Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

ing Bostrom to make the break he needed to get away. In a race that was nose to tail for nine laps, Bostrom opened a gap of one second on the 10th, doubled it a lap later, and added at least a second per lap to the finish. When the checkered flag dropped on the IS-lap, 37.8-mile race, Bostrom had 8.260 seconds in hand. He completed the race in 21 minutes, 55.200 seconds at an average speed of 104.288 mph. Taking the win (and leading the most laps) netted Bostrom maximum points, alloWing him to close Nobles' championship lead down to 15 points. After five of 13 rounds, Nobles has 159 to Bostrom's 144. Canadian Kawasaki's Michael Taylor, seventh today, is third with 130. When the flag dropped, the Honda CBR900RR-mounted Bostrom and Nobles jetted to the front and split. They swapped the lead back and forth, Bostrom taking it for good on lap six. He attempted to make an early break, but couldn't. "I tried, but I was putting everything I could just to get a little breath from Tripp," Bostrom said. "He just kept running it back by me into one. 1 just kept putting my head down, trying to get some confidence going into one. 1 don't think I ever did. Tripp pretty much had me. We drafted each other a few times." It was on the 10th lap that the race would be decided. "We went and caught a lapper in tum six and Eric got by him:' explains Nobles. "He held me up in seven. I was going to get him in seven, but he was coming over and I had to stand it up. That same lap there was another one, and then after that it was gradually." Once Bostrom made the break, Nobles was hoping for the chance to retaliate. "I didn't know - maybe I'd get a break like he got a break," the Georgian said. "Just hope for the best. But when it's that far away, it's hard to take chances. It works both ways sometimes, but it is better when you catch traffic to be out front. Nine times out of 10, it works your way." Little did he know that Michael Barnes was lurking just behind. The Dutchman Yamaha rider had moved into third on the fourth lap and rode mostly by himself. With the race winding down, he caught a whiff of Nobles and bore down on him, coming up less than a second short at the end. . Fourth went to Graves Motorsports' Mark Miller, the Yamaha rider going back and fourth with Suzuki-mounted Joshua Hayes untH taking control of fourth on the 11th lap. From there he was able to beat him to the flag by a handful of bike lengths. Hayes' teammate Grant Lopez came in sixth, about 13.5 seconds adrift with around 2.7 seconds on the race-long 'fight for sixth. Canadian Kawasaki's Michael Taylor finally got the better of Kawasaki Team Green's Eric Wood. t~ Road Atlanta Braselton, Georgia Results: May 30, 1998 (Round 5 of 12) •'lRElLl FORMULA XTREME: 1. Eric Bostrom (Hao); 2. Tripp Nobles (Hon); 3. Michael Barnes (Yam); 4. Mark Miller (Yam); 5. Joshua Hayes (Suz); 6. Grant Lopez (5u1.); 7. Michael Taylor (Kaw); 8. Eric Wood (Kaw); 9. Tray Batey (5u1.); 10, Jonathan Bolton (502); 11. Mark Junge (502); 12. Curtis Adams (Yam); 13. Dean Mizdal (5u1.): 14. Richard Pacella (Suz); 15. Steve Johnson (Kaw); 16. Paul H'aTrel1 (Suz); 17. Greg White (Suz); 18. Larry Locklear (Knw); 19. James Doerfler (Suz); 20. Jimmy Shelton (Suz); 21. Lynn Miller (Suz); 22. Michnel Gage (Tn); 23. Stephen Tuel (Suz); 24. Devin Battley (Yam); 25. Mario DuHamel (Suz); 26. Louis Cobello (SuzJ;"17. Shawn Conrad (Tri); 28. Jimmy Moore (Suz). Time: 21 min., 55.200 sec. Distance: 15 laps, 37.8 miles. Shawn Higbee (3) won the Pro Thunder race after passing both Mark Miller (24) and Paul Harrell (47). Harrell finished second with Miller ending up fourth. Average speed: 104.288 mph. Margin of victory: 8.260 sec. PIRELLI FORMULA XTREME SERIES POINTS STANDINGS lAfter 5 of 12 rounds), 1. Tripp Nobles (159/1 win); 2. Eric Bostrom (144/4); 3. Michael Taylor (30); 4. Mark Miller (128); S. Tray Batey (10); 6. Dean Mizdal (93); 7. Cory Call (90); 8. Mario DuHamel (86); 9. Jack Pfeifer (85); 10. Chris Voelker (82); 11. Mike Sullivan (71); 12. Curtis Adams (55); 13. Myron Bigley (54); 14. (TIE) Mike Smith/Mike Voelker (52); 16. David Perez (47); 17. Harley Barnes (41); 18. (TLE) Paul Harrell/Kevin Holman (39); 20. (TIE) Ben Welch/William Scott (34). Upcoming Rounds: Round 6 . Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, June 13 Round 7 - Loudon, New Hampshire, June 20 AMA Progressive Insurance Pro Thunder Series Round 6: Road Atlanta Higbee's Thunder By Henny Ray Abrams BRASELTON, GA, MAY 31 here were 13 riders in the thin Progressive Insurance Pro Thunder field, but only three really mattered. From the flash of the green light, Shawn Higbee, Paul Harrell and Curtis Adams made the newly reconfigured Road Atlanta layout their own playground, leaving the others behind and scrapping desperately, but cleanly, for the win. In the end it would go to Higbee, the Tilley's H-D Buell rider making his move out of the last set of corners to hold off Orange County Triumph's Harrell by a mere .390 of a second. Harrell's teammate Adams, who'd led six of the 15 laps, dropped back on the 11th lap with an ignition problem and finished a distant-but-secure third. "The last couple laps I felt 1 had a handle on it," Higbee, who struggled through practice and his heat race with various problems, said of the new track. "I knew where I could pass. All I had to do was ride extremely hard." "He's safe to race with, but if he sticks it in there, he means business," runner-up Harrell said. "There was a few times I didn't know what he was going to do, but he rode really hard." In winning his second race of the year, Higbee completed the IS-lap, 37.8mile race in 23 minutes, 11.300 seconds at an average speed of 98.584 mph. By finishing second, Harrell was able to maintain his championship points lead. After six of 13 races, he leads the logjam at the top with 179, four better than Adams and five ahead of Higbee. T The race began on a hot and sunny Georgia afternoon, the top three splitting almost immediately to wage their own private battle. For the first 12 laps, no one led for more than two laps in a row, and, even if they led across the stripe, they were likely to be passed in tum one or turn 10. The Triumphs could consistently motor past Higbee on the back straight leading to tum 10, but he had the ad vantage through the esses and on the exits. Harrell switched to carburetor,s on his Triumph for this race after running into problems with the batteries that powered his fuel injection. His and Adams' Triumphs are now identical, he said. "His bike," Harrell said of Higbee's Buell, "if you're going through the esses in the back, his works really good going up the hill, it's got a lot of torque. And then, when we got to a straightaway or something like that, we can really motor up on him. We have better top end. His bike works extremely well coming out of the corners." So it went lap after lap until the 11 th when Adams, who led laps nine and 10, fell back dramatically. "He came ou t of the horseshoe in the back and he kind of got it sideways and the bike 'popped, so his muffler was burned up a little bit," Harrell noticed. "So maybe - it happened to me one race - the muffler burned up a little bit and it lost quite a bit of power." "We just had, 1 think, an ignition (go out), or something with it. I'm not exactly sure what," Adams said. "But it was something pretty minor that caused the combustion temperature to go way up. The bike temperature never got up, I think the combustion went way up. Probably just before the halfway flags the ignition began to fail and it would cut out any time it was wide-open throttle, it'd cut out a little bit. If 1 rolled off the throttle just a tad it woul~ usually come back. But then it would start to lose as soon as you'd roll through the middle of the corner and put the throttle back open, it'd usually hit real hard and then it'd push the front. 1 had to be kind of gentle with it. Then something just completely failed on it." That reduced the race to a two-rider affair for the final five laps, Harrell leading across the stripe on laps 11 through 14, though Higbee did take the lead going into turn one and through the esses a number of times. The race would come down to one final lap. Harrell explains: "On the last lap, I knew he was coming in right up 'on me (in tum 10) so 1 went in a little too deep, kind of blew my corner speed, and on the way out I knew he was going to come up the inside because 1 saw him out of the corner of my eye the last few laps trying to get by. So I actually did try to block him, because I didn't have any run up the hill, 1 wasn't going to make it dangerous. 1 didn't think he'd back off." Higbee had watched Harrell go by easily on the back straight and into tum 10, but he stuck with him coming out and the pair were side by side exiting the Michelin bridge. Higbee had the line and the drive and won by about five bike lengths. "Th~re was a lot of time when I was testing a lot of the times coming down the hill and there was a lot of times where 1 just knew 1 couldn't get in there cleanly so I had to back out," Higbee said. "But that last time, 1 saw the door there and saw it open up, and I was like, here we go, got in there and it worked." The Buells, which haven't had the greatest reliability, are starting to finish, and that fact wasn't lost on Harrell. "They've been a threat all year long and they will be to the end I'm sure," Harrell said. "And it looks like they have pretty good reliability. If those .things can run around here for 15 laps and not break, they've fixed something." Fourth place, and closing quickly on Adams, was Motorcycle Online's Mark Miller, Buell-mounted. . He'd been alone the whole race with Rat Racing's Michael Gage making his way through the pack to take fifth on the final lap. HMC Racing's Shawn Conrad was sixth, just in front of Vee-Two Australia's Bill St. John. Then came Pat Mooney, on a Bimota, and Team Wreckless' David Hull, riding a Ducati 900. t~ Road Atlanta Braselton, Georgia Results: May 31, 1998 (Round 6 of 14) PRO THUNDER FINAL: J, Shawn Higbee (Bue); 2. Paul Harrell (Tri); 3. Curtis Adams (Tn); 4. Mark Miller (Bue); 5. Michael Gage (Tri); 6. Shawn Conrad (42); 7. Bill St. John (V-2); 8. Pat Mooney (Bim); 9. David Hull. (Due); 10. Robert Mathias (Due); 11. Robert Conzal,es (DUo; 12. James Lickwar (Tri); Frank Stroman (H.ex). . Time: 22 min" 11.300 sec. Distance: 15 laps, 37.8 miles Average speed: 98.584 mph Margin of victory: 0.390 sec. PROGRESSIVE INSURANCE PRO THUNDER C'SHIP POINT STANDINGS (After 6 of 13 rounds): 1. Paul Harrell (179); 2. Curtis Adams (175/4 wins); 3. Shawn Higbee (174/2); 4. Michael Gage (l34); 5. Thomas Tucciarone (116); 6. Mark Miller (113); 7. Craig McLean (104); 8. Thomas David Hull (103); 9. James Lickwar (97); to. Paul Orlandi (96); 11. Bill St. John (90); 12. Robert Gon7.alez (89); 13. Kurt Mund (82); 14. David Hull (SO); 15. Shawn Conrad (70); 16. Nick lenatsch (63); 17. Larry Schnur (44); 18. Michael Dube (4'1-); 19. David Kieffer (38)i 20. Patrick Cody (35). Upcoming Rounds: Round 7 - Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, June 14 Round 8 - Loudon, New Hampshire, June 21 15

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