got clear th er e w as no wa y I could deal wi th him. I kne w someone wa s breathing down my ba ck, but I didn't know if it w as a Honda or a Du cati, I really wanted to win this race - if anyone else but Dale had won I'd really have been Mike Smith (68) fini shed third, Miguel DuHamel (17) was 10th , and Doug Polen (23) finished a title-clinching fourth. bummed . r w an ted to win for Larry Games's team mate Larry Schwarzbach, who was killed in the Superbike National he re last year). That was driving me all weekend." . On the 21st lap, James made contact with lapped rider Brad Hazen in turn 13, and Californian Hazen cra shed. "It was fortunate that w e both d idn't go down," James sa id. Later, Smith had a close call with Dr. Dave Kieffer, w ho he was lapping. Other than that, Smith was pleased with his day at the office: "I gave it the bes t I could," he said . ·"1 w as still sk iddish fro m my 600 crash . I was right beh ind Doug (Polen) and thought that was as good as anyplace to be. I figured w hen he went to the front, I'd follow . At the halfway point I was jus t trying to ride as smooth as I could. If anything, I just didn't give it enoug h in the beginning. I d idn't want to see any more bodywork going down the road . This ha s been a w orld record for me. It's been a lot of work, but I'm gla d to do well here.in front of all the Camel people." Whether or not Polen could hav e made Dale QuarterIey takes the checkered flag, 5.585 seconds ahead of Jamie James. . , 5

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