Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

ROAD RACE AMAIMBNASUPERBIKE NATIONALCHAMPIONSHIP A AlPro H M ondaO 600cc Supersport Series ils Round8:N wH m e a pshireInt'l Speedway By Henny Ray Abrams Photos by Tom Ril es LOUDON, NH, JUNE 21 h e lap char ts s ho w that Mu z zy Kawasak i's Dou g Chandler led all the way in th e Pro Honda Oil s 600cc Su persport race at New Ha mpshi re Intern ational Speedway, but that doesn' t tell the full story. . Chandler d id get the lead in tum one and ran the race at his own pace, ad justing his rid ing somew ha t for some bo thersome brake fad e late in the race, and he did cross the line in fro nt for all 24 laps . But as th e r ace wore d o wn , Yosh imura Suzuki's Aaron Yates made a run at him , coming up less than a seco n d s ho r t a t th e finis h . Ameri can Hond a ' s Ben Bostrom , wh o held off Yates as lon g as he could, finished a distan tthird . "I had a look on that las t lap go ing over the hilt" Chandler sai d of his pursuit by Yates, "bu t other than that, I. was read ing the .boa rd , an d at the start I d id kind of what I wa nted , go t ou t there and d id some good laps and started getting away, and then I put it in the conservative mod e. Aaron (Yates), once he broke into seco nd, her e he come and I definitely had to p u t m y head d own the la st three laps." Th ere w ere b a ckm arkers in bad pl a ces on th e last fe w laps, but they affected both riders equally and Yates wasn'{going to us e it as an excuse. "I was really riding hard the last few laps: ' Yates said after coming up .714 of a second short. "I wa s kind of getting tired ; I backed it off a bit. I was lik e, 'Come on, come on.' Whe n I finall y go t around him (Bostrom), I just wa sn ' t as strong as I should be. I couldn't d o no thing." With Americ an H onda ' s Mi gu el DuHamel hos pitali zed with a broken leg (see Briefly...), th e ch am p io ns h ip was thr own wide open, though the rid er at the top of th e sta n d ings didn ' t cha nge. Yoshimura Su zuki's Ste ve Crevier continues to lead the title chase, despite fini shing fourth a fter s liding all ra ce long wit h what he thought was a bad tire. "Occasionally you can get something that' s not right," Crevier said. " It was no t driving for wa rd, it was just spinning. We ' ve been struggling with setup , but not that bad . I got really d one wrong." Still, he's atop the stand ings with 226 p oin ts, 19 in front of Be n Bost rom . Cha ndler, by vi rtue of his fifth win of the yea r, moved in to th ird wit h 210 points. Cha nd ler comp leted the 24-lap, 38.4mile race in 31 mi nutes, 31.080 seconds a t an average speed of 73.101 mp h. It wa sn 't enoug h to b r eak DuH amel' s record from last yea r. Amer ica n H ond a ' s DuH am el ha d wo n h e r e th e pre v iou s th r ee years, which meant tha t in his abse nce, there wou ld be a new wi nne r. Chand ler wanted to make sure it was himself. H y p e rCy cl e Su z uki' s Jason Pridmore go t the ju m p on th e fie ld - too much of a ju m p, AMA officia ls d ecid- (Right) Ben Bo st rom (11) holds off Steve Crev ier (4) in the ir battle l or third place in 600cc Supersport . Bostro m eventually grabbed th e spot, thou gh he was no matc h l or Aaron Yates and eventua l winner Doug Chandler (below). T 00 Q\ Q\ ,...... 18 ed , and he wa s called in for a s top-and go-penalty . C ha ndler ha d dri ve n by him into turn on e any how, and se t off to make time on the 36-rid er field . He quickly ha d a second in han d o ver Bostrom, upping it to 2.5 seconds on the sixth lap , and then to over th ree by the halfway poi nt. The next lap, Yates wou ld fina lly ge t b y Bo s trom a n d se t a u t for th e leader. The cush io n woul d grow s lig h tly befor e Yates began gnawing away at it in the seco nd half of the race as Cha ndler ran into brake probl ems. "1 had a little b it of brak e fa de," Chandler said. " It wa s jus t one of those things. Thi s track is real hard and you use a lot of brake. I tried to co nserv e what I had ." Yates cut it below tw o seconds with five laps to go, knocking off a couple of tenths every lap u nt il he was w it hi n about 10 bike leng ths with tw o laps to g o . T he n th ey hit traffic in the fin al seq uence of turns. Cha nd ler got it first and then Yat es, the pa ttern repeating itself on the final lap. By then it was too late and Chandler was able to jet acro ss the line first. "I tried to figure ou t the end: ' Chand ler said . "I knew he was coming. I was jus t hoping I co u ld ge t through those backrnark er s, the last couple of groups between." "Yeah, I was riding as har d as I could ou t there: ' Yates sai d . "I almos t cras hed abo ut probab ly - how many tu rn s are there? - 13 turns, 24 laps . I wa s pu shin g really ha rd , as hard as I could. I w as rea ll y ho ping to g e t a ro u n d Ben (Bostrom) a little earli er than I did, but I ju st co u ld n' t d o it anywhere. Then it loo ked like he passed on the caution flag going into turn one and I thought that he 'd get a mea tb a ll or co me in for a s to p- a n d-g o or som e thing like th a t. That 's what the AMA said they wo uld have done to me last year if there wo uld have been enough laps rem aining, an d it look ed like there w ere pl en ty of la p s remaining this lime. Maybe they didn't catch tha t or something - I d on 't know . Finally I had to slick it und er him over ther e; I lost the front big time and I jus t man aged to hold it in th er e. I figured he'd come by on me on the front straig ht becau se he d id the tim e ea rlier. I he ld h im off an d fro m th en I jus t s ta r ted pulling and chas ing Dou g and pu sh ing as hard as I could. I go t to the point that I d idn't care if I fell or not. I wa s just so ou t of shape backing it in." Bostrom found himself a lonely third, in n o d an g er o f bein g ca ug h t fr om be hind and kn owing he cou ld n' t keep up with the front-runners' pace. "I was holding him up a little bit just trying to keep him behind me," Bostrom said. "Every lime he pa ssed me I tried to stu ff him back real qu ick to make sure he d idn't get some ya rds on me . O nce he go t by me , he started running Doug down and there was nothing I could d o. I w as just going to ha ve to take third today . He s ee m ed to go ju st a li t tl e quicker through the corners tha n I did . He was jus t running it reall y ha rd and I just wasn't sho vi ng it in as hard as he was. Obviously, that was just costing . ] felt like my bike ra n rea l good down the s trai gh taw ay . ] was goi ng to get h im back. He just kep t wo rking me over in the corners and es pecia lly in th e back section. I just cou ldn't handle the pace." Yoshimura Suzuki 's Crevie r was able to run third ear ly in the race before his teammate Yates dropped h im on the fou rth lap . After that , Crevier ran the . w ho le race alo ne, his rear tire keepin g him from maki ng any progress. "I put on a big strong charge to try to catc h Ben and Aaron - I knew he' d be charging hard - bu t I tried to catch up and t he ba ck end wa s jus t comi ng aro und too much:' Crevier said . "It was violent. I think it wa s just a bad tire. It might have been a bad tire. I had more chatter than norma l on the wa y in, on braki ng - mor e chatter, really no grip 'a t all. Lookin g at the other guys, it was like Ho ly Chri stma s - th ey w ere s tuc k . 1 w asn 't anywher e wi th them on the exits a nd it ju s t go t w orse and w orse a nd worse all. th rough the race. So I just had to slow down - going int o the corners I jus t had to s lo w down . I w a s really upset becau s e I knew m y la p lim s weren't good - they weren't showing me lap times - but I knew that I was doing those this morning in practice." His pace was stro ng enough to keep him in front of the ba ttle for fifth , the best on the race track. From ea rly on , HyperCycle' s Ni ck y Hayd en held the spot; then he was joined by Barnett Tool & Engi neering's Richard Alexa nde r and Erio n Racing' s Eric Bostrom . Bostrom had gotten a bad start and wou ld spend the firs t seve ra l laps trying to make up for it. "I go t a fairly good jum p and then I missed a shift," Bostrom said. "From the first turn, I go t in ther e on the inside and Richie Alexander came by me fro m the row beh ind me a nd th en he ran into Yates, and I ra n into him and we were hitting all those cones d own in one and kn ockin g all them over and it was just total chaos . It kind of shook me up a bit. We had to pass (Todd ) Harring ton and (Tomm y) Ha yden and a bunch of guys

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