Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

ROAD RACE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROAD RACE SERIES .f; W"" Grand Prix By Heriny Ray Abrams Photos by Gold & Goose MUGELLO, ITALY, MAY 17 t was a day for all ages at the Italian Grand Prix, with the youngest Grand Prix leader and the second-oldest Grand Prix winner. But in the premier 500cc class, it was the old master Mick Doohan giving Italian hero Max Biaggi a lesson in race strategy by beating him soundly with a forceful late-race push on the Repsol Honda to earn his sixth victory in a row at the Circuito lnternazionale del Mugello. Biaggi didn't disappoint at the start, taking the lead from Doohan on the second lap, with Honda Gresini's Alex Barros getting between them. Ever patient; Doohan waited and stalked, passing Barros first, then closing in for the pass on Biaggi on the ninth of 23 laps. From then on, Biaggi was never far away until the final few laps, when Doohan dropped his lap times and Biaggi couldn't keep up, preferring to take a se=e second in front of a 'highly partisan crowd of 60,000 on an intermittently sunny day in the Apennine foothills of Tuscany. The difference came down to tires. Doohan said he was told to take it easy for the first few laps to get heat into the tires, but that didn't work. Like Biaggi, he'd chosen the softest of the three Michelin rears. Unlike Biaggi, he went with a hard front. Biaggi, who is much. easier on the frout end, chose the softest of the th ree. "Once Biaggi got away, I knew had to get by Barros," Doohan said. "1 thought r d go sh:aight past him (Biaggi) and see if I couJd continue to puJI away, but Max came right with me. At the end I saw .5, which I hadn't seen before, so I put my nead down again and did 53s. Either Max couldn't come with me or decided he couJdn't catch me. I was glad I could slow down the last few laps." For Doohan, it was his 48th career 500cc win, tying him for fourth on the all-time win list (all classes) with Phil Read. "1 have to say this is an excellent result for me," Biaggi said after being swarmed by fans. "From Friday, my first day on 500 here, to today, we improve a lot and that's what it's going to be for all the other tracks." Doohan's Repsol Honda teammate Alex Criville was third, running by himself for the duration, never challenged and never challenging. "In the beginning, I was there following Mick and Max," Criville said. "But in the middle of the race I had some problems with the backside, the tiie went down a little bit and the four (riders) behind me' was seven, eight seconds, so I decide to be in third position. At the end it was a little boring for me because It was difficuJt to catch Max and concentrate, but third is good points." The most movement came in the fight over fourth. The race settled into a pattern on about the fourth lap, with Honda Gresini's Alex Barros at the front of a line which included MoviStar Honda Pons' John Kocinski, Yamaha' Team Rainey's Norick Abe, Kocinski's teammate Carlos Checa, Suzuki's Nobuatsu Aoki, and Red Bull Yamaha WCM's Simon Crafar. Barros was destined to fade, slipping from third to fourth on the fourth lap, then all the way to ninth. The problem was tires. He'd gone with soft at front and rear but, since his chassis wasn't set up properly and the front end was pushing, he was hiindered. As he fell back, the others ascended, with Checa being the most successfuJ. Eighth on the lOth lap, Checa passed teammate Kocinski with four laps to go and then held him off at the flag by less than tWo-tenths of a second. Kocinski said that as the race progressed and the fuel load went do~n, he was having a hard time keeping the front end on line. Not long after that, his rear tire was gone. Yamaha Team Rainey's Abe was sixth with a sliding rear tire, a couple of seconds back, with Red Bull Yamaha WCM's Simon Crafar taking his best GJ: finish ever in seven tho Next came Aoki on the Suzuki - like the others, suffering tire problems - and then Barros. Crafar's teammate Regis Laconi was 10th, in front of the Marlboro Team Roberts Modenas of Ralf Waldmann. After testing new Lotus Engineering- Four-time World Champion Mick Doohan won his sixth straight 'Italian Grand Prix at Mugello. designed bodywork all weekend, Waldmann opted for the stock bodywork for the race, and his performance was markedly better. "The standard fairing is better at the moment - the lap times' prove it," he said. Waldmann's teammate, Kenny Roberts J r., had an off day, retiring on the 11th lap after running into carburetion and engine problems. It was his first DNF in nine races. "The motor started missing and backing up and then the clutch started going," Roberts Jr. said. FCC TSR's Matt Wait had a short day, crashing out on the first lap. Doohan broke his own race record by about seven seconds, completing the 23lap, 74.96-milerace in 43 minutes, 55.307 seconds, at an average speed of 102.404 mph. His margin of victory was 5.395 seconds, most of it gained in the final four laps when he pushed hard and Biaggi though t better of chasing after him and backed off. The win, Doohan's second of the year, allowed him to knock five points off Biaggi's championship lead and move past Criville into second place. After five of 15 races, Biaggi leads with 77 points; Doohan has 70, and Criville has 67. Marcellino Lucchi, the 41-year-old Aprilia test rider, became the secondoldest GP winner when he won the Aprilia-dorninated 250cc race, a race that was run in two parts after it was stopped early on because of rain. Lucchi, when he's n.ot testing for Aprilia, is a garbage collector in his hometown of Cesena and has few opportunities to shine; today was one of them. He finished second behind teammate Valentino Rossi when the race was stopped on the seventh lap. The track dried, the race began anew, and Lucchi ran a close second on the track to second segmen t leader (and Aprilia teammate) Tetsuya Harada. When the times from the two portions were combined, Lucchi had won. Lucchi credited the rain for his success. He said iliat he'd chosen the wrong tire for the first segment, then corrected it while waiting out the rain for th.e second race to start. By the time the race was restarted, the track had dried completely. "The last lap, I was thinking of the interview [ did yesterday, because yesterday they told me (Max) Biaggi's not there and maybe I could win," Lucchi said. "1 said, 'When the pope dies, He's going to have another one' and today God made me the new pope, and I'm very happy." On combined time, second went to Rossi, the colorful1taIian teenager making up two seconds in the final two laps to move back in front of Harada, who finished third on combined time. Rossi celebrated by stopping on the track to put on a .full-faced helmet, then stripped off his leathers to reveal multi-colored swimming trunks. He added sandals, sunglasses and threw a beach towel around his neck. His antics, though crowd-pleasing, may have earned him a fine from the IRTA, however. Loris Ca pirossi finished fourth and continues to lead the championship with 58 points - four more than Harada.. Chesterfield Team Tech3's Olivier Jacque, who pulled out of the second part of the race due to injuries suffered in qualifying, is third with 43 points. In the 125cc Grand Prix, Team UGT3000's Tomorni Manako led across the stripe to begin the final lap and again to end the final lap, and so earned the win. But {he story of the final lap is the one that defines the race and provided enough excitement for several races in what was clearly the most competitive 125cc GP of the year. There was the usual bump-and-grind among the tight group of seven as the lap progressed, but it was in the final turn that all hell broke loose. OXS Matleoni's Mirko Giansanti went up the inside of the pack to take the lead entering the final looping downhill left before the long run to the flag. It was soon obvious that he was in too hot, and he high-sided On the exit. Givi Honda' LCR's Nobby Ueda, who led much of the race and was sitting in second, was forced off the track and through the runoff area. He fin.ished seventh. Veda's teammate Lucio Cecchinello, who was in the pack, had nowhere to go and center-punched Giansanti's bike,

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