Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127860
H ooters-back ed Mario Martin won the fi rs t Brid gest o ne G ra nd C ha mpionship race ever, leading all the way in the Amateu r Unli mited Endurance. Riding a 1996 Suzuki GSXR750, th e 34-yearol d Ca na d ia n s p ed to th e fr ont and beg an to pull awa y before being reeled in by Honda CBR600-mounted Jaso n Palmer, Palmer was dose for the midpart of th e 3D-minute race ; then Martin p icked it up and ma rched away in th e second half of the 22-lap race. He would cross the line about 65 seconds in front of Palmer, Woodrow Gephart inherited a distant third when David Dalzell, the thi rd -pl ace fin ishe r, wa s docked a la p fo r jump ing the start. Ma rtin backed up his end urance win with a sprin t victory, takin g Friday 's Amateur Heavyweight Superbike ove r a fiel d of 2 1. After p a ssi n g D w ig h t Mitchell on the second lap, he led all the way, winning by 5.62 seconds. Mitchell was second and Kawasaki rider Rich Audet was third, "The level down here is so much better than back home," Martin sa id. Martin's hopes for a third win, in the Amateur Heavyweight Supersport race, cam e up 2.86 seconds short. That was the margin that Tonnesen Inves tment Group's Garett King had when he won hi s sec o nd race of the d a y aboa rd a Honda CBR600. King , wh o would w in three races (and nearly fou r), go t away out front with Martin before cutting to the front and taking second on the fo ur th lap. Tha t's as far as he'd get. Palmer was second in this one, with Honda-mounted Paul Pen oskavic third . On Sunday, King 's final win came in the Amateur Middleweight Supersport class and Palmer was again second , though the result was mostly decided by back ma rkers they hit in the final corner sequence befo re the finish. The margin was .19 of a second. Ho nda-mounted Peter Douvris ended up third, King 's b id fo r a fourth win was derailed by Palmer in the final corner of the Amateur Middleweig ht Superb ike race. That's when Palmer, who'd led much of the race, ran hard up the insid e of King , sendi ng both rid ers into th e dirt , Palmer won the drag race to the stripe by .34 of a second. " went for it and it pai d off," Palmer said . "I don 't kn ow if 1 too k away his line, but it worked." Dwig ht Mitchell was third aboard his Kawasa ki. When Eric Wood hit the track for the first tim e, in the final race on Frid ay, it was with some trepidation . Tran smission problems had cropped up in practice, forcing him to a backup mot or for his Kawasaki ZX-6. A few tu rns into the race, it was obvious he had no worries, but he'd have some later in the weekend. He was gone rig h t fro m the s ta rt, adding nearly two second s per lap to his lead before back ing off and cruisi ng to his first win of the day, His bes t lap was a 1:16.53, whi ch wa s abou t eight-tenths bett er than the best that second- placed Chou inard could turn in , and contributed to his winning by 8.99 seconds. (Opposile page) Eric Wood (5) leads the way at th e start of the Ex pert Un lim ited Superb ike class during the AMA Brldgestone Grand Champ io nship at New Hamps hire International Speed way. J ohn SCheesher (43), Jo hn Haner.(2) and Brett Guyer (711) give ch ase. (Abo ve) Matthew Palumbo won four races ยท over the course of the weekend. (Right) The big winner was Eric Wood, wh o ca ptu red five race s on his home race 4 tra ck. go t some help, though he didn't need it. Haner high-sided violently in turn three on the fo urt h lap w hi le lying second, less than two seconds back . From there it w as smoo th saili ng and Wood took the win by 28 seco nds . Kyle Zazzi put his Yama ha YZF1000 into seco nd w hen Haner crashed, holding it to the end a nd well in front of Cha d Healy on a Yamaha TZ250. Thou gh Wood was the most productive winn er, there were oth er multipl e victo rs, ind uding his father. Jerry Wood, the Penguin Road racing School o wne r, rode his Du cat i Supermon o to wins in the Expert Lightweight Grand P ri x a n d Exper t Lig ht w ei gh t Superbike. In the Amateur ranks, Watermill, New York's Matthew Palumbo came up big. winning three races on Friday and again on Saturday on a Yamah a FZR400 rat bike, which he proudly says he does no maintenance on. Palumbo's first win was in th e 30-m inu te Ama te u r ligh tweight End u rance, a win tha t w en t largely unnoticed since the Lightweights ra n wi th the Unlimiteds. H e fi nished seventh ov erall . Then came his victory in th e eig ht-lap Amateur Lightweight Superbikes, and he en ded th e d ay by w in ning the Amateur Lig h tweig h t Su persport, which he won by over 11 seconds , even after slowing to fumble a R s tan d-up wheelie approaching the flag. ."I wa s a little nervous about the competition," Palumbo said . "I didn't know what to expect." Th e others kn ew wha t to expect on Saturday wh en Palumbo, despite a couple of near high -sid es in the righ t-hand carousel, w on his fo urth race in four tries. In th e Amateur Ligh tweight Gra nd Pri x, St ephen Scott pressured him for m uch of the race before Scott s to pped wit h a mechanical problem with less than tw o la ps to go. That h and ed seco nd to Ya m a hamounted Patrick Salo nis wi th 'similarly mounted Bruce Ulleru p third. H knew so meone wa s back the re, I eithe r Dwight Mitchell or him (Marlin )," King, 28, said. "I knew [ had to keep up a good pace. If I had to catch up, I needed some room for error. " Honda-mounted Jaso n Palmer w as third, Kin g also wo n th e A mate u r Mi dd leweight Endurance race, run in two seg ments after a red flag five laps in . Before the red flag, he'd led the first segment - about five minutes - then got a bad start before comi ng through to take o ve r th e lead o n the fourth lap of th e final 25-minu te segment. On the fourth lap, he took th e lead and won by 2.67 seconds . C hou ina rd ha d so me tr a ffic to get through before he could secure his spot, and it wa sn't until the fifth of eight laps tha t he actually too k over seco nd, dropping Roland Williams, who wo u ld eventu ally not finis h, to third. Th en he was go ne, lea vin g the best bat tle - the one for third . Craig Babcock took over the spot on th e seventh la p, moving Marc Underberg to fourth. At the back of the tri o, Jeff Curtis was fifth. On Sunda y, Wo od w ould have to w ait until the third r a ce to ' ca rd his first win. But , after that, they came in a flu rry and with preci ou s little opposition. EI ~ ~ I:'-... 0\ 0\ ..... 00 ... III ,.0 ' o oW U o 17