Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

BEVENTS 11. K. Bowen (18); 12. Ston e (17); 13. Hunter (15); 14. Schrauben (15); 15. Kirkpatrick (12); 16. Rid geway (12); 17. Han sen (11); 18. Sches ser (9); 19. Pororobb a (8); 20. Joyce (8). ~ CMC Trans-Cal Mx S North Round: 3 eries Brandes brilliant at CarsonMX By Joan T ieamey CARSON CITY, NY, SEPT. 19 ace Tech l Answer-backed Michael Brand es got it all toge ther to master four moto wins in the 125 and 250 Pr o cl a sses a t Sil ver State Rac ew ay wh ere Plenty of p ros turned ou t for the north ro und of th e CM C Trans-Ca l Series . In moto one of th e 125cc Pro class, fir st turn action sa w Sha ne Esposit o grab the holesh ot wit h Tod d McMaster, Spu d Walters, and Brandes g ivi ng chase. Eigh t other fast-char ging pros were on the gas and fighting for position, but Esposito had a solid lead ou t front. Brandes qu ickly moved into second from fourth, and the two front runner s leftthe p ack. Esp os ito held off Brandes for six laps, and Brandes tried every line and finally got around him on the seventh lap . Esposito settled in second while Brandes railed his Suz uki in for the first moto win. Spud Walters finished third, Greg Tirheimer fourth, and Chris Barker fifth. In moto two, Esposito again got the holesho t with Rus ty Holland on his rear tire . McMaster ran in third , Barker fourth, Kenny Lash fifth and Brandes, havin g his work cut out for him, was in sixth po sition. Brandes quickly passed three rid ers in one lap and was in pursui t o f Espos ito. Lap after lap, it wa s Esposito and Brandes battling it out for the lead. Tirhe imer pulled off with mech an ical problems. Walters was trying to make his move and was in third after d icing with Chris Barker, who opted to hang back and br eak in some new susp ension. Brand es took the lead on lap six and was gone. Esp osito finished second, Walters third, Holland fourth and Barker fifth. In the 250cc Pro class, Rusty Holland got th e holeshot a h ea d o f Ty son Vohland, Brandes, Hawkins and Tirheirner. On lap three, Brandes made a spectacular pass gaining two positions with no problem, leaving Vohland in second and Walters in th ird. Brandes headed hom e for the win with Vohland finishing second, Holland third, Walters fourth and Lowell Moural Jr. finishing fifth. In th e s eco nd 2S0cc Pro m oto, Bran des cap tured the holesh ot and took his Race Tech Suz u ki to the bank with anothe r flawless win . Spud Walters was second , claiming a second overa ll. Rusty Holland took third overa ll wi th consistent 3-3 finishes, and Vohland pos ted a , fifth in the rnoto, giving him a fourth overall. Greg Allen finished fourth and placed fifth overall. ~ R Matthew Crown (91) and Keith Bowen tussled at the Fall Classic's firs t roun d. AMA Fall Classic MX Series by Dirt Shirts. LaRocco stars in Fall Classic debut By D a vey .Coo m b s BUCHANAN, MI,SEPT. 26 he famo us Red Bud Track 'N Trail racing facility was the starti ng poin t for the new AMA post-season MX series, a nd newl y crow ne d SOOcc National MX Cha mpion Mike LaRocco was the first big star to lend his name to th e six-rou nd series. Th e Kaw asak il MSR I Sco t ti Be ll I EBC I Brid gestonesponsored laPor te, Indiana, na tive traveled to his old s tomping g rou nds and won the 250 I SOOcc class w ith a perfect 1-1 moto score. The extre mely competitive 125cc class was won by journeyma n pro Barr y Ca rsten, wh o p assed Kawa saki-mo u n te d D a vid Gay lo rd three corners from the checkered flag to cl inc h th e seco nd -moto win a nd th e overall victory. Mich ig an ' s own Jeff C urry and Yamaha-mo u n te d Greg Bowen joined laRocco on the pod ium as the secondand third- overall finishers, respec tively, in the big bike class, whi le Michiganers Gaylord an d Todd DeHoop followed Bayville, New Jersey's Cars ten in to the winner's circle as 125cc show and place riders. Accord ing to AMA officia l Duke Finch, "The object of the program is to p rovid e a fall series for our guys w ho don't hav e a factory contract or conn ections to ge t ov er to Eu rope and race after the Nationals end. This series will provid e these riders with good compe tition, Nationa l-caliber race tr ack s and hopefully earn them some recognition ." Th e purse for each of the six ra ces totals $7000, spli t evenly bet ween the two classes. laRocco ea rned $800 for his two-mote sweep of the big bike class. Some of the other tracks included on the inaugu ral schedule are New Jersey's Raceway Park, Penns yl vania' s High Point Raceway and Tennessee 's Muddy Creek Raceway. Since th e 1970s, the Ritchie family's Red Bud circui t has he ld AMA National MX rounds, earning the facility the distinction of being 'the oldest venu e on the sched ule (an d making the tr ack older than many of the rid ers that now compete there). Unfortunately for the Fall Classic co mpetit o rs, heavy ra in s la te T 24 Saturday night turned the track into an early-mo rning quaqmir e. A decisio n was mad e to delay practice until close to 11;00 a.m ., as the grounds-keepers continually work ed and scraped the track. The track was still in muddy cond ition when the first moto wen t off, but later in th e afternoon th e tra ck sta rted drying ou t. LaRocco, a Kawasaki factory rider, arrived at the track in his pick-up truck, h is KXSOO practice b ike in th e ba ck. Wi th his fat her - Mik e Sr. - acting as mechan ic ra ther than his regular tuner Tom Morgan , laRocco dominated both motos in the 25-rider 250cc/Open class. He spent mu ch of the second 3D-mi ut e n lon g mot o entertaining the crowd by conti nually dearing "laRocco Leap," a spectacula r uphill tripl e jump named for the forme r Red Bud regular. . In the first moto Tuf Racing 's Curry stayed in sight on a 250cc Kawasaki, but was never a real threa t. The second moto saw laRocco bu ild a sizeable lead on Hond of Tro y' s Todd DeHoop and Greg Bowen, the younger brother of former Yamaha factory pilo t Keith Bowen, w ho finished th ird in th e mo to. Wit h Cu rry finishing outside the top 20 after ex perienci ng d iff icu l ties, De Hoop . claimed second overall with a 3-2 score, wh ile Bowen's 7-3 was good for third . (Keith Bowen placed fourth in the first mudd y moto ab oard a Yamaha, but problems in race two kept him ou t of the top 20 in the moto and dropped him back to 11th overall). Fourth in the 25Occ/Open class was Gaylord, and rounding out the top five ov erall was Mon tgomeryv ille Suz uki! MSR/ Tsubaki/Sunstar I N-Style /Sco ttbacked Carsten, wh o r an 5-5 in th e two mot os to a ugment his 12Scc class win . One highlight to the big bike class was the presence of form er pro MX hero Warren Reid , w ho was compe ting on th e onl y four-strok e m achi ne in the ' field . According to Finch, Reid's motorcycle wou ld not have been legal for a regular SOOcc Na tion a I - th e bike is a Honda XR600 bored out to 630cc. The muddy conditions weighed heavily on Re id' s performance a nd th e ve tera n could only muster a 20th-place overall finish. Other u n iqu e en t ri es in the o pe n class incl uded Chris Rid geway, who rode to 16th overall on a KTM 300 that was pumped up to a 370cc, and Dag Boyesen, who rode the Kawasaki " Link" 500 to sixth overall. What the 250cc/Open class lacked in close r~cing was more than made up for Mike LaRocco won both motos and the overall in the Ope n class at Buchanan. in the 12Scc class. DeHoop came from fourth to first in the opening heat even after a sto p to swap goggles one third of . the way thro ugh the moto. Carsten and Gaylord ran a clo se second and third wh ile Florid a's Anthony Pocorobba was fourth and form er mini cycle champion John Kitsch placed fifth. The second 12Scc moto was even closer as Ca rs ten took the lead in race two three corners from the finish, passing Gaylord and claimin g the overall with a 2-1 score. The Kawa saki-mounted Gaylo rd was second overall with a 32 tally. DeHoop was beset by problems in the fina le. The Honda rider's clutch star ted fading on him in the early stages of the race, and th e trouble was compo unded by a smashe d pipe. DeHoop lim ped across the fin ish line in fifth place as Cu rry rebounded from a 14thplace finish in the opening moto to score third. Pocorobba was fourth and Kitsch followed DeH oop from six th pl ace at the finish. The program also included yo u th an d ama teu r racing on both Saturday and Sunday. One highlight of the program was Sa tu rd ay afternoon's grass track Vintage program, which attracted 112 entries. (N Resu lts 12S MOTO 1: I. Tod d De Hoop (Hon) ; 2. Barry Cars ten (Su z); 3. Davi d Gay lord (Kaw); 4. Antho ny Pocorobbc (Suz); 5. John Kitsch (Su z); 6. Ty Harris (Han ); 7. Brad Strunk (Han); 8. Wall y Silva (5uz) ; 9. Jay Wagner (Hon); 10. Dan [anne tte (Ya m); 11. Adam Martin (Ho n); 12. Doug Stone (Kaw ); 13. Doug DeHaan (Su z); 14. Je ff C u rry (!

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