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Further back in the pack, John Rudder
was starting to make his presence felt in
the Over 30 Pro division, Bryan Folks
was looking like a runaway winner in the
12Scc Pro class, and motocrosser Mike
Healey was strutting his stuff at the head
of the Four-Stroke Pros.
"This is only the second desert race
I've done, and I'm not sure riding here
last year counts as a whole race because
1 only got half the race in before they
disqualified me for missing the course,"
said Healey, who was sporting an IMSprepped Honda 440.
As the racers headed into their second circuit of the figure eight, the rave
reviews that had greeted the terrain the
first time around started to change.
. "The second loop was really rough really whooped out and chuckholed,
and it had changed from a tight course
to a wide, beaten trail," Davis said.
The other thing that was changing
was Davis' margin of safety. After racing a little ahead of Zitterkopf on adjusted time all through the first half of the
race, the Kawasaki pilot was in danger
of losing the lead as Zi tterkopf kept
pushing hard behind him and, when he
cleared the pits for the last time with
just 20 miles to go, the pit board gave
him the bad news: "Zero lead; push,"
read his pit board.
"I didn't know he was close until the
beginning of the last loop," Davis said.
"Nick had been close earlier on - he was
charging hard, so 1 upped the ante and
pulled away from him, but when they
told me 1 had zero lead, 1 didn't even
know who it was. 1 knew it wasn't anybody in the 250 class, so 1 figured it had
to be Zitterkopf or Healey."
But the warning had the desired
effect.
"I hadn't been charging very hard. 1
was having a kind of lazy day," Davis
said, "but that woke me up. It pumped
me up and 1 finally got into the rhythm.
1 charged hard for the last loop once 1
got pushed."
Also sneaking up in the time-adjusted standings was KX500-mounted Dave
Ondas, who had turned a last-row-ofthe-Open-Pros start into seventh overall
in the physical standings.
"Being last off the time was a big
advantage because 1 could see where 1
was all day," Ondas said. "I passed all
of the 500s except Zitterkopf and Jim
'Gray, and Gray was just 10 seconds
ahead of me, so 1 knew 1 had him on
time. Last is a great place to start in a
race like this if the dust isn't too bad."
Further back in the pack, Jeff Fredette
was putting the moves on an unsuspecting Bryan Folks and had sneaked up so
close behind the KTM racer that his
KXI25 had taken the 125cc Pro lead on
adjusted time.
"I was trying too hard at the start of
the race," Fredette said. "I saw him and
got pumped up, and 1 went off a corner
into a rock pile and went flying over the
bars. Then r had to try to catch him
again. That gets your adrenaline going,
but it came together later on. 1 could see
him and 1 knew 1 was probably leading
on time, so 1 rode safe."
After a two-year break, Garth Sweetland was enjoying the ride of a lifetime
and was threatening race-long leader
John Rudder for Over 30 honors, and
17-year-old Russell Pearson was turning
heads wi th a rocket-like rise that had
him out in front of the Sportsman's division and well within the top. 10 overall
on adjusted time.
"I had a good race," Pearson said. "I
never crashed or tipped it over once.
The only problem was that 1 started to
get tired."
(Above) Jim Gray finished second to Dave Ondas in the Open Pro
division.
(Right) Eighteen-year-old Nick Pearson was the top overall
Sportsman finisher In seventh overall.
(Below) Steve Hengeveld (X27) and Destry Abott (X01) try to get the
advantage over one another at the start of the time-adjusted race.
Out in front, Davis was riding just as
hard as he could, trying to stretch out a
safety margin over Zitterkopf, who had
started five rows behind him on the grid
and could finish as much as two and a
half minu tes behind him and still t;u.;e
the win.
Davis flashed across the finish with a
total elapsed time of two hours and
seven minutes, and turned nervously to
watch for Zitterkopfs arrival, not knowing that his challenger was kneeling
beside his bike in the long wash that led
into the finish.
"It (the bike) was running rich like it
was fouling a spark plug all of a sudden, then it just instantly died and that
was that," said Zitterkopf, who started
pushing the KTM up the road that ran
alongside the wash. "The guy at the
check said 1 would be disqualified if 1
didn't push the bike on the course and 1
really couldn't do that because it was all
uphill," said Zitterkopf, who then
switched to plan two.
"One of our pit guys was going to
ride out with an ignition so 1 could fix
it, but (Casey Folks) said he couldn't
bring it out on a bike - the only way he
could do it was to walk, so he went
back and parked the bike, then walked
the part au t to me and 1 pu t it in," Zitterkopf said. "It took about half an
hour, so by then 1 was way back, but if
1 finished, 1 would have the (Open
Pro) championship for the year and
that was important. But when it was
all over, Folks disqualified me for outside interference. That made me really
mad, because we had been talking to
him on the radio and he was saying
you could do this, but not that, and we
did everything he said. 1 could've
walked in and got the part myself,
then 1 would've been okay, but he
didn't tell me I'd be kicked out. But
what can you do? Whatever he says
goes at these races."
With Zitterkopf out of contention,
Davis was in the clear and it was time
for the beginning of a Team Green celebration.
"The race was a lot of fun. Casey
Folks always puts on good races and
this is the best of the year," Davis said.
"I chose to ride a KX2S0 here because
the course is so tight. The bike is narrower, too, so you don't catch so much
cactus, and that's a big concern because
there's cactus everywhere."
Second overall, and first in the Open
Pro class, went to KX500-mounted Dave
Ondas, and Nick Pearson's stellar performance earned him third overall, just
a minute behind Ondas.
Fourth overall was grabbed by Colorado's Jim Gray, whose second-place
finish in the Open Pro class, coupled
with Zitterkopf's disqualification, gave
him the win in the Open Pro championship for the year and the $800 winner's·booty.
.
"I fell a couple of times," Gray said.
"That cost me a lot of time and cost me
first in the class today because Dave
Ondas caught up to me one of those
times, but I'm happy about the class
championship."
Gray was followed in by Hengeveld,
who scored third in the 250cc Pro class.
The fourth 250cc Pro was Abbott, who
fought all the way to sixth overall
despite a recent bout of the flu, and Russell Pearson topped the Sportsman racers in a stunning seventh overall, establishing himself as a racer to watch in
upcoming events.
Healey took Four-Stroke honors in
eighth, ahead of Paul Krause and Brian
Brown, and Scott Morris rode to 11th
overall before discovering he had blown
the head gasket on his KX500.
Sweetland finished nine seconds
ahead of Rudder to steal 12th overall
and the win in the Over 30 Pro class.
Sixteen-year-old Casey Longman took
second in the Four-Stroke Pro division
in 15th overall, and Fredette stayed right·
behind Bryan Folks to take the 125cc Pro
win by less than a minu te in 16th overall.
Sean Steele continued his domination
of the Open Experts all the way to the
checkers and took the class win in 18th
overall, and Bill Maxim topped the Over
40 Pros in 26th.
t~
Laughlin Hare Scrambles
Laughlin, Nevada
Results: December 7,1996
alA:. 1. Ty Davis (Kaw); 2. Dave Ondas (Kaw); 3.
Nick Pearson (KTM); 4. Jim Gray (KTM); 5. Steve
Hengeveld (Kaw); 6. Destry Abbott (KTM); 7. Russell
Pearson (KTM); 8. Mike Healey (Hon); 9. Paul Krause
(Kaw); 10. Brian Brown (I