Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

"I had a fairly bad sta rt, bu t I am rea l familiar wi th the area so I knew where I could pu sh it : ' sa id th e Utah rider. "When the Dezert Foxes put their race on out here, I laid out all these trails. I never had a chance to race here before, . but I knew what was coming up and I was chuckling to myself because I could see where the guys in front of me were blowing corners left and right on the ball-bearing roads they have out he re." Ha mel was a lso p utling his lo ca l know- how to good use. . "This is on the opposite side o f th e state from w here I live, bu t the terrain is fairly simi lar:' sai d Ham el. "It's sagebrush country, an d yo u have to stick to the tr a il be ca u s e of the rocks and because the bru sh is so ornery . If you get off the trail in this stuff, you're taking some big chan ces. You can' t get off to the side and go for it like yo u can in Ca lifornia." Th e pace started to slow as the racers neared the halfway point of th e 27-mi le seco nd loop. Wid e-open two-track ga ve way to tight trails tha t dodged back and forth through the trees, and Hamel started to glance back over his shoulder. "In the tight s tuff, you have to work rea lly hard on a SOO and 1 knew those , g uys on th e 25 0s w ere goin g to be hounding me," said Hamel. "I was just waiting for them to cat ch me, but somehow I staved ahead of them." At the end of t h e second loop, Hamel's m in ute-a nd -a -half lea d was s till in tact. Ab bo tt was in second by a few seco nds, having gained a temporary advantage in his loop-long battle with Ru ssell Pearson, and Book was hard on Pearson's tail in fourth. "Russell and I went back and forth a few tim es and Book was right behind u s, so it was like a three-way battle the whole way ," said Abbott. " I thought it was a rea lly good course. It was nice and demanding , n ot that fas t where whoever holds on the longest is go ing to win. It wa s more of a rid er's course, which I like." Jim Gra y raced his Open-class KTM throug h in fifth , which was a pleasant surprise after struggling in the dust for most of loop one. " N ic k (Pe a rs o n) and 1 go t s t u ck behind this guy on a fou r-stroke and followed him the whole first loop. We both got by him in the first gas stop, but after tha t it was almost too late to catch up with the leaders: ' said Gray. " I ended up back there because I kind of took it easy off the start. A lot o f gu ys were taking chances and were getting hurt." Loop thr ee was 23 miles of the tightest terrain most desert ra cers will ever see. " It was tight - reall y ti ght, " s a id Hamel. "Th ere were no berms and the trees w er e so thick and ov ergrown. It was like sticking your face in the middle o f a bush." Hamel nearly got knocked ou t of the ra ce w he n he tried to dodge through a tree rather than arou nd it. "About five m iles in to the third loop, I came out of the shad e an d the su n hit me right in the eye and I hit a tree limb I did n't even see," sa id H amel. "It was like somebody punched me in the face. It tried to knock me off th e bike, but I was in first gear, go ing real slow, so I d idn't crash - but it gave me a bloody nos e and boy, d id it awaken me! Now I find i t wiped my visor o ff-I didn't even know. I'm to tally embarrassed knowing I looked like thi s." The Abbott /Pearson battle continued to rage in second ove rall. Book held his ow n in fourth all the way around the loop and Gray held off Nick Pearson for the numbe r-five spot. Jeff Lund g reen wa s finally making his presence felt in sixth. "I go t a two-kick start and when I go t int o the d ust I had to slow d ow n, but"! caught a bunch of people," said Lundg ree n, who battled with Four-Stroke series champion Jeff Capt for the en tire second half of the race. " It was a real fun cou rse - just a few too many roads for my taste. It was ha rd to go fast in the dust on those roads." Further back in the pack, Jeff's bro ther Mark Lund green was charging hard on his KX500 after suffering a slow start . of his own. "I was pro babl y 40th at the start, but I wo rked my way up into what I think was the top 15, and that was great," said Mark Lundgreen. "I thoug ht the course was marked rea lly well except for the color of the arrows. A light green arrow blends in too mu ch wi th the terr ain. It's kind of hard to pick out." In a n u nu sual m ove, the BLM had all owed the ra ce orga nizer to supp lement the usu al removable course markers w i th o ra nge spray paint that was used to mark tricky rocks . 'There were definitely a lot of orange rocks. It was one hairy d eal as far as that went-a lo t o f rocks everywhere," sa id Pete Russell. As the race drew to a close, tired rid ers started to make mistakes, and there was the usual rash of last-m inu te panics. A nu mber of rid ers slipped and fell on a dry waterfall. Rob Philli ps rammed his KTM620 into a tree, and Steve Pitts ra mm ed his ATK into a rock . "I hit a rock and tu mbled end o ver end right at the end," sa id Pitt s. " I near ly blew it." But Hamel wasn't blowing any thing - except, perhaps, the minds of his fellow racers. He stayed on the gas all the way and dashed across the fini sh line with a comfortable two-minutes-plus to spare. "Everybod y's shocked and excited me, too," he said , with a smile that reached from one ear to th e o t he r. " I couldn't ask for a better race. I had no dust, never fell down, the bike ran perfect - everything worked ou t great, and the course had a lot of fast stu ff, w hich helped me out on a 500." "Way beyond my goals," Hamel said, describing his win. "I'm a rookie. This is my first year racing .the National s an d I wa s hoping to maybe break into the top 10 at the end of the season. Since I started riding the KX500 at Yeringt on (Hamel rode the first three eve nts of the series on a KX250), things have been going my way. It's helping me get better starts. I'm pretty cautious in the dust, so I hav e to get a good start to get a good finish, and it's working well for me . I' ve come up toward the end and now I'm hopi ng for like five or six in the overall results." Hamel's reason for racing this year's Ha re an d Ho und series wa s simply to see how he stacked up against the competition. " I just came out to see if I could d o it: ' th e 28-ye ar- old racer explained. " I q u it racing 10 yea rs ago w hen 1 was starting to ge t fas t, and 1 always wond ered how things would' ve turned ou t." Second overall went to Russell Pear son, who dodged around race-long rival Destry Abbott with just 10 miles to go and was still ahead w hen it really cou n ted . "I had a good race," sai d the KTMbacked 250cc rider. "The cou rse was fun . It was a little dangerous in the dust - you just had to get out of the dust, and there were lots of hidden rocks that you co uld n' t see, but things went well for me." Russell Pearson stop s for gas en ro ute to a second overa ll finish and fi rst pla ce in the 250c c clas s. A b bo tt, who p iloted hi s KTM to third overall and second Open Ex p e r t, reported tha t Pearson go t h im in th e tight stuff . " H e wa s riding well a nd he just went by me," said Abbott, who will be trading this yea r's Vos burg Raci ng KTM for a T eam G reen Kawasaki in next year's series. "1 ju st was n't r id in g real we ll in the tigh t st uff toda y a nd th e bike wa sn 't s e t up th e way I would've liked, but I'm ha p py w it h th i rd o ver a ll. Thi s hasn't been the best series for me. " I ' d like to co ng ra tu la te Hamel, " Abbott continued. "He rod e a grea t race and I'm glad to see him w in ." Fo ur th overa ll and second in th e 250cc Expert division wen t to KX250 racer Donnie Book, whose co ns istent p erforman ce ea rn e d him the 25 0cc Na tional Cha mpionship. "I go t a bad sta rt, wo rked my wa y u p to fou rt h, and just hung there all da y. I couldn't do anything be cause it was so dusty, but there's nothing the club can do about that:' said Book. "I thought it wa s m arked kind o f questionable and the danger markin gs were just terr ible, b ut we did what we had to d o and that's about it. I think I ended up second overall for the seri es." Open Exp ert KTM racers Jim Gray and Nick Pearson continued to pla y follo w-the-leader all th e way to fift h and sixth ove ra ll. " W e just kind of c ruis ed all da y long," said Gray. 'The cou rse was good . It wa s just a bit scary because it had a lot of rocks th at would sneak u p on you. You had to be real smooth , but I had no problems and didn't fall all day - jus t kind of rode my own race. " " I d idn't ha ve that good of a day. I go t a bad sta rt and I just stru ggled ge ttin g by guys in the dust:' said KTM3OOmounted Pearson. " I wasn't prepared to tak e a c ha nce i n the dust, s o I ju st backed off and finished ." Jeff Lu ndg reen turned a two -kick start into seventh overall, narrowl y ed ging out race-lo ng rival Jeff Capt. "I bar ely sq u ea ked him out at th e end by abou t half a w hee l length: ' said Jeff Lundgr een, who was all smi les. "No proble ms . Th e Kawa saki ran great a nd got me here in o ne piece . No crashes... my only p rob lem was keepi ng up with th is guy." For Ca pt, an eigh th-place finish was enoug h to earn him the Fou r-Stroke win fo r the ra ce a n d make th e fa ct ory backed H onda XR628 racer back -eo-ba ck Four-Stroke cha m p io n in the Hare & Hound series. "I just had to finish to g et another cha m pions h ip, so that w as my main concern . Winning the class makes seven National number-one plates for me in seve n yea rs ," s a id Capt. "O ver all, I th ought this ra ce w a s a little bit to o fast." Pete Russell battled thick d ust all the way to nin th overall, just ahea d of Brad Ch ristensen, who wa s the first Vet-class rider to cross the finis h line. "I tho ught the course was fun , but it was pretty dange rous from the wa y he had it marked," said Christensen. "I was probably eig h th o r someth ing to th e bomb, but I started losing a lot of position s in the dust. I couldn't see the trail, couldn't see the markings that well, bu t 1 didn't ha ve any p robl em s and d id n't wreck. ' Christensen was followed home b y Robert Phillips, Russ Webster and Darrol Brow n, who took second in the Vet division, and Stev e Pitts crossed the line in 14th at the head of the Seni or pack . 'The start is criti cal here, because you can 't go off the trail at all in this area because the rocks wi ll ge t you, and the trail s are sta rti ng to ge t pretty che w ed up ou t here because th ey've been running th em over yea r after year. It works you pretty good, with the whoops and everythi ng , but I still enjoyed it," said Pitts. ''I' ve sewed up the championshi p . in m y cla ss, and yes , I'll be back next yea r to try to do it again ." The 32-mil e minibike race w as o vera il ed b y 15- year-old lo cal racer Levi Allen , w ho grabbed the lead from fellow Yam aha YZ80 racer Tris tin Ch erwood near the hal fway mark. " I ha d a g rea t ti me but 1 crashed about six tim es: ' Allen reported. fX Nevada Hare & Hound Wendover. Nevada Results: No vem be r 1, 1997 (Round 7 of 7) O /A : 1. Da ve H ame l (K4I W); 2. Ruscell Pea rcon (KTM) ; 3. Des try Abbott . OrEN AM: 1. Glen Babcocl. 30+ AM: 1. Kevin workmen. MIN I: 1. Levi AII ~n (Ya mt 2. Tristin Cherwood (Yam). .... Q) ..0 a Q) > o z 17

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