Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

ENDURO AMA National C!\ampionship Enduro Series LONDON, KY, SEPT. 15 n dramatic fashion, defending National Enduro Champion Ty Davis used the last mile of trail to pilot his Team Green Kawasaki to an important win at Moose Redbird National Enduro in Kelltucky. The win was Davis' fourth of the year and served as a comeback notice to five-time National Enduro Champion and Team Suzuki rider Randy Hawkins, who had won the previous three rounds. Hawkins finished third, mOre than good enough to maintain a substantial lead in points standings. With two events left, Hawkins has 170 points, followed by KTM's Michael Lafferty with ·140 points. Davis narrowed the gap with this win but still trails with 136 points. However, there is more to it than meets the eye. Take away each rider's throwaway rounds and Hawkins and Davis are tied for the series points lead with 136 points apiece. With two events left on the calendar, the series will no doubt go down to the wire at the series finale in Delaware. In Kentucky, the seventh event of the series was hosted by the Kentucky Trailblazers in the Redbird Division of the Daniel Boone National Forest. In the land of the Hatfields and McCoys, open cock fights and where four-wheelers are a way of life, the club, consisting of Kirk Sessions and Vic Ely, put on a well-organized event with great trails that challenged everyone. With this being a new event to the series, it leveled the field as it offered trails and terrain that were new to series veterans as well as newcomers. After a disappointing 20th-place finish a week earlier due to a burned check, Davis came to Kentucky with a vengeance. He came to make a statement, and he did just that. Davis was in a league of his own as he consistently rode a blazingly fast and Round 7: The Moose Redbird 100 Enduro hard pace all day. Davis rode fast enough to gain at least one minute on his closest competitor at each test section. He rode hard enough to completely blowout three sets of brake pads and warp the metal backing plates from extreme heat and pressure. Dennis Hawthorne of Kawasaki Team Green said, "Ty was upset after Illinois. He prepared hard and rode hard. His bike worked flawlessly and he showed everyone who was fastest today." "It was a tough and tricky race," Davis said. "You couldn't really pin it because the hills were so steep. If you make one mistake, you're off the trail and it would cost you lots of time. "But it was a really good race," he added. "The club laid out a great course. II was really challenging, had a lot of off chambers. They checked you in and checked you out. It was a race from the beginning and not just the end, which was a plus." Davis picked up at least a point at every test section today, building a fivepoint lead over Lafferty two-thirds of the way into the event. . Good thing he did. Just when it appeared he was unstoppable, Davis, following his computer which was telling him he was late, blew into the ninth check two minutes early. More amazingly, Davis had to ride totally"on the gas" in order to burn the check. Only Lafferty and Hawkins were able to reach the ninth check on time. All other riders were late to that check. "My computer was off all day," Davis said. After the burned check, and with just the final A loop left, Davis trailed Lafferty by two points and Hawkins by one point. The final three positions would be determined in a very tight, slippery and technical section consisting largely of new, virgm trail. Davis hit the first check seven miles in at three minutes do~. Both Lafferty and Hawkins went four. On the final check, both Lafferty and Hawkins dropped eight, giving Lafferty a one-point edge over Hawkins. Everyone had to wait to see what Davis would do as he was the last AA rider out. When Davis finally came in, he was six minutes late, good enough to regain the lead with a one-point margin over Lafferty. Lafferty, who has been riding very well lately, had mixed feelings about second place. "I'm pleased," he said. "Randy beat me by one minute last week; I beat him by one minute this week." Hawkins did not seem pleased with third place, but gladly took it over a DNF. "I was in the hunt," Hawkins said. "I just kept coming up a few seconds late. I went 3:09,' 1:13 and 8:08 at the end. A few seconds at each one of those and that's the difference between first and third. On the other hand, I fell hard the first loop and was thinking 'DNF: I was unconscious for a moment. But I cleared up, got on the bike and kept going." 250cc A and Honda rider Tim Tabor rode to a solid fourth place, moving him into eighth place in the standings. FourStroke A-class rider Harvey Whitaker, aboard a Honda, finished out the top five, . The club used a newly developed digital scanner and barcode system to score the event. Scoring went off without a hitch and results were. printed out quicker than usual. Many of the riders welcomed the barcode in place of the traditional scorecard. The club attached barcodes to each rider's helmet. As the rider crossed the checkpoint, a checker would scan the barcode with a hand-held scanner and instantly record the time the rider arrived. Another checker wrote the rider's number on a backup sheet just as it is done with the conventional scoring system. After starting down the pavement, the course quickly routed riders into a challenging warmup section. Riders were checked in at 3.6 miles. They had to get up to speed quickly to handle the slippery and rocky trail. Davis set the pace early, coming out at check three, eight miles later, at 1:59. Lafferty went 2:36. Hawkins went 3:09. KTM's Franklin Ramey scored 3:19, while Kawasaki's Terry Cunningham scored 3:22 to round out the top five scores. After some gas and easier trail, the club once again checked the riders into a lengthy and tigh~ single-track section as they started loop two. Davis also set the pace in this trail section, scoring a two and three, respectively, at the fifth and sixth checks; Lafferty, Hawkins and Ramey were closest, all scoring three and five. Tabor was next with a three and six. With his computer unknowingly out of whack, telling him he was late, Davis displayed incredible speed, actually picking up time through the nasty section and nearly burning the check. Davis crossed the check two seconds into his minute. "I saw the check," Davis said. "I thought I was 58 seconds into my minute and was going to be late. D pinned it as hard as I could:' Any harder and Davis would have had another infamous burned check. Davis didn't realize his computer was off by almost a full minute. When he crossed the 'check, people yelled, "AIl right. You just made it:' Davis thought people were telling him he had made it through in the last few seconds of his minute rather than a few seconds from being early. Believing he was now into the next minute and his computer was

• Cover