Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

··.· ·R O AE C Round 9: Sears Point International Raceway ..AMA 250ccAO·R series Grand Prix By Henny Ray Abrams SONOMA. CA, AUG 21 ich Oliver made offi cia l at Sears Point International Raceway what ~ v e ry o n e who ha s raced against him has known this year: Tha t he is the undisputed champion of the 250cc Grand Prix class. After dicing for half the race with Enough Said Productions' AI Salaverria, Performance South Racing's Oliver put his head down and sped to his seventh win in record-brea king time, in the process clinching the one title that has elu d ed him for his entire profession al career, the AMA 250cc GP crown. "This is a really important champions hip to win. It has nothing to do with t h e d ifference b etween WERA and AMA ," the reigning WERA Formula II 250cc champion said, "It's that I've tried to win this one for so long. This one has taken me 10 years to get." Oliver's 14th career win gave him an unassailable points lead with one race to go. With the Road Atlanta series fina le remaining, Oliver clinched the title wi th 286 points, 59 better than his teammate Chuck Sorensen - fourth at Sears. On a warm and windy day, Oliver com p leted the 19-1ap, 47.88-miIe race in 33 minutes, 2.657 seconds at an average s p e e d of 86 .248 mph, to break the records set by Jimmy Filice last year. He R would cross th e line 4.753 seco n ds in front of Salaverria, despite ra cing a t a pace that was over a second a lap slower than his qu alifying record. "The pace Al (Salaverria) and I we re going w as so far remo ved from o ur qualifying times. We were running tw o to three seco nds behind. The wind hurt everyone's time," Olive r said . Salaverri a, w ho led laps five through 10, finished second after he was unable to keep pace with Oli ver once his tires began to go aw ay in the later stages of the race. Third, about 8.5 seco nds ba ck, and alone for the entire race, was Zero Gravity's N ick Ienatsch, wh o had qualified e ighth, ca us in g so me to think h e wouldn't be a contender. But in th e .race, the Sport Rider editor turned laps more th an a second and a half faster than he'd qualified and edged awa y fro m the pack at the start. "When it gets to Sunda y , St e v e Biganski gets the setup right," Ienatsch said . . The third-place finish, coupled wi th Sorense n ' s fourth, sends the p a ir to Road Atlanta separated by two points, Sorensen ahead 227 to 225, in the battle for seco n d in the champ ionship . Salaverria is fou rth at 211. Sorensen finish ed about six seconds behind Ienatsch after losing touch early in the race an d getting caught up in a rac e-lon g tu ssle with Hyd-Mech Saws' Jon Cornwell and Motoworld /Lassak Racing/Spectro's Chris D'A lu isio , who m oved to th e front of th e tr io on th e n inth la p, dropping So rensen a s p ot, then cras hed a lap later when he pushed th e fro n t end in th e heavily r ippled, downhill carousel comer. Cornwell held on to second until tw o laps from the end w he n Sorensen outbraked him in the firs t tum chicane and pulled out a th reesecon d margin b y the finish. Fifth woul d go to Cornwell, the Canadian suffering an undiagnosed engine problem near the halfway point that slowed him. "O nce it went so u r, it d e flated me kin d of bad," Cornwell said. Six th p lac e w en t to Mike Sullivan, th e Dick Wall /Brian Swart/Centralia Kn itting Mills-backed Wa shingtonian alo ne almost the entire race . Southwest Mot orsports' Christopher Rankin, Ross Barron Racing' s Bobb y Keith, Helimot/R & J Cycles' Jeff Leggitt, and Cycle Racer 's Kent Kunitsugu filled out the top 10. Before the race Oli ver had said that he wanted to clinch the championship the way Jimmy Filice had in 1993, wi th a w in. No on e doubted he would, but Salaverria was pretty sure he could stick wi th him. He was right. From th e ve ry s ta r t, Oliver a n d Salaverria, a Sears Poin t regular, left the pack behind. The pair of northern Ca lifornians en ga ge d in their own battle Rich Oliver (97) leads th e way at the start of the 250cc Grand Prix fi nal at Sears Point; Oliver Is being chased by AI Salaverrla (22), Jon Cornwell (49), Chrls 0 'Alu ls lo (2) and Chuck Sorensen (90). with no one able to mat ch th eir pace. Salaverria took the lead on the fifth lap w ith a hea v y braking move in turn seven, Oli ver right on his tail. Though Salaverria knew that he co u ld always make a run on the bra kes, he also knew that he was down on acceleration. "He could get off the comers better than me," Salaverria said. "We started hammering pretty hard." The pace w ould take its toll by the halfway point, Oliver making h is way to the front on the lOth lap as Sal averria began losing rear tire grip. "About halfway through the race the tire was spinning qu ite a bit," Salaverria said . The problem w as that he w as using a 5 'kinch rim, while Oliver and cJ.. th e others use a fiv e-inch wheel. "All 0\ year long I've been using the wrong rim t-! size. I didn't have the grip I needed to stay with Rich. I couldn 't put the power down." By now they were heavily into traffic ' and Oliver, who had seen Salaverria's tire spinning w hile he w as in second, was able to slice more cleanly through them. It became apparent on the 13th of 19 laps that Oliver was pulling away,

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