Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

(Opposite page) Spaniard Alex Criville became the third different winner of the season when he won the Spanish SOOcc Grand Prix at Jerez. (Right) Alex Barros (9) got the jump on the field at the start of the race, leading Criville (4), Max Biaggi (6) and Mick Doohan (1). (Below) Doohan led for most of the race, but Criville eventually worked his way past the four-time World Champion. Blaggi ended up third. Olivier Jacque, the Frenchman passing Benetton Honda's Tohru Ukawa on the final lap. Harada, meanwhile, had an extraordinary afternoon, pulling out of the pits again to join the race 0!le lap behind but with the two leaders. At first it appeared he might be planning to act as a blocker in case any Hondas came up but instead he overtook Rossi, with the effect of allowing Ca pirossi to make a small and ultimately crucial break. Con·spiracy theorists were having a field day, but speculation was cut short when Harada was black-flagged and disqualified; The rules only allow a rider to rejoin the race if he has worked on his bike on the pit apron, while Harada had ridden into the garage. UGT Aprilia's Kazuto Sakata took an assured start-to-finish win in the 125cc GP, the first of the day, leaving UGT Honda's Tomomi Manako to win the battle for sec.ond from young Italian Mirko Giansanti and his Matteoni Honda. SOOcc GRAND PRIX . It looked more like a 125cc race as the fielded bunched off the line, and contin. ued to do so as they remained close as anything as the race wore on. Barros led the first lap, but Doohan was packed up close and outbraked him the second time down the back straight to take a lead he held until the 16th lap. But there was never any question of him breaking away, as Barros drifted backward to be displaced first by Biaggi anq then by Criville. This trio was narrowly in control, but Checa was also coming from behind, with Okada with him and sometimes ahead. It took the Spaniard until lap eight to finally get past both Barros and Okada for good and start to close the gap, which was now about 2.5 seconds. He did so slowly but with such intent that it seemed for a while as though there may have been four riders battling for the win. It never quite happened, however, though he did get to within a second of third-placed Biaggi in the closing laps. By then, the front-runners were heavily engaged with one another. Criville first attacked Doohan at the start of lap 16, slipping inside under braking at the uphill first corner. Doohan responded directly at the second one, forcefully pushing his teammate back to second. But he was having trouble with front-end adhesion, and when on the next lap Criville attacked again at the end of the back straight, Doohan had no defense. With 10 laps left, Criville put his head down and rode like a demon, stretching the gap to almost a second. But it was not oyer, and Doohan is a redoubtable competitor even when his bike is not performing to his liking. "I upped the pace in the last three laps, and I got back onto Alex," Doohan said. "But I always knew it would be tough to pass." Thus Criville claimed his second successive victory at his home GP, with Doohan right on his back wheel. "I chose a harder front tire, and it worked well for me," Criville said. "It's something very special to win like this here for a second time." Doohan, on a softer front, was philosophical. "After all the suspension problems we've had here, today was probably the best the bike has been all weekend. We're still not on top of the suspension. HRC say it's the same as last year, but it feels different. Some parts may have been manufactured differently. Honda got the top five in the race, but they must stay on top of their game or they may find there'll be some defectors." Biaggi showed Doohan his front wheel a couple of times, but a slide on the iast lap meant he wasn't a factor in the final run to the line. "In the early part of the race there were~several chances to go ahead," he said, "but I wasn't sure I could hold on to the lead. I decided to stay with Mick and Alex. There were some parts of the track where I was faster, but the slide on the last lap lost me a I~ of time. Third is okay - it is only my third 500 race." Some ways back, Barros successfully repassed Abe, who had another good race, fighting back all the way to the line. "I was having some big slides from the rear - maybe because it was hotter today," Abe said. He still had enough to beat Okada by half-a-tenth. The Honda rider was depressed. "I solved my chatter problem from practice, but the handling in the race was never right," Okada explained. Aoki was not pleased to be eighth, but reported encouragement nonetheless. "The bike has some little problems, but we get it better every race," the new Suzuki rider said. Roberts was -three seconds behind at the finish. "When I was with the Vfours, they were slowing me down midcorner, so I couldn't use my better corner speed," he explained. "Then I lost the draft, and things got a bit more slippery for me." Waldmann was three seconds behind him at the finish, delighted to have put two seconds on Kocinski. The American was reluctant to explain his poor performance. "Read the press release," he smilingly told journalists. Trouble is, ·there wasn't one, leading to speculation that his Spanish team had not made their best efforts on his behalf this weekend, favoring instead their other rider, Checa. Gibernau was a lonely 12th, with Simon Crafar 13th, professing himself pleased, if only to have finished. Red Bull Yamaha teammate Regis Laconi was another 13 seconds behind, after a long battle with V-twin rider Garry McCoy which had included several collisions. "We were just having fun," McCoy said. Kyoji Nanba was 16th, somewhat at sea in his first European GP. The rest were spaced out, with Sebastien Gimbert finishing top Honda V-twin in 17th, ahead of Yukio Kagayama. The Suzuki rider had been in the points, but slid off after losing the front wheel. With true gung-ho spirit, he climbed back to continue. "I haven't retired for the past year and a half, so as long as 1am still okay, I will finish," Kagayama grinned. Matt Wait had another disappointing day. "I had suspension and carb problems, so I just had to ride around," he said. Biaggi's title lead remained safe. The Italian has 57 points to Criville's 51, and Doohan also moved past Checa to take over third with 45. Checa has 41 points, and Okada is fifth with 29. 2SOcc GRAND PRIX Considering the potential, this was not a particularly exciting race. Harada took off in the lead from Jacque, but at the end of the second lap the former slowed dramatically and pulled into the pits soon afterward while the latter faded to become embroiled in a threeway Honda battle with Ukawa and Stefano Perugini. It was Perugini in front at the end of lap two, then Jacque, Capirossi and Rossi. Tne most exciting move of the

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