Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

eIN THE WIND ~ B Papa Wealey y Ita lian Fabrizio Pirovano (Yam) and Carl Fogarty (Duc) split wins in the 13th round of the World Championship Superbike Ser ies in Estoril, Portugal, October 17. Piro vano gave Yamaha its first victory of the year in the first race a t Estoril, topping Piergiorgio Bontempi (Ka w ) and Aaron Slight (Kaw). Meanwhile, championship rivals Scott Russell and Fogarty failed to finish the first race w ith Russell running into clutch trouble and Fogarty crashing. In the second race, Fogarty took the win followed by Russell and Piro vano. With one round remaining in the series in Mexico City on November 7, Russell leads Fogarty in the championship point standings, 378.5-349.5. Mike Brown (Hon) was the 125cc Pro class winner at the fourth round of the AMA Dirt Shirts Fall Classic MX Series, h eld a t Birch Creek Motor Sports & Recreation Park in Danville, Virginia, October 17. Damien Plotts (Suz) was second with Chad Lough (Hon) rounding out the top three. Todd DeHoop (Hon) won the 250cc/Open Pro class, beating out Steve Childress (Suz) and Barry Carsten (Suz). HNS Racing (Yam) won the WERA Power-M ist/Performance Machine Endurance Series round at Roebling Road Raceway in Faulkville, Georgia, October 16. HNS 's Tray Batey and Tom Wilson topped class champion Team Suzuki Endurance (Suz) by five laps with Team Pearls Suzuki (Suz) finishing third. Fred Andrews (Yam) clinched the AMA Grand National Cross Country Championship with a second-place fin- is h to Scott Plessinger (KTM) at Elizabeth, West Virgin ia, October 17. Doug Blackwell (Kaw) was third ahead of Jan H rehor (Yam) and Jeff Russell (KTM). Two rounds remain in the series. Italian Edy O r i o li (Cag) won the Pharaoh's Rally in Egypt, October 3-13. Spaniard Jordi Arcarons (Cag) was second ahead of Italian Franco Picco (KTM). German fema le-rid er Jutta Kleinschmidt (KTM ) was fourth overall. From the rumor mill: Camel Honda team owner Martin Adams is attemp ting to lure Australian Kevin Magee into riding the Camel Honda RC45 in the 1994 AMA Superb ik e National Championship. Currently, Adams has d irt tracker Mike Hale under contract to ride the team's Honda CBR600 in the AMA/CCS 600cc Supersport Series. Magee, who rode for Yamaha in the AllJapan 500cc Championship this year , is currently in northern California undergoing therapy for the hand he injured during practice for the Suzuka 8-Hour. Mike Smith and Tom Kipp rod e Camel Hondas in the 1993 AMA Superbike Series, and many expect Smith to stay on the tearn for the '94 seaso n. Lewis Leathers, England's oldest motorcycle clothing company, has closed its doors. A drop in sales and a s tring of burglaries forced the 101-year-old shop in London to go out of bu siness on September 24. According to reports from Europe, England's Carl Fogarty has re-signed with Ducati to contest the 1994 World Championship Superbike Series. ISDE win to Poland r 2 eam Poland recorded its first-ever International Six-Days Enduro World Trophy Team victory after six gruelling days of competition at the 68th ISDE in Assen, Holland, October 10-16. In the premier six-rider World Trophy Team division, the Polish contingent joined runner-up Ireland as the only two teams to finish the rainsoaked event with its entire squad intact. Third overall wen t to the pre-event favori te and the hos t country team of the Netherlands, while France and Great Britain rou nded out the top five overall. All three teams had one rider drop ou t d uring the course of the week. The U.S. World Trophy Team, made up of Randy Hawkins (Suz), Fred Hoess (Hus), Steve Hatch (Suz), Rodney Smith (Suz), David Rhodes (Suz) and Ty Davis (Kaw), was all but eliminated on the first day when Rhodes' DR350 seized; then, during the third day of competition, Hawkins' RMI25 locked up. Hoess, Hatch, Smith and Davis all made it to the finish line, and the team ended up finishing 13th overall. Team Sweden, the defending champions, finished in last place with only two of its six Trophy riders still running at the end. In all, 19 World Trophy Teams competed in this year's even t, In the four-rider Junior World Trophy Team division (for riders 24-years-old and under), the Dutch team scored the overall victory over France, Czechoslovakia, Spain and Sweden. The U.s. Junior World Team - Pat Garrahan (Hon), Chris Smith (Suz), Josh Whitaker (Hon) and Scott Mclaughlin (Hon ) - fared even worse than the U.S. World Trophy team. Garrahan was the only U.s. Junior World rider to finish the event, resu lting in an 11th-place finish for the U.s. squad. Twelve Junior World teams competed. Of the total 37 U.S. entrants, 17 made it to the finish line. The "Top Ame rican," based on total evaluation points, was ISDE rookie Ty Davis, who finished 21st overall. He was also the top U'S, class finisher, placing sixth in the 500cc division. The next best U.s. class finisher was Fred Hoess, who was eighth in the 125ccdivision. Only 12 gold medals were handed out at this year's ISDE, and none of those went to American riders. In fact, only three riders from the U.S. earned silver medals - Davis, Hoess and Rodney Smith, who finished 14th in the 250cc class. The other 14 U.s. finishers earned bronze medals: Garrahan; Randy Dubois (Hon); William Rush (Suz); Jason Edie (Kaw); Hatch; Jeff Fredette (Kaw); David Crain (Hus); Tom Ebersole (Hus); Dan Harte (Hus); Chad Carlisle (Suz) ; Jason Dahners (Suz ); Steve Silvestri (Hon); Bob Bechtel (yam), and Steve Travis (KTM). The overall individual winner was Dutch rider Gerard Jirnmink (Kaw), who also won the 500cc class. Other class winners included Czech Roman Michalik (TM) in the 80cc class; Dutchman Henk Knuiman (Kaw) and Jan Van Oorschot (Kaw) in the 125 and 250cc classes, respectively; Swede Svenerik Jonsso n (Hus) in the 350cc Four-Stroke division, and Italian Fabio Farioli (KTM) in the 500cc Four-Stroke division. A deluge of rain prior to and during the event resulted in nearly half of the total SOO-plus entrants houring out after the first day , but most of those riders were allowed to continue the event after an FlM Jury met to discuss the issue. The many giant mud bogs that formed throughout the week were blamed for the extraordinarily high attrition rate at this year's ISDE. Kit Palmer Seattle added to Camel SX schedule ust six weeks after being released, the 15-race 1994 AMA Camel Supercross schedule has already undergone its first change. The popular Seattle Kingdome even t, originally removed from the schedule for '94 because of scheduling confl icts, has been added, and will run on May 7. In addition, the Las Vegas Supercross has been rescheduled for June 11, replacing Los Angeles as the final round. There will be no supercross at the Los Angeles Coliseum in 1994. The Seattle round, which in the past has run early in the year, will now be the 13th round of the series. Also, Mickey Thompson Entertainment Group (MTEG) has taken over as promoters of the event, which has been promoted by SRO Motorsports since 1978. MTEG has promoted a round of its Stadium Off-Road Race Series at the Kingdome since 1987. "We are excited at the opportunity to bring yet another motorsport event to Seattle," said MTEG president Gary Campbell. "Our Stadium Off-Road Race Series has received a great reception from the locals. You can 't find a better location than the Kingdome." King County's ordinance against tobacco advertising had been a factor in the original decision not to include the Kingdome on the Camel Supercross schedule for '94. With Camel's involvement onl y including the sponsorship of the riders' point fund, signage at the stadium will no longer be a problem. J Foga rty, who currently lies second in the World Superbike Series behind Scott Russell, will ride Ducati's 1994 916 which will feature a single-s ided sw ingarm. The Brit will again ride in a team managed by Raymond Roche . Fogarty was being pursued by Honda to ride the new RC45 in the '94 series. Acc o r ding to his manager Dave Steven son , John Kocinski s till hasn't made a decision as to what he'll be racin g in the 1994 500cc World Champ ionship Road Race Series. Kocinski and Stevenson have been negotiating with Cagiva and have also had talks with Sito Pons and Erv Kanemoto regarding their Honda teams. " Rig h t now, he doesn't know and I _ don't know," Stevenson said. AFAM USA, makers of sprockets and handlebars, is now accepting resumes from motocross racers looking for support in 1994. Interested parties can send resumes to AFAM USA, Inc., 5953 Engineer Dr., Huntington Beach, CA 92699. Florida's Ron Tic henor (Suz) wrapped up the All-Japan Nationa l MX Championship with his victory over Eddie Warren (Kaw) in the final round of the series on October 17, according to sources in Japan. Camel Supercross Champion Jeremy McGrath will miss the AMA Pro Awards Banquet in Long Beach, California, on November 20. McGrath, who is one of the nominees for the AMA MotoWorid Athlete of the Year award, is under contract to compete in a supercross in Spain the same weekend. The race was originally scheduled for a different date, but was switched when a conflict with a Japanese supercross was d iscovered. " My heart's gonna be in Long Beach, even though my body has to be in Spain," sa id McGrath. Accord ing to his manager Dave Stevenson, McGrath signed the contract for the Spanish supercross early in the yea r, before winning the Camel Supercross Championship and prior to the d ate of the banquet being announced. McGrath will likely be making a vid eo that will be shown at the banquet in his absence. Indiana's Mike La Rocc o, the 1993 AMA 500cc National MX Champion, has re -signed with Kawasaki for the 1994 season. LaRocco, 22, will ride a Kawa saki KX250 in the Camel Supercross and 250cc National MX Championships. Answer Pro ducts and multi-time National Hare Scrambles and National Cross C ountry Champion Sco tt Summer s have joined forces with the AMA to maintain and expand off-road riding areas around the co u n t r y. Answer ha s developed a new line of Summe rs-endorsed off-road gear, including jacke t, pants, tool belt and back pack. A portion of the proceeds from sales of the gear will go to the AM A, .speci fica lly earmarked for offroad land use. "Riders are constantly facing the threa t of land closures, and developing new riding areas is a long. difficult and often expensive pr oposition," said Robert Rasor of the AMA's government relations department. "We' re gratefu) for Scott's support of the association's efforts, and applaud Answer Products for its dedication to off-highway motorcycling. We hope other companies within the industry will follow Answer's .lead in this important effort by making an investment in the future of off-highway riding ." Here's the first tentative (very tentative) 1994 World Championship Road Race Se r ies schedule, as released by England's Motorcycle News: Australia (Eas tern Creek) - March 27; Malaysia (Sha h Alam) - Apri l 3; Japan (Suzuka) Ap ril 17; Spain (Jerez) - May 1; Italy (Mugello) - May 29; Germany (Hockenheim) - June 12; Holland (Assen) - June 26; England (Donington Park) - July 24; Czechoslovakia (Bmo) August 7; United States (Laguna Seca) September 4; Spain (Barcelona) October 9. Former Vance & Hines Yamaha team manager Steve Johnson will work for Rob Muzzy's Kawasaki team in 1994, according to Muzzy. Johnson's role in the team has yet to be decided. Motocrosser turned road racer JeanMichel Bayle won the Gu idon d 'Or Superbiker event held in France, October 17. AMA Pro Racing Director Roy Janson won the 1993 True Grits 500cc Fun Run, held October 17 in the north Georgia mountains. Over 50 riders participated in the 12th running of the event, with Janson joining a list of past winners that includes Jack Penton, Bob Hannah and Mike Sm ith. American Su zuki Motor Corporation has announced that a tota l of $84,000 in U.S. Savings Bonds have been awarded to qualified participants in the 1993 Good Schola r Program . The program pa id $500 savings bonds to motocross racers who purchased a 1993 RM80, 125 or 250, competed in at least five sanctioned events and maintained a "B"

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