Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

"(Yates) caught some bad traffic and I closed up on him," said Pegram. "With two laps to go we had a bunch of traffic on the front straight and I was right on the back of him. We had a littlel'roblem with the battery and then I knew I couldn't get past the traffic on the straightaway, and that was about it. It's a good end to the season because me and Michael like riding this bike and we like racing with aU these other guys." Kling hung onto third, a lap in front of the Lee's Killer Bees bike. '1t was not as good as we expected," Kling said. "We were hoping to at least beat Cycle Motion and get the championship. I don't like second very much." But team owner Dave Schlosser added, "l don't want to take anything away from those guys. They won it fair and square." Fifth was the Battley Cycles Yamaha FZR1000, Dutchman regular Nick Ienatsch riding early before giving way to AI Salaverria. Next was the Action Speed Moriwaki Honda CBR900 of Hikaru Miyagi and Don Canet. Anaheim Yamaha paired Jead rider Dean Mizdal with Brian Parriott to take seventh, a lap up on Mark Miller Racing. l~ Firebird International Raceway Phoenix, Arizona Resul.ts: September 23, 1995 SUPERTEAMS: 1. Cycle Motion Racing (Suz); 2. Erion Racing (Hon); 3. Dutchman Racing (Yam); 4. Lee's Killer Bees (Kaw); 5. Batt ley Cycles (Yam); 6. Action Speed Moriwaki (Hon); 7. Anaheim Yamaha (Yam); 8. Mar.k Miller Racing (Kaw); 9. Hubbard-Wolf Racing (Hon); 10. Oats Racing (Suz); 11. Barnett Racing (Hon); 12. Team Hollywood/Radioactive Racing (Due); 13. Redneck Racing (Suz); 14. Keystone/Northstar Racing (Yam); IS. Ebsco Media Suzuki (Suz). Time: 59 min., 55.976 sec. Distance: 50 laps, 80 miles. Average speed: 80.090 mph. Marpn of victory: 6.268 sec. FINAL SUPERTEAMS CSHIP POINT STANDINGS (After 10 of 10 rounds): 1. Cycle Motion Racing (310/5 wins); 2. Dutchman Racing (307/4); 3. Erion Racing (293/1); 4. Action Speed Moriwaki (231); 5. Keystone/Northstnr (215); 6. OATS Racing (212); 7. Battley Cycles (203); 8. Marie: Miller Racing (200); 9. Anaheim Yamaha (174); 10. Miller Genuine Draft (147); 11. Anderson Dynamic Racing (138); 12. EBSCD Media Suzuki (109); 13. Fastline Racing (83); 14. Team America (71); 15. Grand Prix Apparel Supeteam (65); 16. Lee's Killer Bees (63); 17. Barnett Rating (55); 18. Stanton Radng lndustries (51); 19. Cheetah Racing (48); 20. Keystone/Northstar II (45). AMA Harley-Davidson SuperTwins Series Bostrom·s win, zampa(h's title By Henny Ray Abrams ~LER,~SEPT.24 ~~I t's been like a dream," Bill .. Bartels said after his riders Ben Bostrom, Shawn Higbee; and Eric Bostrom swept the top-three spots in the final round of the Progressive Insurance Harley-Davidson SuperTwins series at Firebird International Raceway. "We've been hoping for this all year long. Now we have it." For Bostrom, it was his first career SuperTwins victory. "Around the carousel was the best corner," said Bostrom, who passed Higbee on the final lap of the 16-lap race to win by 0.521 seconds. "It's just a big half-mile dirt track. You just slide the 883s through there. I knew I had about a couple miles an hour on Shawn through there so I just held out until the last lap and took him there." Though Bartels' Harley-Davidsons may have swept the top-three spots in the race, it was the Tilley's Harley- (Right) Masahiro IIzuka won the 125cc Grand Prix final at Flrebird alter a race--Iong battle with Randy Renfrow. Davidson of Scott Zampach that - won the title, the fourth 883cc title of Zampach's career. Zampach rode to a comfortable seventh, though the title was his as soon as he took the grid. "I'll tell you what, lowe this to Don Tilley of Tilley's HarleyDavidson," Zampach said in victory-circle ceremonies. ''I'll be wearing this proud." Zampach, who won three out of the 11 SuperTwins races, finished the year with 303 points. Higbee was second with 285 and Mitchell's Modesto Harley-Davidson's Matt Wait, fourth today, finished the year with 281. Ben Bostrom completed the inaugural 16-lap, 25.6-mile SuperTwins race in 20 minutes, 15.871 seconds, at an average speed of 75.798 mph. The race began on a hot and sunny Sunday afternoon, a light breeze greeting the slim field of 15. Because of the scarcity of riders and the size of his points lead coming into the event, Zampach would be the champion as· long as he qualified for the field, took the grid, and made an attempt to start .the race. He did it with ease, though he wasn't going to take any unnecessary J:isks on the tight and twisty 1.6-mile circuit. Off the start it was Eric Bostrom in front of Wait, Ben Bostrom, and Higbee, though Higbee moved up to join the Bostrom brothers by the end of the first lap as Wait dropped back. The second lap ended with Ben Bostrom in front of Higbee, who had passed Eric Bostrom near the end of the lap. The top three began to make a break, with Higbee using the draft to get by Bostrom to take the lead on the fourth lap. That left the two Bostroms behind, with Wait settling into fourth, a spot no one would challenge him for. When the halfway flags were shown at the end of the eighth lap, Higbee and Ben Bostrom had cleared out to better than a five-second margin on brother Eric. Wait, another second and a hali back in fourth, had more than six seconds on a ferocious battle between Citrus Heights H-D's Mario DuHamel and Bartels' H-D's Brian Gibbs. DuHamel took the spot with a draft pass into the turn-one chicane, though Gibbs would use it to his advantage on the next lap. The status quo held for a few laps, Gibbs taking over fifth on lap 12,'again in turn one, though the top four did not change. Higbee held about a five-bike-Iength lead for most of the second half of the race before Bostrom decided to make his move. It came in the carousel turn asBostrom went under Higbee on the inside. '1 tried to give a good move on him on the inside of the carousel about the second lap and he went right back by me:' Bostrom said. "I said, 'This is just going to be a hunt.' So I just sat there behind him praying and stalking. When I saw that white flag I took it balls to the wau. I took it inside and took it as fast as I could around the track. It proved to be a good move." Higbee stuck with BQstrom to the end, but came up half a second short. Third, about 11.5 seconds back, was Eric Bostrom who was coming under increasing pressure from Wait early in the second half of the race, before being able to pull out to a 2.6-second cushion. "I kept my eye on Wait," Bostrom· said. "I saw he was catching me a little so 1 turned it up and got going. I don't think he closed in any more. It was a tough race out there with the heat and I started getting fatigued a little, but everything worked out well." The battle for fifth was decided when DuHamel used traffic to lose Gibbs after passing him early on the 14th lap. At the flag the difference was about 1.3 seconds. Then came Zarnpach, the four-time champion sitting back in eighth most of the race, content to follow Matthew Guidera until the 13th lap. From there it was an easy jaunt for Zampach to the flag. Guidera was eighth, Andy Fenwick alone in ninth, with Tom Shields 10th. l.~ Firebird International Raceway Chandler, Arizona Results: September 24, 1995 PROGRESSIVE INSURANCE SUPERTWINS: l. Ben Bostrom; 2. Shawn Higbee; 3. Eric Bostrom; 4. Matt Wait; 5. Mario DuHamel; 6. Brian Gibbs; 7_ Scott C. Zampach; 8. Matthew Guidera; 9. Andy Fenwick; 10. Tom Shields; 11. Devm Battley; 12. Michael Friberg; 13. Alan Eadie. Time: 20 min., 15.871 sec. Distance: 16 laps, 25.6 miles. Average speed: 75.798 mph. Margin of victory: 0.521 sec. FINAL PROGRESSIVE INSURANCE SUPERTWINS C'SHIP POINT STANDlNGS (After 11 of 11 rounds): 1. Scott Zampach (303/3 wins); 2. Shawn Higbee (285/4); 3. Matt Wait (281/1); 4. Eric Bostrom (265); 5. Matthew Guidera (242); 6. Billy Graef (235); 7, Ben Bostrom (228); 8. Andy Fenwick (221); 9. Brian Gibbs (206); 10. Mario Duhamel (200); 11. Owen Weichel (171); 12. Dave Estok (164/1); 13. Dean Mizdal (147); 14. Alan Eadie (139); 15. Devin Battley (132); 16. Jim Whitaker (131); 17. Aaron Yates (113/1); lB. Jerry Casciero (B6); 19. Michael Friberg (76); 20. Ron McGill (74). AMA 125cc Grand Prix Series lzuka wins, Fee (rowned By Paul Carruthers Photo by Henny Ray Abrams CHANDLER, AZ, SEPT. 23 alifornian Rodney Fee became th.e AMA's first-ever 125cc Grand Prix National Champion with a third-place finish in the final round of the series at Firebird International Raceway. Fee was never a factor in the race, but then again he never reaUy had to be. The race itself boiled down to Masahiro Iizuka vs. Randy Renfrow. It also came down to the final lap with Renfrow getting bucked up and out of his Honda RS125's seat, miraculously saving a near crash, but allowing Iizuka the breathing room he needed to take his fourth win of the season. Fee cruised home third, narrowly bea ting Roland Sands to the flag, to claim the title. Young Bobby Keith rounded out the top-five finishers. "I worked with a bike that really wasn't as competitive as I wanted it to C be:' Fee said. "1 just worked with it. I saw him (Sands) coming and said to myself, 'No, I'm not going to get beat by Roland.' " Fee needed only to finish 12th in order to claim the title, and - with 13 rid: ers starting the race - the title was his when the first of many crashers slid off on the opening lap. Renfrow, meanwhile, was way out front, running away to what appeared to be an easy victory. lizuka was fourth after running off the track; momentarily, though he would climb to second by the end of the second lap. By this point, Fee seemed to be going backwards, dropping from second on the first lap to sixth on the third. Geep Terranova threw his little Honda RS125 down the road on the fourth lap, a lap after a near get-off. On the sixth lap the red-flag came out as a crashed motorcycle had taken up residence in the middle of the track. Things were different on the restart, with Renfrow taking the holeshot again, only to be trailed closely by Iizuka. Fee, meanwhile, was a comfortable third - a position he would hold to the end, though with some pressure from Sands in the final laps. Renfrow continued to lead Iizuka until the sixth lap, when the Japanese rider took his first turn a t the front. The two would fight it out the rest of the way, with lizuka leading the rest of the laps - constant!y threatened by Renfrow. It came down to the final lap, with Renfrow very nearly crashing. '']'d call it a God save:' Renfrow said. "It was a really good ride, but I made a couple of mistakes. We were bumping all the way through. On the third lap from the end, I thought, 'This isn't going to work.' I let him go and I should have hounded him in the carousel." He recovered, but the race was a foregone conclusion - it belonged to Iizuka and the Moto Liberty Honda RS125, the team's sixth win of the ninerace series. "Randy (Renfrow) and me are over 30:' Iizuka said. "We need young America rider. Taday's race was very hard. I ~ almost crashed. Randy, I'm sorry." Fireblrd International Raceway Chandler, Arizona Results: September 24, 1995 125ee GRAND PRIX: 1. Masahiro lizuka (Hon); 2. Randy Renfrow (Hon); 3. Rodney Fee (Han); 4. Roland Sands (Yam); 5. Bobby Keith (Han); 6. David Pare (Han); 7. Bruce Und (Yam); 8. Troy Galloway (Han); 9. Todd Bowman (Han); 10. Geep Terranova (Hon); 11. Kevin Murray (Hon); 12. Chris Laauze (Han); 13. Mike Mondo (Hon); 14. David Sjoblom (Hon). Time: n/ a due to red flag. Distance: 16 laps, 25.6 miles. Aver.tge Speed: n/ a due to red £lag. Margin of Victory: 5.933 sec. FINAL 12See GRAND PRIX C'SHIP POINT STANDINGS (Aft" 9 of 9 round,): 1. Rodney Fee (273/1 win); 2. Randy Renfrow (257/2); 3. Masahiro lizuka (227/3); 4. Billy Greaf (199); S. (TIE) Mike Mondo/Todd Bowman (176); 7. David Pare (165); 8. Kevm Murray (163); 9. Roland Sands (132); 10. Nancy Delgardo (106); 11. Takahito Mori (102/2); 12. Andre Castanos (100); 13. Bruce Lind (91); 14. Chris Rogers (90~ 15. Bobby Keith (BO).

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