Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

IN THE WIND Denny Ste phenson (Hon) picked up his first two wins of 1998 at rounds 19 and 20 of the AMA /PJl Na tiona l Arenacross Series, held in Mil waukee, Wisconsln, February 13-14. Stephenson topped bot h Friday and Sa turday evening's 250cc ma in eve nts over Jeromy Bueh l (Han) -and G rayso n Goo dman (K aw) , Buddy Antunez (Suz) too k the wi n in Friday's 125cc main over Buehl and Mike Jones (Kaw) . Chad Pe derson won Sa tu rday nig ht's 125cc main event, besting Todd DeHoop (Yam) and Stephe nso n. Peder so n has closed the gap to 25 poin ts on defending cha mp and se ries points lea d e r A n tunez, 628-603, w i th e ig ht rou nds rem aining. T y ler Evans (Suz) wo n the 250cc Pro class in round four of the CMC Golden S ta te N a tio nals So u th , he ld at G le n He len Raceway in San Bernardino, California, on February 15. Espen Bliks tad (Yam ) a nd Je ff Willoh (Suz) finis he d second and third, respectivel y. Willo h ca me back to win the 125cc Pro class over Eva ns and Keith Joh nson (Yam). Rep sol Hond a's Taku ma Aoki suffered s p in a l in ju r ies in a crash at Ho nda 's Tochigi test track in Japan on February 5. Aoki, who finished fif th in the 1997 500cc Wo rld Champio nship, crashe d in to a foam -p ad d ed wall , s u ffer ing injury bet ween the seven th and 'eighth vertebrae in his back. Ao ki underwent five hours of su rgery to reduce press ure on his sp ina l co rd and to stabiliz e th e fracture, and he is cu rre n tly par a lyzed from the waist down. It was Aoki's first rid e on the Honda 500cc V-tw in since su fferin g a hand injury in the Big Road Race in Sugo, Jap an , in Novemb er. His test session in Jap an was schedule d to be a warm up sess ion before he was to join the res t of the Hon d a team for tests in Au stralia at the end of February. "T aku is figh ting s tro ng ly to recover and his wife and brothers are with him, but they are a ll s uffe ri ng a g rea t dea l a t this moment w hile try ing to stay positive," a s p o kes ma n fo r th e Aoki fami ly s ai d. "Ta ku is co nsci ous and h as spoken to (his brothers ) Haru and Nobu about the cras h and is aware of his condition. If necessary, Taku wi ll be taken to America for a second ope ration, whi ch eve ryone hopes can hav e a positive resul t." T e am Ra in e y Yam a ha a n d Red Bull Yamaha recently com pleted four days of t e s tin g a t th e Sh a h Alam ci rc u it in Malaysia , wit h so me surprising results. A t the end of the four days, it wa s Red Bull's Simon Crafar w it h the q uicke st la p, a 1:25.81, in hot a nd hu mid cond itions. The former World Superbike racer was obvious ly p leased with his perfor mance. "We tested a lot of d ifferent tires here, w hic h w ill give Dunl op a lo t of information for future direction s," Crafar said . "I'm read y to move to the Creek (Eas tern Cr eek in Australia) now to go into the next stage of tes ting, w here I can see how thi n g s a re co m pared to th e o the r factor y mach in es." Tea m Rainey suffered a setback on the first dav of the test when Jean-Mi chel Bayle crashed his YZRSOO and had to retu rn to France for X-rays on his da maged left hand. The Frenchma n is expec ted to be ready to go again w he n th e team heads to Eastern Creek Febru ary 24-27 fo r a co m bi ne d test w ith the Honda and Suz uki tea ms . The second- quickest rider during the test was Tea m Rain ey' s Norifume Abe. The Japan ese rider lapped at 1:25.83, just off Crafar's time. "I was really surprised by the lap times," Abe said. "The track was really d ifficu lt and I'm very sa tisfied with the results of the test. We learned a Schwantz ei hth in Da tona car debut en yea rs after wi ning the Day to na 200 By Arai, Kevin Schwantz returned to Dayt ona Interna tiona l Speedway to beg in his firs t full season on fou r whee ls. His eighth-place finis h in th e NAPA Auto Parts 300 NASCA R Busch G ra nd National race was hard -fou gh t. It was also filled with enough close calls in the final laps to last the 33-vear-old Texan for a w hile. ;'It was so close," ex pla ine d Schwantz of his near-miss of an acciden t w hic h broug ht out the PHOTOS COU RTESY OF DAYTO NA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY final caution flag . "My spotter sa id, 'Ge t off the wa ll, get low.' 1 jus t ya nked the w heel and the "I miss all the people and the traveling," he said. "I d on't miss minute I did that , the tire smo ke cleared and I had a car broad- having to get on the bike and race." What was miss ing was a new cha llenge to conq uer. Au to racside right in front of me. Somehow, I missed him. "We d id n ' t ha ve th e best lu ck in practice a nd qualifying, ing seemed like a natural. . "NASCAR racing was always so methi ng I watche d on TV where we wo und up 16th, but I thin k our luck in the race mad e up for it. I'm running for 'Rookie of the Year ' honors and to come w he n I was in the states," Schwantz said. "It's so me thing that's to Daytona an d finish eighth is great . Once we got to -racing and really had my a ttention for a lon g time." things settled d own a bit, a lot of stu ff I used on the banking w ith Last year, Schwantz ran in four Busch Grand National races the motorcycles see med to help me. You don ' t get the vetera ns after hooki ng u p with fellow Texan and tea m owner David ' ru nnin g wi th yo u or helping yo u whe n you 're a rookie. I basical- Ridling. Now, it's on to a fu ll season in the #88 Team Ryder ly ran my own race an d took help (in d rafti ng) w here I could find Chevrolet Mont e Carlo - and a ru n at the "Rookie of the Year" title . it." For Schwantz, the glamour and limeligh t of the 500cc Grand The Busc h Series is one step removed fro m the pinnacle of Prix circu it, where he had fans wo rldwide, has been rep laced by stock-car racing, the NA5cAR Win ston Cup Series . Visually, the the relative anony mity of the Busc h Series. lt won' t last lon g. cars and engi nes appear the same ; but the cars are 100 po unds The 1993 500cc World Champ ionshi p title, the 25 Grand Prix lighter and p roduce less horsepower d ue to a 9.5:1 comp ressi on w ins, the ad ulat ion of the two-wheel fans is now a closed chapter rati o. in the "book" on Schwa ntz . Yet he misses parts of it. Gary Van Voo rhis T lot of new th in gs in th ese co nd it io ns abou t th e handlin g of the b ike which will hel p in putting tog ethe r a g ood co m b ina tio n in th e fu tu re. The h ot weather was also very good for my personal body-eondition training." In addition to Crafar, Red Bull also had number -tw o rider Regis Laconi and test rid er Niall Mackenzie testing the new Yamahas. With the extre mely hot tem peratures in Malaysia, Yamaha engineers were content to concentrat e on endurance testing for pa rts and on the improved coo ling ' system of the 1998 YZRSO . "One of the O major targets of thi s test were to monit or the reliability of all the en gine parts in the new bike," Yama ha's G ra nd Prix manager Shuji Sakurad a sa id . "Cranks ha fts , pi st ons an d cy li nders a ll p erformed much better than we had anticip ated . The conditions at this test w ere ". not good for riding, but were good to test the revised cooling on the bike. We suffere d fro m wa ter-cooling p roblems and a loss of pow er in ho t conditions at so me circuits last yea r, but this is now much better . Altho ug h the tim es were not that fast, we had no major prob lems a nd th ere was n' t any pressure on th e ride rs to put in qu ick laps. I'm still very happy wi th every thing and we're still on target for the s tart of th e season. O u r next test will be with Honda and Suz u ki, so that's when it becomes more in terestin g ." Norifu me Abe p ut in over 600 miles on the new bike during the test, accord ing to Yama ha . Castrol Ho~da team manager 'Neil Tuxworth claims that his newest rider, Colin Edwards II, must cha nge his riding sty le to master the Honda RC45, according to Cycle News contrib utor Darryl Flack. The Texan finished up 10t h fastes t a t the recent F1arnmini test at Phillip Island in Australia; 1.17 seconds behind teammate Aaron Slight. "Colin's ta king his tim e working his way into the RC45, and he' s te lling u s what he likes and w ha t he d oesn't," Tu xworth sa id. "What w e've fou nd over the last four years is tha t all the ride rs who have ridden for ou r team have had to adap t to the bike so mewhat, becau se it d oes have its ow n person ality. Aaron's in his fifth year on the bike and you ' ll notice that he's hunched over the tank m o st o f the t im e, k ee pi ng th e weigh t over the front end. It's a style that John (Kocinski) sort of d eveloped and it won him the World Championship. I'm sure Colin will corne up with his ow n ver sion." Ed wards said tha t it's only a matter of laps before he comes to grips wi th the V-four and sta rts to push it to the limit. "The more time I spend on the bike, the more confide nce I have to chase fast times," Edwards said . "I'm still ge t.t ing to know th e Ho nd a a n d g e tting u sed to th e Michelin s. Th e fron t ti re they' ve come up wit h is incredible, jus t in cr edible." Edwa rds tested both the existing si ng le Pro -a rm a nd dua l-fork swingarm, and has expressed a preference for the more conve ntio nal configuration. Tro y Corser finished beh ind bot h PierFrancesco Ch ili and Carl Foga rty a t Phillip Island durin g the recent Worl d Superbike test as he sea rches for a combination to cha llenge for th e 1998 Wo rld Superbike Champions hip . The three wo rks Ducati riders tested the full 1998spec 996 Du cati, w it h th e Aus tra lian exp ressing a d istinct d islike for the new "flexi" chassis. "I tes ted the new fra me and I have to say I hate it," Corse r told Da rryl Flack. · "T he n e w eng ine s ti ll makes that abrupt bo ttom-en d pow er, although the factory cha nged the engine ' spec, including the ch ip, w hich makes the w hole package very diffic ult in corners . I went back to the stiffer '97 chassis, which is ide ntical to the '95 frame, for the last day of the test and , although it's an improvement, we still have a lot of wo rk to do." Corser's best was a 1:35.28 beh ind Fogarty's 1:35.18and Chili's 1:34.71. Castrol Honda 's A ar o n S ligh t came . away from the thr ee-day World Superbike tes t at Phill ip Isla nd in Aus tra lia w it h th e fas te s t lap tim e - a 1:34.589. Sli ght ed ged Du cati' s Pier-Franc esco Chili ' s 1:34.709 to lea d th e way. "We tes ted both a lternatives of swinga rms available to the team, but it's still a difficu lt deci sion to say which would be best over the course of a seaso n," Slight said . "My best lap on Thursd ay morning was something we pl a nn ed . We kn ew the wi nd would be stro ng in the afte rnoon, so I went for it and it paid off. I'm feelin g co m fo rt ab le a n d happy - it' s a shame the first rou nd is not this weekend ." Te a m Kawa sa ki tea m m ates Martin Craggill and Damon Buckmaster won a race apiece in the opening rou nd of the 1998 Aus tra lia n Sup erbik e Cha m pionshi p at Sym mo ns Plain s, Tasmani a, on February 9. The Bimota DB2 that Cycle News con tribu tor Alan Cath cart rode to victory in the World BEARS Cha m pio ns h ip in '1996 will be auct ioned wit h no reserve duri ng the J. Woo d & Go. Auction a t Dav tona du rin g Motorcycle Week on Mar ch 7. The machine will be sold to the highest bid de r an d it comes with racing spares. Accord ing to the bike's owner, Brook Henry, it's read y to be raced in the new AMA Pro Th und er class. Robbie Kn ievel, son of world-famous daredevil Evil Knievel, will be televised live on Fox Spo rts II Network on Tuesday, Feb ru ary 24, during a tw o-h ou r Daredevil Special , airing at 5 p.m. (Pacific time) . Knievel will perform a jump at the Tropica na Hotel in Las Vegas . The Ride for Kid s Dual Sport Ride will be held on March 15, starting and finishing at Glen Helen Raceway in San Bernardino, California. Overnight camping w ill be a llowed at the facil ity and those participa ting will also be allowed to take a lap of the motocross track . For 1

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