ROAD' RACE
SUnoco Rate Fuels FormulaU$A Series
Round 6: Portland International Raceway
By Henny Ray Abrams
PORTLAND, OR, AUG. 11
his has been the year of empty
hyperbole for Doug Polen. All
year long the veteran Texan has
been predicting great success for himself
in the Sunoco Race Fuels Formula USA
series and people were getting a little
tired of listening. Today he delivered on
the promise.
Riding an overbored Suzuki
GSXR750, the former world and national champion rode like the Polen of old,
smoothly pulling away from a field of
bigger bikes to notch his first solo victory in over three years in the red-flag
interrupted first leg of the Formula USA
(Top) Tray Batey (3) leads Doug
Polen (23) and Dave Sadowski
(25). Polen took his first race
victory In three years when he
topped race one. Polen's
. engine dropped a valve In the
second race as he was pulling
away from the pack.
(Above) The second race came
down to the final corner and
. the dash to the finish line.
Dutchman Racing's Fritz Kling
(2) simply outpowered
Sadowski (25), who was
running one of the teem's
smaller engines, to take the
race-two win. Tray Batey (3)
finished third In the second
race.
(Left) Kewesakl-mounted Joe
Pittman (6) 10110_ Sadowski
(25). Pittman finished fourth In
theflrst~.
at the end of the front straight, flooding
the track with water which Suzuki rider
Dave Stanton crashed on. Because a
number of riders hadn't completed
seven full laps, scoring reverted to the
end of the sixth lap and the race was regridded. Stanton made it back out, but
on his Supers port machine, which
hadn't been through tech inspection (see
Briefly...). Kling also made the restart,
though he ran the second part of the
first leg with no water in his radiator.
Second ended up going to Tray
Batey, the Suzuki rider running an
uncontested second for almost all of the
second leg: Behind him came Elkhart
Lake double winner Dave Sadowski, the
Team Labelle rider, finally overcoming a
slew of engine problems on the Honda
CBR900s he uses.
Then carne Washington's Joe Pittman
and Graves Motorsports Chuck Graves,
aboard a Suzuki GSXRllOO.
