Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

GOFF-ROAD ~ Best in the Desert Grand Slam Series: Round 4 Larry Roese ler (shown) and Danny Hamel werean unbeatable pair at the Tonopah 300 team race in Nevada. Roeseler/HameI have their hands full in Tono ah 300 By Anne Van Beve re n Photos by Tom Van Bevere n TONOPAH, NY, SEPT. 18 eamed together for a 230-mile da sh through the Nevada desert, Kawasaki 's Danny Hamel and Larry Roeseler make a formidable pair. But the odds-on favorites at this year 's Tonopah 300 team race got a run for their money in the early stages of the five-and-a -half hour sprint from Colorado's Jim Gray, who was tea med with first -time desert racer Donnie Books on a privateer Kawasaki KX500. At the end of the first circuit of the 77-mile figure-eight course, the factory backed KX500 racers were surprised to find themselves half a minute behind the Colorado duo on adjusted time, but a stepped-up pace, coupled with trouble-free rides in the second and th ird laps, put them comfortably ahead when the checkered flag finally fell. After five hours and 18 minutes of dusty racing, Hamel and Roeseler crossed the line with an eight-minute lead and parlayed their $330 entry fee into a $550 check for the Open Pro win . "I like team races - especially when I'm teamed with Hamel," said Roeseler. 'They are longer races and more things can happen. The bike gets ridden a little bit harder, and it makes for a more interesting race." ,. The fourth round of the Casey Folkspromoted race series was sponsored by T 16 . Kawasaki Team Green and drew 105 two-man teams, and one two-woman team , to Tonopah, Nevada, a remote former mining town midway between Las Vegas and Reno, best known recently as the development site of th e Stealth Bomber. The event bega n at 7:40 a.m . with a police-led parade from the impou nd area at the Station House Hotel and Casino to the starting line on an abandoned highway two miles south of town. The morning was chilly with a steady breeze as the racers lined up two abreast on the starting grid behind Hamel, who had drawn the number one s ta r ti ng spot. Hamel was hard on the gas when the starting light flashed green for the first time at 8:00 a.m. and got the drop on KTM racer Daryl Folks, who shared the front row . The Team Green racer powered through the left-hand corner that led off the pavement and was shifting hard as he disappeared in a cloud of dust on the high-speed road that headed east into the 39-mile first half of the figure eight. The rest of the field followed, two bikes at a time every 30 seconds, for half an hour. Ted Hunnicutt's bid for 250cc Pro honors hit the skids just three miles from the start when he wrapped a length of wire in the rear wheel of his Kawasaki KX250. "I hit the berm in a right-hand tum and there was a pile of wire right there," said Hunnicutt. "Joey Lane dropped his fanny pack off for me, but he didn' t have anythin g in th er e that help ed . 1 spent about 20 minu tes trying to get the wire out." Brandon Gerber, who was riding in the Four Stroke Expert class, was forced to drop out of the race a few miles from the start when his ATK broke a rocker arm. Open Expert Andy Nelson's hopes, meanwhile, deflated 15 miles into the race when he suffered a rear flat while leading his class and had to finish the first half of loop one on the rim. Ron Mitchell rode a rear flat for 15 miles before it ended his race near the 28-mile mark. "I fina lly cut the tire off and rode the rim for five miles, bu t it d idn't like not having a tire so it (the eng ine) blew up," said the KX250 pilot, who wa lked back to his pit from the far side of Tonopah to deliver the bad news. "The bike's absolutely thrashed." Hamel enjoyed a trouble-free opening ride and handed over to Roeseler for the 38-mile second half of the figure e ight with plenty of time to spare. Roeseler had disappeared over the horizon before the next racer came into view and was a minute and a half ahead of Greg Zitterkopf, who held second on adjusted time on a box-stock KTM 250. "My partner (Scot Harden) had the forks, shock, pipe and stuff but he d id n't make it," said Zitterkopf, who bundled Jeff Capt onto the bike for the second half of the loop. "He's (Capt) not used to the bike and it's kind of beating him up, but he's doing a good job." Third overall was held by Kawasaki KX500 racers Da ve and as and Pa ul Krause, 15 seconds ahead of the Dan AshcraftlJohnny Campbell Honda CR500 . Gray, meanwhile, handed the bike over to Books in fifth , two and a half minutes behind the leaders. The fast terrain of the first half of the figure eight gave way to tighter, more technical trails as the second half headed sou theas t from the pits. "My loop had ca nyons and washes and roads - a variety of stuff," said Roeseler, who had trouble finding the trail in one of the virgin areas. "I got lost briefly and that's when (Books) caught up tome." Roeseler's time-out searching for the course, coupled with brake problems late in the loop, put Books hard on his heels, and the newcomer from Colorado was 30 seconds ahead of the desert ace on adjusted time as he followed Roeseler down pit row. Campbell had catapulted ,Ashcraft's factory backed Honda CRSOO into third overall, ahead of Ondas and Krause, a KTM 300 piloted by Daryl Folks and Destry Abbott, and Scott Morris and Craig Smith aboard a KX500. Capt still held the 250cc Pro lead when he handed the KTM ba ck to Zitterkopf, five minutes ahead of the KX250 piloted by Paul Pitts a nd Aron Huntin gton, and Jeff Kawell and John Braasch had an eightminute lead over their nearest 12SccPro rivals. Gray tried to keep the charge going in to the second figure eight but found he couldn 't keep up with Hamel in the high-speed terrain tha t made up the first half of the loop. To make things worse, both Gray and his partner got lost during the second circuit of the track. Like Gray , Zitlerkopf saw his chance of a high overall finish slip away in the fast opening section of the second loop. "It's (the course) too fast for a 250cc to win on. It has some mile-long, perfect power line roads, SO the re's no way we will get the overall," said Zitterkopf. And the fast sections weren't the only challenge the 250cc Pro leaders faced. A lightening fast circuit by Ty Da v is tha t shaved five minutes off Roeseler's time in the second half of the figure eigh t had m ov e d the Hunnicut t/Davis KX250 within striking dis tance of the KTM pilots. As the battle continued near the front of the pack, some of the class leaders were taking it easy. "There was no one else in our class today, so we were just out for a trail ride," said Steve Pitts, who was teamed with Mike Sixbery in the Over-38 Pro class. "All we had to do was finish to take the (series) points lead so we didn't even have to work up a sweat." Brian Schmuckle and Dan Worley, the so le en try in the Over-30 Pro division, found themselves in a similar winwin position, and victory looked almos t as certai n for Jeff Kawell and John Braasch in the 125cc Class when they raced into the second half of loop two more than 10 minutes ahead of their nearest rivals. "We had it won but the main bearing went out and our race was over," said Braasch. "Tha t' s racing, 1 guess. If nobody's bike broke, it wouldn't be fun." Folks' fun was over when he picked up so me wire in his rear wheel and gro und to a halt in loop two. The' KTM 300 pilot wa tched Ondas, Morris and Z itte r kop f go by as he s truggle d to rem ove the wire. "I kept yanking and pu lling until it came out," Folks said. "Luckily, it was pretty rusty, but 1 lost five mi nutes a t least. It felt like 1 was there forever and it probably lost us the race." Further back in the field, the proble ms were m a n y and varied. So m e

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