Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

eROAD RACE ~ World Championship Road R aceSeries:Round12 ~~----::::::--=:--- ~ Micha el Doohan end ed up fin ishing second after charging through from a poor start; he fin ished just behind Luca Cadalora. John Kocinski again turned in good performance on the facto ry Cagiva, finishing fourth in his second ou ting on the bike. 8 him boxed in the early laps, but he had qu ickly m ad e h is way thro ugh fr om eighth to fifth by lap "three, and though at th is stage he was n ' t closing on the le aders, he was rap idly drawin g Kocinski into his net, and he passed him one lap before Rainey crashed. Even now he see med too far out of touch, but with superhuman effort, setting a new lap record, he grad ually and then quite suddenly caught the leading duo , and as they closed on backmarkers on lap 24 he started to attack Schwantz, final!y getti ng by in the kink after the main straight after the Suzuki gave an extra little sideways kick. The traffic complicated matters considerably now, with a batch of six privateers in their own battle. But w h ile nobody was really serio usly held up, it inevitably made a big difference, and at the end of lap 26 Cad alora and Doohan were thro ugh the group, but Schwantz stil! in the thick of it. It was enough to ensure that it was now a two-bike dash to the finish . " On th e fi nal lap s, Doohan tried everything, and it seemed likely that the power of the Honda would give him the chance to take the lead last time down the straight. But Cad alora held him off all the wa y, with both coming close to crashing on the exit of the next hairpin; and they held their positions to the finish. "1 tried 100 percen t, and took a lot of risks," sa id Cadalora afterwards. "At the end the tires were sliding a lot and I was worried when I saw Doohan was coming. I jus t kept it at my maximum, and it was just enough." Doohan only knew in the closing laps that he was racing Cadalora. "1 thought he had crashed and that it was Rainey and Schwan tz up front," he said . "They were doing the same times as me, so it was really hard to catch up . I thought I might get the d rive onto the stra ight on the last lap, but it didn 't work out. Luca was making mistakes , but so was I, so it kind of equa lled out at the end. I'd had to take a guess on suspension because m orning w a r mu p was we t - but it se emed to w or k as well as anybody else's," he said. Kocinsk i kept on going to take a lonely fourth, saying later that the tire- suspension combination had been his problem. " It didn't work the w ay I wa nted and the bike wa s real hard to ride," he said, add ing: "The track was real slippy wh ere the seams join the old and new tarmac." Almost half-a-minute adrift, a racelong ba ttle saw Barros, Criville and Beattie locked in combat. The positions remained the same from lap six to the finish, but the trio was glued together as each looked for some advantage. Criville led briefly on the last lap, and he and Barros collided several tim es before th e Braz ilian finally recla imed fifth. Shinichi Itoh was eigh th on the third Rothmans Honda, just managing to stay ahead of top privateer Niall Mackenzie's Roc. Th e Japa nese rid er on the fue linjected Ho nda had made a bad start, bu t had passe d Macken zie, who h ad such bad tire pro blems that he debated stopping altogether . Then Itoh slowed on the last lap, and Mackenzie came to within less tha n a second of ca tching him over the line. Dou g Cha nd ler was a disap poin ted LOth, saying later that the Cag iva ha d .suffered some kind of engine tro uble that mean t it was surging for almost the full di stanc e, as thou gh cutting in and out on one cylinder. "It migh t have been a plug or something. Coming ou t of corners it would suddenly com,e in and the back would step out." British privateer John Reynolds was an excellen t l lth, well ahea d of the next privateer Juan Lopez Mella, who was in turn only frac tions ahead of Berna rd Ga rcia' s w orks Yam aha Fra nce bike. Then came Sp encer, sco ring hi s fir st championsh ip points since 1989. He had been 12th, but was having trouble shifting h is weigh t abo u t because of his injuries. "At half distan ce it got really bad," he said. "After that I couldn't move my leg a t all and I cou ldn't use the rear brake. Then the tires started to go off, and I could n' t get on the throttle hard enoug h to make up for slowing comer speeds." Michael Rudroff was 15th, claiming the last point. He was also the last rider on the same lap as the leaders . There were 26 finishers. Rain ey's cr ash ove rsh ado we d the cham pionship, but with Schwantz now on 219 points to Rainey's 214 it is almost certain that the Texan will win his first world title. Doohan is thir d, on 156, with Beattie fourth on 145 and Cadalora up to fifth on 129, ahead of Itch's 109. 250cc Grand Prix Twenty-seven hectic laps of the giddying Misano circuit yielded a fine second win for Ruggia, who led from start to finish, but for a brief inte rru p tion fro m Harada on laps 10 an d 11. The Frenchma n was extremely im pressi ve under sev ere pressu re, for a concerted attack also came fro m pole starter Biaggi. Both obligingly crashed, and it is to Ruggia's eterna l credit that he didn't. The sta rt wa s a sli g h t muddle, " because the gr een lights did not come on, but most are in the habit of leaving when the reds go ou t, so most got away without delay. In fact it wa s Capi rossi who led off the line , displaced rapidly by Biaggi. Ruggia seized control on the first run down th e straight, and said later: "It w.as qu ite easy to ge t a good gap ." Indeed so, an d he wa s over a second ahead by the end of the second lap. Th ere wa s a pack of six d isputing second at this stage; but soon it started to thin down as Cap irossi, Harada and Biaggi broke free. Romboni was among the pack, but retired after three laps with one of his carbon brake discs shat-

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