Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Round 7: Black Coal National On lap two it was, once again, the Suzuki twins of Hatch and Smith separated by only 10 seconds. More than one minute down on the Suzuki duo was the KTM trio of Dahners, Conner and Plessinger. The third lap is where the real race action began. Halfway into the lap, Hatch's sprocket fell off his bike. "It fell totally off," Hatch said. "1 stopped and said, 'Oh man, now I'm hurting.' 1 ran back about 20 feet and started looking through the leaves and finally found it. I put it together and was holding it together with my foot. Luckily for me my mechanic and girlfriend had come out to find me. We wired it together so 1 could get back to the pits. We changed the sprocket clip, got some gas and 1 was now four minutes down. 1 made up some serious time and was riding rea.lly strong and aggressive. 1 just kept pushing towards the next guy that would take me up to Rodney and Plessinger." With Hatch out of the running for a ,By Cindy Lemere Photos by Kurt Bauer and Lemere LYNNVILLE, IN, ocr, 7 or the second time in the 1996 National Championship Hare Scrambles Series, KTM/MSR/ Arai / Tsubaki-backed Scott Plessinger pulled off a major come-from-behind win, leaving Suzuki's Rodney Smith second and nothing short of bitterly disappointed. However, the bottom line remains that Smith is still way ahead in the series pqints chase and looks to be a shoo-in for this year's title, but that doesn't make losing to Plessinger today any easier. Plessinger's victory was no easy feat, either. "1 was all over the place on that first lap," Plessinger said. "1 just couldn't get into the sync of riding and 1 couldn't do anything right. 1 was running into trees, 1 bent my hand backwards and hurt it and blew off comers. 1 had no rhythm and 1 was ready to call it quits after that first lap." Smith wished he had. The American Suzuki/Moose Racing/ Acerbis / Dunlop-backed Smith, sullen and obviously displeased over his second-place showing, had very little to comment on today's ride other than saying: "Numerous lapped riders was what probably cost me the race. 1 was catching the lappers, and they were really holding me up and other riders were given the chance to catch up to F me." \0 0\ 0\ ...-l rr) C'l 1-0 Il! .g tJ o 38 Ordinarily all Novice and Amateur riders are called off the course at the twohour mark, leaving only the Experts and Pros to finish off the race by themselves. Such was not the case in Indiana as all 270-plus riders remained out for the entire event. When the starter's £lag dropped at 11 a.m., there was little surprise when Suzuki's Steve Hatch grabbed the holeshot. The Suzuki team of Smith, Hatch and Eric Mashbir had all claimed the inside comer side by side in what was perhaps an attempt to grab the first corner all together and block off fellow competi- . (Above) Scott Plessinger scored e come-from-behlnd win et the Black Coal National Hare SCrambles In Indiana. (Right) Series points leader Rodney Smith was the early leader but ended up second. (Below) Steve Hatch overcame bike problems to finish third. tors. Hatch did his job but somehow Kawasaki-backed Rob Kopp snuck in behind Hatch. Smith followed through next with KTM's Jason Dahners on his outside and Kawasaki local favorite Mike Sampson on the other side. Mashbir, Brian Garrahan, Duane Conner and finally Plessinger rounded the first comer followed by the rest of the AA riders, which tallied 17 for the day. As the AA riders left the infield starting area and headed for a small loop in the woods which emptied back into the spectator viewing area, Plessinger already had shifted to a better position sixth • while the rest of the riders had maintained their original positions. From here the group emptied back into the woods down a very narrow patch which in turn dropped down a 20-foot hill and across a pallet bridge about 30 feet long. It was back into the woods to traverse along the ridges and whate'ler else they would encounter. Hatch was the first to emerge out of the woods 26 minutes later, followed closely by Smith. Right behind Smith came Sampson, Conner, Dahners, Mashbir, Kopp, Garrahan and Plessinger. '1 had a really good start," Hatch said. "Rodney Smith and 1 were riding really strong for the first lap. We kept looking at each other, playing around, and 1 kept giving him the thumbs up. He actually overshot a corner and passed me, and then we crossed a field where 1 passed him back." But back in the pack, things weren't looking so good for Plessinger as all his troubles hit home at once. "1 was about fourth when 1 clipped a tree that knocked me over a bank," Plessinger said. "1 got back up from that and was about seventh when 1 tried to pass Garrahan. 1 looped out big time and the bike flipped over another hill. 1 was blowing off turns and then 1 hurt my hand. That first lap just went so bad for me." Plessinger wasn't the only KTM rider having difficulty with the course. Dahners was having his share of problems with a misbehaving spririg mechanism on his shift lever that had him kicking at it to keep it in place and thus overshot several comers. while, Dahners and Plessinger joined forces and were running rampant through the woods. The duo pulled into the pits side by side, but it was Plessinger out first with Dahners right behind. Plessinger now sat one minute and 15 seconds behind Smith but was chewing up ground fast. "We came out of the pits and he (Plessinger) was just gone," Dahners said. The fourth lap saw Smith finally take part in some of the misery that most of his fellow competitors already 'had witnessed. Smith .got tangled up with a lapped rider who fell on top of him and valuable time was wasted as the duo pulled themselves apart. The end of the fourth lap saw Smith with a mere 20-second lead on Plessinger. Dahners was back in third by more than a minute, and closing up the gap was Hatch, who was riding like a madman. The last two laps saw Plessinger and Smith in the battle of the titans. Each rider would manage to compensate when the other made a mistake, such as when Plessinger stalled his bike at a bottleneck that aJJowed Smith to get by. At this point there was only half a lap left and neither Plessinger nor Smith could afford any more mistakes. But the final blow came for Smith when he went to 'pass a lapped rider. Plessinger took the lower line around Smith and the lapper and pulled into the lead to ride home to the checkered £lag. Smith was right there but never hall, the opportunity to pounce again, as

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