Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Round 2: Soggy Dry Lake By Anne Van Beve ren Photos by Tom Van Beveren LUCERNE VALLEY, CA, FEB,27 here were mixed opinions about the difficulty of the three-loop, 93-mile course laid out by the Huntington Beach Motorcycle Club, but eve ryone agreed that there is no stopping Kawasa ki Tea m Green 's Danny Hamel, who record ed yet anothe r wi n in the AM A Na tio na l Championsh ip H are & H ou nd Ser ies. Th e Kawasaki KX500 racer was out in front at the end of the bomb run and remained unchallenged all the way to the checkered flag, taking his second win in the two- raceold series by an imp ressive four and a half minu tes. "I knew I had a good -sized lead going into the third loop, so I took it easy," said Ham el, who was two-an d-a-half min utes ahea d of the field after the first loop and fou r minutes ahead at the end of loop two. "I jus t kind of cruised, taking my time, and mad e sure I didn't make an y mistakes or do anything stupid." The event got underway 15 minutes after its scheduled 10 a.m, starting time with an across-the-va lley dash towards Victor Pass. Hamel had the lead ahead of Team Green teammate Ty Davis as he flashed past the bomb, and the top 10 included the u s u a l line-up of Paul T (Above) The day afte r winning the San Felipe 250 In Baja, Danny Hamel (1) breezed to victory at the National Hare & Hound race In Lucerne Valley, California. Jeff Capt (210) won the Four-Stroke class• . (Left) Dan Richardson matched his th irdplace performance of the previo us round at the same venue. Krause, on a KX5OO; Ted Hunnicutt, also I aboard a KX500; Dan Richardson, on a Honda C RSOO Todd H oy, piloting a _ ; KTM 550 E/XC; and Bill Fullmer, aboard a Kawasaki KLX650R The m orning was su nny but cool, thanks to a strong wind that blew most of th e d ust off the trail and help ed to make the d ry conditions bea rab le. The st iff breeze wasn ' t s tr ong enough for Over-40 cont ender Bob Wad low, however. "I started next to all the big boys and it was like lights ou t when the banner d rop ped," sai d Wad low. "By the time you let the clutch out, you couldn't see a thing." Some of the out-of-state riders got off to a miserable start. Utah's Brandon Gerber was slow off the line w hen he kick-started his Husky WXC610 in neutral and then missed his first stab at the shift lever. Mark Lu ndgreen 's ride end ed 15 miles into the race when the Utah ho peful's piston welded itself to the cyli nder, and Colorad o' s Jim Gray , reportedlysuffered a flat near the same spo t. Destry Abbott went over the bars of his KTM 550 an d cut his chin on landing. A number o f AMA District 37's local r iders did n ' t fare much better. The District's to p-ranked Vet , Geo ff Sanbo rn, crashed out half way around the fi rst loo p in a tricky cross-grain section. "I clip ped about three sets of crossgrain Whoops and went over the bars," said Sanborn, who was running in the top 15 overall. "It was mixed back and forth - th ere was some really fast st uff a nd th e n some n asty cross grain in between. I was in the wrong plac e at the wrong time:' Kawasaki KX500 pilot Kurt Hintz got off the line slowly after a two-kick start, and Rex Staten turned a good jump off the line into a slower than usual performance on the bomb. "It was getting kin d of dusty an d I didn't want to go that fast across the desert," said Staten. "I backed off a bit and was 10th, maybe 15th at the bomb:' Dave Donatoni's problems started right after the bomb when the throttle on his CRSOO began to stick. "I had to stop and fix it and I lost a lot of positions. I had a great start and the n that had to happe n," said Donatoni. The 32-mile first loop was fast paced almos t all the way . Gerber described the loop as "too fast" but used the hard-onthe-gas run to work up from his dismal start into 15th overa ll. "I thought it was wa y too fast. That first loop - almost anybody that's got good suspension can ride that. It wasn't technical enough," said the Husqvarna pilot from Utah. Abbott, who had traded his usual small-bore KTM for a 550 mount, found the high speed way too demanding for him. "I can't ride this fast - I'm not a bigbore rider, " said Abb ott. "And I just can 't ride the cross grain like these guys can." H am el had no problems with the speed or the cross grain an d completed the first loop in 40 minutes. He dashed into pit row two and a half min u tes ahead of Davis, and was gassed and heading into loop two in just 14 seconds. Hunnicutt was in third as the 3O-mile second loop got underway, with Krause half a minute behind him, Richa rdson held fifth ahead of KX500 racer Dave Ondas, an d Abe Bau mann brough t his KX500 through a t the head of the Vet class in seventh. Greg Zitterkopf was six places, ahead of the nearest 250cc competition in eighth , d es pi te p roblem s with his KTM 250's top-end po wer. "I could only get three-quarter throttle - anything over tha t and it w ould sputter. I th in k it's a reed," said Zitterkopf. . Tod d Hoy hel d ninth, H onda's Jeff

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