Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

By Tracy Hagen Phot os by Ko Kaglya SUZUKA CITY, JAPAN,jULY 27 t cou ld be said with com plete certaint y tha t every on e of the 75,000 japanese fans who saw Shinichi Ito and Tohru Ukawa become the first alljapan ese te am to w in the Su zuka 8 Hours since 1982 were misty-eyed at the finish of the race - either from the emotion of the mom ent or from the day-long rain delivered by the typhoon located some 125 miles to the south. The pair rode their Honda RC45 pe rfectly in the most imperfect of all condi tions to a we ll-deserved victory. Itu clai med the lea d on lap eig ht, an d the pair were nev er cha lleng ed over the remaini ng 178 la ps. To their credi t, they never displayed the wild kamikaze style of racing for which japanese riders are frequently known. After all , tha t approach may be e ffect iv e in timed qualifyi ng sessions and sprin t races, but not in endurance races - especially wet endurance races. '11's great for me and for Tohru and everyone involved w ith th e Horip ro Ho nda effo rt," Ito sa id af terward . No t u nlike Colin Edwards Il's victory in last year's Suzuka 8 Hours, Itoh's tri u mph was his first major victory in international road raci ng after competing in 500cc Grand Prix for four years withou t a win . This year marked Ito's seven th attempt at the 8 Hours, and his previous best finish was second in 1995. The Japanese ace was third in 1994, and in '92 he crashed out of the race with 15 min utes left to go while only 10 seconds or so behind leader and eventual winner Daryl Beattie. Ito's teammate Ukawa was riding in his third Suzuka 8 Hours, and his pr evious bes t finish was eigh th in last year's event when he teamed up wit h Miguel DuH amel. "I am so ha ppy," sai d Ukawa, w ho no rma lly com petes in the 250cc World Champions hip. "Wi nning Suzuka is a dream, a nd I'm pleased to h ave achieved it. My teammate made my life easy tod ay." Much like the race in 1982, this Suz uka 8 Hour s - sponsored by the soft-drink Sprite Cool - was held in stead y ra in . that began at 9:30 a.m. the da y before and was s till falling the da y a fte r the race. The 186 laps tha t Ito and Ukawa turned in were the few est ever for a Suz uka 8 Hours that was co mpleted w ithout being sto p ped by a r ed flag . (The race has bee n red -flagged twice in its 20-year run: the firs t in 1982 w he n rain made conditions too severe for racing, a nd the secon d in 199 4 whe n a m ulti bik e crash in the openi ng hour eru pted into an out-of-con trol fire.) Finis hi ng second, two minu tes and fou r seco nds behin d , was the Castrolsponsored Honda effort of john Kocinski and Barros, the last-minute replacement for in jured Alex Criville. "If only" are th e two words that best describe their day, as Kocinski had to pit twice in the first 10 laps to ad dress a problem wit h his visor mist ing d ue to the humidity and the ra in . A t the com ple tio n of lap 11, Kocinski 's first lap afte r the second unplanned stop , he was scored 57th out of the 69 bikes on the track. The team foug ht back to 25th after the firs t hour, 11th after the second hour, sixth afte r the third hour, fifth afte r the fourth hou r, and were in second place by the fifth hour. "To fi n is h on the podi um is a n ac hievemen t, le t alone th e runner-up p lace," Kocins ki sai d . "For most of the race, we w ere the fastest team ou t there, (Above) Aaron Slight takes on gas and prepare s to give way to Tadayuki Okada. Despite being one of the tavorites going In, the Slight/Okada team could only manage a sixth-place finish in the wet race . (Below) Doug Polen was all smiles after winning the World Champ ionsh ip. (Above) Kawa saki finished third. wtth Aklra Ryo teaming with Shlnya Takeishi on the Lucky Strike-backed bike. (Left)Troy Corser (22) prepares to pass one of the Haga brot hers en route to fourth place. and it's such a shame I had problems in the o pening hour. It w as great rid ing w ith Alex, and I'd love to come back here next year an d rid e wi th him aga in." Kocinsk i' s boast of being the fast est team in the race was with merit: Kocinski and Barros had a faster lap lime than Ito and Ukawa on 124 ou t of th e 186 laps comple ted by the top two teams. H w as Barros' first race o n a fo urs t ro ke b ike since th" 1993 Suzu ka 8 Hou rs, w her e he finish ed sev enth on a Suzuki. Barros' performance, alo ng with that of Ito an d Ukawa, was furt her proof tha t the Gran d Pri x men can set up as well as ride a superbike better than the World Su pe rbike boys ca n . Ito se t the fastes t lap of the ra ce at 2:28.838, an d Ba rro s was sec on d fastest at 2:29.130 . Kocinski's bes t was 2:29.413. "I'm very happy," Barr os said. "The te am, John, me, did a ver y hard job tod ay. Unfor tunately, w e had a littl e problem at the beginning, but I always push hard and John push hard ." The Lucky Strike-sponsored Kawasaki te am o f Ak ira Ry o and Sh inya Takeishi spoiled an all- Honda podium party. Ryo, one lap down from the leaders, clinched third place w hen Yama ha's Scott Ru ssell overs hot the 130R corner on the final lap while trying to hold off Rye's cha llenge. Ru ssell brought th e Yama ha home in fourth, .193 of a second behind Ryo, th e scene bringing back memories of the classic r ace in 1994 when Aaron Slight beat Russell to the line by .288 of a second for the overall victo ry. "I had to go deep (in the 130R corner) ," Russell said . "He was right on my ass. I went too deep, and slip ped off the dry line. I was sick (over losing thi rd) ." Russell' s pa rtner was non-defending World Superbike Champion Troy Corser. "I'm sort of ha ppy," the Aus tra lian said . "We we re sort of right there p retty much from the start of the race. (It was the) first time here really in the wei wet, particular ly on the Yamaha, so it was a bit d ifferent and I had to get used to that." Russell and Corser were the meat in a Lucky Strike sa ndw ich, as the Lucky Stri ke-sponso red Suz uki of Doug Polen and Peter Goddard finished fifth 'wi th a total of 184 laps. Th e pair were delighted wi th the fin ish, having qualified a lowly 16th a nd w it h Go ddard strug gli ng w it h t he flu t hroug h th e ra ce weekend. Th e biggest delig ht, though, wa s the fact that the position gave Polen an d Goddard enough poin ts to cli nch th e 1997 World En d ura nce Cham pi . onship w ith one rou nd left to ru n. "I t' s ni ce to be Wo rl d Champio n again," said Polen with a smile. Th e H o nd a p o w e rh ou se team of Aaron Slight and Tad ayuki Okada wer e thoroughly d ilu ted by the wet condi tions, finishing a d isappointi ng sixth. "If I would have known how bad our bike was going to be in the rain; I would have stayed in bed," Slight admitted . Slight and Oka da were the top finishers th at ra n th e ra ce wit h a fiv e-stop stra tegy, as the five teams that finished , ahead of them all stopped at least six ti mes. As Po len had figu re d o u t, th e extra time gained on the race track w ith a rich carbure tion setting more than offsets the time lost by an add ition al p it stop. "Think about if you could run a second a lap faste r," Polen exp lained . "In a 200-lap race, that' s 200 seconds. How much actual time o n th e race track would you lose (with an ad ditio nal pit s top )? Under a min ute. Out of the 200 second s, yo u now gai ned 140 seconds by running it richer. We found that I can go a second - maybe a little faster - a lap wi th it richer tha n nol. It doesn' t take a mathematician to add that one up." Like Slight and Oka da , the seventhplace Lucky Strike-sponsored Kawasaki of Simon Cr afa r and Akira Ya naga wa ran a five-s top race. Their Kawasaki was the top-finishing entry on Dunlop tires, as Michelin tires were fitted to the top six finis hi ng mot orcycles . Crafar and Yanaga wa were the seco nd-fastest qua lifiers in the d ry; but in the we t, Crafar 's best lap tim e was 2:32.652 - anecdota l d ata that s u p por ts th e the ory that a Michelin rain tire is worth two to three seconds per lap. Crafa r and Yanagawa we re the last of the teams to have w hat could be called " mi nor" p rob lems in the soggy race. Behind Cra far and Yanagaw a was the Marlboro-sponsored 'yamaha ridd en by Wata ru Yoshi kawa an d No rih iko Fujiw a ra , fo llowed b y the pole-pos ition H onda of you ngs ters Youichi Takeda a nd Daijir o Kato; both tea ms finished six laps behind Itoh a nd Ukawa, a nd both used Dunlop tires. The final spo t in the top 10 went to the Yama ha Motor France entry of JeanMarc Deletang and [ean-Phillipe Ruggia, w ho com pleted 179 laps and wer e on Michelin tires. No tably absent from the top 10 were the Aoki bro the rs, Takoma and No bua ts u , w ho each cr ashed th e Ult ra m a n sponsored Hond a once apiece. Defe nd ing event co-cha mpion Colin Edwa rds 11 ha d to b ow o u t afte r Wed ne sday' s free p ra ctice becau se of nagging injuries from his collision wi th Ruggia on j une 21 at the Mon za Wor ld Superb ike ro u nd (see Br iefl y .. .). Edwa rds' p art n e r N oriyuki H a ga teamed up with his olde r brothe r Kensuke for the race, with Kensuke cras hing their Marlboro-spo nsored Yamaha twice when he touched th e p ainted line a t De gner C urve. Deg n er C u rve al so clai med Brit Terry Ryme r ea rly in the race, denyi ng co-rider Piergiorgio Bon te m pi th e op port u nity to ra ce t hei r Kawasaki. Californian- Ben Bostrom, the sole full-time AMA racer in the race, was u lti ma te ly scored a n on-finis h er . Bostrom's Honda RC45 ran ou t of gas in the far-away Spoo n Curve, and later the e ngine conked o ut w hile co- rid e r Toshiya Kobayashi was in the sadd le. RACE Th e rai n came wi th plenty of warn ing - the typhoon that de livered it had been discovered by wea thermen a week before the event an d, in the three days pri or to the race, the cen troid of the system had been on a straight-line cou rse to Suzu ka . Th e rain start ed on Sa tu rday

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