Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Cycle News 1994 11 09

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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At the finish line, Zam pach and Wait bumped while Higbee was forced to take avoiding action. Wait won by inches (.OO9-of-a-second) from the "Z Man" and Higbee. "I had the worst and best experience ou t there," explained Wait as soon as he go t of his Mitche ll's H-D. "I saw dea th and victory all at once. Scott cut over to the inside, 1 didn' t know he was gonna do that . He kind of chopped my front tire and 1 thou ght 1 was going to go down. Then 1 saw the checkered flag so 1 figured 1 must not hav e crashed." Zampach, unhappy w ith Wait's aggressive efforts, explained: "I've been teaching these guys for four years now, 1 think they' ve learned their lessons. 1 was faste r thro ugh the ch ica ne, bu t th ey co u ld draft me. On the last la p 1 just stayed bac k, 1 thought I had my move timed perfect, but I might have moved a split second early. Matt moved, I moved, there was some pushing and shoving but 1 came up short." . " Matt has ma jor horsepower; Scott and 1 know tha t," Higbee said. "Horsepower is very important here. On the last lap 1 outbroke them into the chicane, 1 lead throu ght the banking, bu t they were ab le to draft by me. At the line we all could have dumped and slid across the finish line. Scott bumped Matt into my wa y and 1 had to pull hard to miss Scotty." This co ntroversy tu rned in to the majo r talking point of the weekend within seconds of the start of Sunday's opening H-D World Final leg. Although Zampach took the lead from pole, Wait dove underneath to take over entering the International Horseshoe. Going into the chica ne for the first time, Wait was inches clear of Higbee and Zampach wh en Wait crashed. Higbee was unable to miss the leader wh ile Zampach and the rest of the pack threaded through the mess. Out came the red flag, and while Higbee struggled, in vain, to get his bent bike back to the pits in time for repairs, an inju r ed Wait was taken to hospital. Although the Ca lifornian d amaged his hand, broke some ribs, punctured a lung and broke a collarbon e, concerns about head injuries proved unfou nde d, even though his helmet took a beating fro m Higbee's bike. Most observers figured that Wait lost the front end on a bump entering the paired double tu rns on the back of the track, a view confirm ed by eye-witness Zampach. But Wait though t that he lost the back end, possibly due to an unintentional bump by Higbee. No matter what the reason was for Wait's crash, his co mpetition did not app r ove of his behav ior. Zampach : "Maybe this taught him a lesson. This is a life-threatening spo rt. 1 think the AMA has to take some action, you can't live on the other side of the fence, over the edge, all the time:" Higbee agreed, adding: "It 's his first season of road racing, and I'm happy seeing him run u p with us, but 1 d on ' t know...1 was pretty disgu sted with the way that happened. Matt's had incidents earlier in the year, he's kind of reckless. He got away with it for a long time, bu t unfortunately when he fell down it cost me a lot of money and a bent-up bike. 1 bent myself up too." Altho ugh Higbee made it back to the grid in time for the new .sta rt, officals would not approve his hasty b ra ke repairs. . The full seven-lap restart promised to be a more cautious affair, with two of the front-row starters missing and all the top guns spooked by the lea der's incident. Bostrom jumped out front followed by Zampach , Ya tes a nd Sp ringsteen, but (Above) Scott Zampach (1), Aaron Yates (19), Chuck Blackmon (4) and Ben Bostrom fight It out in the first leg of the HarleyDavidson World Final. (Left) zampach and Higbee battle for the win in the second of the two Harley races. (Below) The race for fourth place between Billy Graef (8), Ron McGill (26), Brian Kohl (16), James Rando lph and eventual fourth-place fi nisher Jim leslie (13). (Bottom) zampach celebrates his World Champ ionship. Blackmon was the man on the move. Taking advantage of the delay to fix a crooked re ar w heel, Blackm on was a d emon on the bra kes, grabbing first through the infield as the leaders worked lap three. With two la ps re maining, Bos trom held first from Blackmon, Zam pach and Yates wi th Sprin gsteen six seconds back in fifth and just clear of another mob that in clud ed Bria n Kohl, Ronald McGill, James Randolph, Billy Graef, Gary Stas, Jim Leslie and Michael Ba rn es. Then "Sp ringer" got into trouble at the chicane when his steeri ng damper broke, d ropping him do wn the field as Leslie, Stas and McGill struggled to take control of the second group. Back at the front, Zam pach started the last lap in the lead, with Bostrom taking the p oin t in the infield, the fou rsome shuffling their way thro ugh traffic on the west ba n k. Blackmon and Yates were right together as Zampach held th ird exiting the chicane, Bostrom out of the lead fight. Then Zampach ducked low, powering by the leaders in a photo finish that eventually revealed Zampach the winner by .000-of-a-second from Blackmon and Yates: Bostrom was back on form with fourth, followed by Leslie, Stas, MCGill, Kohl, Randolp h, Graef and 10th-placed Barnes. A post-race protest required Stas to present his machine for inspection, and when he did n't s how he was removed from the results, moving everyone from sixth on up a spot. -::t< 0\ 0\ rl 0' ~ Q) E Q) :> o Z 13

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