Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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.':.WorldChampi6riship500cc MotOcross series .• R d4: British .G ·M T C O S··:'·. .: .' oun OO R S P ers (Lett) Defend ing champion Jacky Martens piloted his big Husqva ma fo ur-stroke to wi ns in both moto s. (Below) J oel Smets wa s second ove rall on his trick VertemaU four-strok e. By Alex Hodgkinson HAWKSTONE PARK, ENGLAND, MAY15 usqvama four -stroke ace Jacky Martens s to rm ed back into contention fo r the World Championship 500cc MX title with his first overall victory of the series. Martens' win cam e at the gnarly Ha wkstone Park circuit in central England. The defending champion is now jus t six po ints behind series points leader Marcus Hansson from Sweden, while fellow Belgian Joel Sm et s still ho lds do wn second in the standings. The trio have completed the podium a t tw o of the la st three round s; it mechanical DNF for Mar tens on e week earlier in Ireland had pr evented a similar tale there. A broken hand in England for Gert Jan Van Doom, the w inn er of the series opene r, has dropped him out of contention. Overnight rain had made the alwaysdifficult track - deep unrelenting sand for most of its length, bu t also featuring one of the longest, steepest climbs in motocross - treacherous in the extreme. It was more a matter of survival than racing. Martens and Dutch sand expert Carlo H ... rl Q) § -. 26 Hulsen, contesting his firs t GP of th e year, holeshot the opene r, bu t it was the Belgian who raced dear, already leading by nearly the length of the finish stra ight at the end of the first shortened lap . The champion was never in tro uble: "Once I was in front I knew tha t no one could catch me. I qu ickly ope ned up a lead of more than ten seconds and knew tha t was enough," said Martens. Hu lsen held onto second for half the race. "I didn't like the track yesterday. It was too fast, but the rain ma d e it jus t how I like it. I had my bike set up wrong for the whoops, but I d on't think I could have beaten Martens anyway. Perhaps 1 would hav e kept back Smets," he said. Smets admitted ho w tough the track was for the race: "I had to settle for second. It is too rou gh today to take risks. Mistakes can come fast and be serious on a track as brutal as this. I might ha ve had a small chance if I had got to second earlier, but I got struck in the left eye by a rock the firs t time I came up behind Hu lsen on the second lap." Championship lead er Hansson eventually got home fourth after a hard ride. "I alwa ys seem to start badly here. I was 11th at the start, and then I took too long to get past (Billy) Liles. He was all over the place. " The American, now a full-fledged me mber of the Jobe team and a triple w inner on his last visit to the track in 1992, was content with fifth. "I have never seen it so rutted as today," said Liles. "They had already watered it yesterday evening before it started to rain. There was no way you could try too h a r d . Look what happened to Van Doom ." Van Doom ha d gone out on lap one after starting fourth. He had already left the facility befo re the end of the moto, his title dreams buried. His mechanic explained: "He struck his right hand on a. post a nd broke the middle hand bone." The sun came out for race two and the riders sta yed cleaner, but the bumps were still there. Martens and Smets were outgated by Mervyn Anstie, but needed onl y a few hundred meters to oust the Brit. Smets just could not hold Martens even before he fell for the first time. "I star ted to get into real d ifficulties during th e second ha lf of th e ra ce. I developed a migraine after Ireland and I was in bed for two days this week. I ...