Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Nevada Rally ~ lf) 0\ 0\ ...... 6 exhaustion before the final gas. Trolli shot past Campbell to take the lead when his teammate lost time changing a flat tire and he finished the day 46 seconds ahead of Campbell to earn the gold bib going into day three. When the racers reached the overnight stop in Fallon, just east of Reno, the leaderboard showed Campbell was still two minutes ahead of Trolli on total elapsed time, and the Honda duo had pulled 10 minutes on thirdplaced Peterhansel. "The first goal for us is to win the rally with a Honda. [f I be faster than Johnny, I be winning. [f Johnny be faster than me, he's going to be winning. Which one wins is not important. We just want a Honda to be first," said Trol-. Ii, whose XR628 was identical to Campbell's except for higher-pr9fi1e handlebars. "I let him go by me when he is fastest and he let me go by. We try to ride as a team." Day three took the racers to Winnemucca - the northernmost point on their 2000-mile clockwise journey around the Silver State. Troill took the day's win just 10 seconds ahead of Campbell in the 260-mile special test and they stayed onetwo in the overall results. Peterhansel lost time due to a navigation error and was 21 minutes behind at the end of the day, with Lewis 25 minutes back in fourth and Sainct overcoming a crash to limp home in fifth, ahead of Jim Loh, Fabrizio Carcano, Ogilvie, Pearson and Tony Megla, who took the lead in the over 30 class after Daryl Folks blew his transmission and then had to replace two faulty ignitions. "TItis is the first time any of us have done a rally," said Megla, wh.o led a three-man team sponsored by the Mammoth Mountain Ski Area. "We are on stock XR600s, which are severely underpowered, and it's been a learning experience trying to navigate. When you're going 80 miles an hour and you look down for a couple of seconds, you're at the corner by the time you look up. I got lost for half an hour once, but Ogilvie showed me the way. He's the desert fox. Every time we got lost, we'd look around and say, 'Where's Bruce?'" Mammoth Mountain teammate Bill Postel, who was pushing for the Over 40 win, provided some entertaining moments for the racers he passed. "He'd be dogging me, behind me in the dust, and then he'd try to pass and crash his brains out," said Morton. 'Td stop and ask him if he's okay and then he'd go right back by me and crash again. The guy is just hilarious. He's an animal. I can't believe someone is riding as hard as he is in this thing." As day four began, the racers and their pit crews were starting to settle into the pace of the rally, which involved getting up at 4 a.m. to prepare for a 6 a.m. start, racing until dark, and then staying up until almost midnight preparing the bike and the road book for the following day. "They keep us up late with the riders' meeting anq, then you have to put your whole route book together and get it on the bike," said Campbell. "You get maybe six hours sleep a night at the most, and it's very difficult to keep going. After about the third day your body gives lip and you get used to it." Day four from Winiiemucca to Elko brought the longest special test of the event - a grueling 323-mile course that Campbell completed in six hours and 13 minutes, just over a minute faster than Trolli. The two were three and a half minutes apart on total elapsed time, with Campbell still on top, and they had stretched out a one-hour cushion over their closest rival. "I've always been confident about my riding skill but by the time we got to Elko I was feeling a lot more confident about my navigational skills as well," said Campbell. "We went out every weekend for the last month and a half practicing, just navigating, navigating, navigating, and it paid off." Campbell reported an almost trouble-free ride. "I hit a big ditch going pretty fast on day three. I almost got off pretty bad but I saved it and kept on going, and [ got a (Right) Riding Honda's experimental two-stroke, team captain Bruce Ogilvie suffered mechanical dlfflcultJes throughout the rally, but stili finished eighth overall. .. rear flat one day and was in the pits for 10 minutes," said Campbell. "There were a couple of other things like some loose bolts on the bike, but, other than that, it's been flawless." Back in third, Peterhansel reported a few problems adjusting to his 600cc Yamaha. "It's a good race for me, but it is not a very good result because it's the first time I ride with this bike," Peterhansel explained. "Here I ·ride with a fourstroke more bigger than I am used to and I have not enough time on the bike." Lewis was adapting to his 400cc Honda mount just fine. 'The bike is excellent with the exception that it needs like 24 miles an hour more top speed so I could run with the boys up front. Campbell and Trolli passed me going 30 miles an hour faster down a road," said Lewis. "My highlight was finishing third overall and making it onto the winner's podium at the end of day four. My low point was hitting a ditch and cartwheeling 20 miles out on day two. I hurt myself and smashed my map book. Everybody does one map book. That's part of the rules, I guess." By the end of day four the field had dropp'ed to 47. Some - like Bill McDaniel, who was rescued by Bass after he crashed, broke his ribs and punctured a lung - were sidelined with injuries. Others - like Zitterkopf, who blew two engines in two days - retired due to mechanical problems. (Above) Jimmy Lewis and Richard SBlnct (right) rode stoe" XR400s to fourth and fifth overall. "I wanted to win it, not ride for a finish, so I packed it in," said Zitterkopf. Others persevered no matter what. "I had problems every day, but I hung tough," said Ogilvie, who bent his exhaust on day one, broke a clutch cable halfway through day two, crashed when he clipped a rock, and then had bad engine-vibration problems on day three. "We were stressing the motor mounts because we were hitting things so hard, but we didn't know that at first. The mechanics worked all night to put a new motor in, which cured the vibration problems. They got zero sleep that night, and then that motor started vibrating and we worked out what the problem was and had to fix that." The racers used their day off in Elko to repair their machinery, do some laundry, and rest for the two days that still • lay ahead. But for many, the day of rest was a mixed blessing. 'The day off was nice but it gave my body a chance to catch up and it was screaming, 'What are you doing to me?' It told me, 'You're old and you shouldn't be doing this:" said Ogilvie. To add insult to injury, the tough ter- rain that had taken rally experts by surprise in the opening sections of the race got even more technical as they headed into Ely for an overnight stop and then on to the end of the special tests in Mesquite. "You got into sections that were r rough for 50 or 60 miles at a time. They'd give you two miles of rest, then you'd be right back into the rough stuff:' said Ogilvie. "1 slowed down considerably on days five and six. I was fatigued and the extreme roughness didn't suit my bike. The course was too tough for a bike that likes high speed." Conway, who was running 28th among the 47 survivors going into day five, described each of the last two days as "three desert races back to back." 'Tm not going to be a wuss about it because I finished every day, which is something a lot of people can't say, but those last two days will be something I'll remember for a long time:' said Conway. "It wasn't 'can you win the race: It was a case of 'can you make it through the terrain.'" Trolli took his third win of the rally on day five, topping Campbell by just

• Cover