Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Sorensen said of the wa y he won. With Oliver out of the race he should have felt confident, but he'd crashed in practice on Sunday morning and said that he was "still nervous as hell, as usual." It didn't show. Second in the race and championship w as decided with a daring move by William Himmelsbach on the final lap. The Pennsylvanian went up the inside of Gr eg Esser running do wn the hill to the fina l comer and just nipped Esser at th e flag . Patrick Moore and Scott Ma rtin followed . His first w in was worth $3000 to So rensen, with Himmelsbach getting $2000 and Esser $1000. Oliver rode the final lap to clinch the title, his 66 poin ts three b etter th an I Sorensen's . i "I could n ' t d o it tod a y. Chu ckie I (Sorensen) di d it for the team," Oli ver . i . sai d . H imme lsba ch ' s move net te d him t hi r d in th e cha mpionshi p with 38 p oints, tw o better than Esser's. Roadra cing World's Ch ris Rog ers won the RK Chain Formula III race and titl e a t Road Atlanta, bu ild in g u p a n early lead on a wet track and cruising to th e win while thre e of his p ursuers crashed in nearly the same place on differe n t laps. In the en d, Rogers won the six-lap race by 4.27 seconds with Jim Struke a comfortable second and Toby Jorgensen a distant third. MCE Ra ci n g's Kevin Mur ray ha d been chasing Struke before he crashed exiting the Goo dyear Bridg e on the fina l la p. Ea rlier, Greg Tickle had crashed there while in second place and Roadracing World editor John Ulrich crashed in the same spot while in fourth place on the fourth lap. Rogers finis hed the season wi th 152 lap s, 24 better than Murray. Ulrich finished wit h 97. . The winner's sha re of the p urse was $750 w it h Struke's cut $400 and Jorgensen poc keting $300. In the Metzeler Grand National Final sp rints, Kink o' s Thomas Wilson Jr. was the winningest Exp ert, wi n n ing th ree classes and co mi ng close tw ice more. The 26-ye ar-old 's firs t w in was th e C Su p e rbi ke Exp e rt, one o f 11 races on Th ursd ay. Aboa rd a Yamaha FZR600, he bea t Glenn Szarek b y .71-o f-a -secon d w ith Jeffr e y Co v in gto n t h ird on a Ho nda CBR600. Earli er in the d ay he'd Expert race while ru nning in the lead on nearly caught Valvoline Suz uki's Graves the third lap. "I should have won th at one going in B Su perbi ke Exp ert when the rac e was red -flagged on the fifth of eight laps aw ay," Wil son sa id . "My knee ca u ght while Wilson Jr. was a close third. on the asphal t, it got me a little wide, I los t the fro n t end a n d fe ll d own. I'd "Graves was leading, but I was a second, a second and a half a lap faster. I never fallen d own in the lead before." w ould've ta ken the w hile flag right But thin gs quickly improved. Startbehind him," Wilson sai d. ing .fr om th e fifth row he won the B W il s on ' s n a r rowes t victory, a nd Superstock Expert by 1.51 seconds over ha rdest race, came on Friday, with jus t Tea m Pearls Suzuki's Darry Saylo r with 0.05-of-a-second se parating him from Pete Martins third on a changing track. Team Valvoline Suzuki's Dave Stan ton "It's dry and wet," Wilson said. in the A Superstock Expert final. Wilson "Some places there 's a dry line. It ' s was using his Yamaha FZR750 against tougher that wa y than when it's all wet. the bigger Suzuki ll00s and he also had I pretty much knew it was going to be a one-line race." ·to start fro m the second wave . It took The leading Amateur was Joshua three laps to ge t to the front, then, he said, "Dave Stanton gave me a good Kurt Hayes with a sweep of the A; B, "run." and C Production No vice finals aboard his Honda CBR600. In the last few laps they traded the lead back and forth , Wilson taking it The four-day crowd was estimated by WERA at 15,000. go ing in to turn one on th e fina l la p. Desp ite being do wn on power, and usuF-USA . ally ge tting p assed ·on t he s traightaways, Wilson was a b le to buil d up Rain soaked the track before the first enough of a lead to hold off Stanton at F-USA heat so WERA officials gave the the e n d o f th e ei ght-lap ra ce . Team field an extra 15 minutes to fit rain tires. Suzuki Spor t's Ma rk McDaniel wa s The ra in abated somewha t, but at the third . fir s t call for rid ers, it p icked up and when the green flag flew it was raining Saturday started poorl y for Wilson. He crashed o u t o f the C Supersto ck hard. Martin an d Sadow ski wen t for th e lead w ith Sad ow ski ta ki ng it briefl y before Martin took over on the third lap. Pu shi ng hard to keep up wi th Martin, Sad ows ki lost the fro nt end exiting the fina l com er, a fas t righ t w ith little run-off before th e start/finish. Da vid Klassen also cras hed, bu t he was able to continue. Sadowski di dn't. By the time of the restart the rain had stopped and Mar tin was ready to go. He was im mediately out front and by the second lap it was obvious he was checking out. He later said that he and crew chief Keith Parry had taken a gamble on setup and that it had paid off. "After the red flag it shot a little bit of confidence in me," Martin sai d. " I thought, 'Shoot, I can do it again: I go t a good jump off the line. It he lped a lot that I didn't have anyone slowing me down:' By the fou rth lap Ma rtin had better than six seconds, more each lap until he backed off for the e n d of th e race . Behind him was where the action was and it was intense. Mi ke H arth, Graves an d Q uarterl ey made up the trio con tes t in g second , with little joc keying until the seventh la p. First Q uarterle y sli p ped by Hart h on the run up th e hill out of tum one, (Top) The second leg gets underway with Michael Mart in (96), Dale Quarterley (32 ) and Chuck Graves (1) getting the jump. (Above) The race turned Into a battle between Quarterley (32) and Martin (96), with Quarterley tak ing the win. Martin and Graves , th ough, ended up tak ing the Tr iple Crown Challenge money. H arth rea ttacking, but to no avail unt il later in the lap when he retook the spot. Now it was Graves' tum and he went after Quarterley, tr ying a bold insid e move in tum one, only to be rebuffed. It came down to the final la p w it h Qu a rt erly t ry in g Harth in turn on e, Harth hold ing h is ground as the two went side by side into tum six. Q uarterley moved into third out of tum seven on th e run to t h e Good year Bridge, Harth never backin g off until it was too late. Tha t was when he crashed in to the mud, unhurt, exiting the bridge while in thi rd. "Me and Mike, four or five ti mes were side by side in the tu rns ," Quarterley sa id . "Tha t's rea l rare in the rain. What ha ppened was that he ran too hard into the last tum and lost the front end:' Harth's mis fortune vaulted Graves to th ird, the re igning F-USA champion -::l' 0\ 0\ """" ..D ~ ~ Q) E Q) > o Z 11

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