Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

lot - and I still have a lot to learn. It' s just a real up wa rd curve' for me and I think it 's be en a goo d tim e and th e resul ts have been good." . , Having clinched the championship in th e previ ou s round at Pikes Peak, Bostrom fini shed the y ea r w ith 363 points - 59 more than teammate Tripp Nobles, who was third today after a ra ce-long du el with Graves Yamaha' s Mark Mill er (w ho was second today) and Canadian Kawasak i's Micha el Taylor (who was fourth). Miller finished the , season third with 293 points. It wa s fittin g that the top thre e finish- . ers wer e also the top thr ee in the cha mpionship. Among them, they won all 11 round s, Bostrom taki ng nine, Nobles and Miller on e eac h. In the race, Miller, riding the co ns tan tly improving Yam ah a Rl , slotted himself into second on the eig h th lap when Valvoline EMGO Suzuki's Grant Lopez dropped ou t. Miller became the lead runner of a tri o, with Taylor a nd Nobles chasing, and held the sp ot until the 12th lap, when N obl es sli pped by . ' His lead was shor t-lived, however, with Miller almost ins ta n tly r eturnin g th e favo r an d th en u sing tr a ff ic to edge away. At the end his spo t was secure, and it wo uld move him to third in the cham pionship. . "I feel prett y good abo ut our year," Miller sa id of h is inaugu ral seaso n on the Gr aves Mot or sports Yamaha. "We se t o ut with a brand-ne w mot or cycl e th at h ad to be prov en an d d eveloped agains t a real talented bik e a nd a 900 (Honda) tha t' s been around a few years. We knew that it wa s going to be really difficult , and [ fee l that th e team ha s gi ven me absolutely 120 per cent and I'm really happy to be w ith th is team thi s year. They want to wi n really bad and I want to win really bad , an d they're very profes sional a n d 1 ca n' t say en ough about Graves Mot orsport s . This. bike was capable of winning these races, and 1 think that thi s bike could 've won tod ay and 1 think that Eric Bostr om had a little bit on Mark Miller. But there' s one solid thing tha t we need to test and get going if I'm go ing to rid e this bike nex t year in some of the sus tained fast sweeping corner s - we need to ge t the thing slid ing a littl e bit more predictably. It wasn' t an ything speci fic, it's just a combination of mding out how stiff we need the spring and what kind of chassis geome try . Tha t's the ki nd of thing we're d ealing with now . Th ey're nitpicky things that make th e difference between being in first and dicing for second ." The team gave him more power for this race, Miller said, and also fashi on ed the tank for a more comfortabl e fit. No bles sai d he tried to ge t away from Miller in traffic, but that it didn't work. He als o saw that Mill er w as on a bike that was slig htly bett er for the 2.5-mil e track. "I had a gre at tim e watching them ," Nobles said , refe rri n g to Mark Miller and Michael Taylor. "Michael kept trying to get it up u nd er Mark, and Mark's got s uc h good co rner speed o n th at ' Yamaha. I was con ten t to just sit and wa tc h th em , an d o n ce I go t around hi m... I d ecid ed he was goi ng to try to ge t away on me . Of co u rse, you saw w ha t happened : I could n' t do any thing with him. Wh en I saw traffic coming, I tried to get a way fr om h im - p r ett y much rule of thumb: You want to b e ah ead if you' re racing with so mebody. I di d it a coup le of tim es and then I got bo tched; then I almost threw it away ." Nobl es th ou ght th at Ta y lor' s Kawasaki wasn 't quite as stable as his Honda CBR900 in the fast sections and tha t the Ho nda was faster on top. "My bik e was actually fas ter th a n his," Nobles sa id . " It looks so s ta ble through the right-handers here, he wa s really making up a lot of tim e there . His bike was real good th rough the fast stuff while I was ou t there dirt tracking ." . Behind th e top three came Michael Taylor, s ha d owi ng Nobles to th e en d and well in front of what would be a procession. Va lv oline EMGO Su zu ki-m ounted Jos hu a Hayes en ded up alon e in fifth, 'follow ed at so me di stance by Michael Barn es on the Dutchman Yama ha . Then came Cz ech rid er Vi ncen t Va cla v ; who g ra d ua ll y broke free of RYHO Racing's Josh Graha m as the race wore on. A pair of Suzuki GSX-R750s rounded ou t the top 10, withRacers Edge Performance's Da le Kieffer beatin g Hooters' . Restaurants' Mari o DuHamel for l Oth, the pair once part of a quintet before leaving the others behind late in the race. I~ las Vegas Moto r Spee dway las Vegas, Nevada Res ults : Octo ber 3, 1998 (Round 11) rlR ELLI FO RMU LA XTR EM E: 1. Eric Bost rom (He n): 2. Mark M iller (Yam); 3. Trip p Nobles (Hon }, 4. Michae l Taylor (Kaw ): 5. Joshua Hay es·(Suz); 6. Micha el Barnes (Ya m); 7. Vincent Vacla v (Ka w): 8. Josh G raha m (Ya m); 9. Dale Kieffer (Suz): 10. Mari o Dul-lemel (Suz) : 11. Co ry c..u (5 uz ); 12. De a n Mizda l (5u z); 13. Chr is Vo elker (Hen): 14 . Mik e Voe lke r (H e n ): 15. D ean Vincen t (Yam ); 16. Eric Sewa rd (Suz ): 17. Greg White c.suz ); 18. Law rence Wolfel (Suz): 19. Dennis Burke (Su z ): 20. Dc yin Bartle y (Yam); 21. .Mic ke y Ma ~ zet ti (Suz ): 22. DaVId Perez (Due); 23. C urtis Ada ms (Tr i): 24. G ra n t Lopez (Su z): 25. Micha e l Kost a (Su z ); 26. Er ic WOI.:'Id IKaw ): 27. Mark Hensley (Suz ). Ti me: 24 m in.• 55.997 sec. Distance: 15 1 ps. 37.5 mile

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