Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

back to eighth. "I held Eatig off the last couple of laps in the first moto. He was putting on a good charge, and it felt good to do that." In the past, Hangtown has treated Suzuki's Greg Albertyn well. Last year, Albertyn posted second after splitting moto wins with Jeremy McGrath. The year before that, the South African won the event. It appeared as though Albertyn might repeat his former success as he went from eighth in the firsf moto to second, finishing behind Lusk. In moto two, Albertyn was involved in horrible first-lap crash tha t also claimed Lusk and Yamaha-mounted Motoki Tatsuyuki. Luckily, Albertyn was not hurt, but he could only climb as high as 12th at the end of the moto, placing him a disappointing sixth. So wha t happened to reigning 250ccc World Motocross Champion Tortelli? Once again the French rider put on a spectacular show, but it was too little, too late. In moto one, Tortelli got a bad jump off the line and crashed in the first turn. From dead last, he worked his way up to an impressive seventh. Moto two saw another mediocre start for Tortelli, which he could only turn into a fifth-place finish. Finishing seventh overall in the results, Tortelli had a reasonable explanation for his poor starts in the first two rounds of the series thus far. "Last week at Glen Helen was the first time I ever started on concrete," said Tortelli, who has grown accustomed to the traction-filled starting gates of the World motocross circuit. "1 worked a lot on the starts this week on my driveway. I'm trying to get better at it. It was the only place 1 could practice. You need to get a good start, and I'm still not good on concrete." Mazda/Chaparral-Yamaha's lone rider, Steve Lamson (9-7), Suzuki's Robbie Reynard (15-4) and Noleen/Yamaha-mounted Tim Ferry (11-9) rounded out the top 10. . "I'm finally, 1 think, learning how to ride a 250," said Ferry, whose 10th-place finish was good enough. for the top-privateer honors once again. "I've been rid. ing it like a 125, and I'm a little bit on the wild side, so I've calmed down a little bit and tried not to ride the thing in second gear all the time. I've been overrevving it too much. It's going to take a while to get used to it still. I'm just trying to catch and pass as many factory guys as 1 can." (Above) Afourth·place start in the first mota helped Ezra Lusk claim the firstmota win. In the second mota, however, Lusk had to make up time from a first-turn crash that left him In the back of the pack. He soldiered on to finish sixth in the mota, third overall. (Above right) Mike LaRocco finished one spot off the podium with a 6-3 mota tally. (Right) 23,745 spectators cheer as Doug Henry (1), Jeff Emig (11), Kevin Windham (14), Larry Ward (7), and John Dowd (6) separate themselves from the rest of the pack just moments after the start of the second mota. MOTOONE Windham. exploded out of the gate to start off the day, with the four-stroke of Henry, Suzuki's Larry Ward, Lusk, Emig, Honda's Mickael Pichon and Lamson closely in tow. Many others struggled just to make it out of the first turn. "1 got a horrible start - 1 was probably only ahead of a handful of people," said Yamaha's Jimmy Button, who was involved in a lot of contact at the start, though he luckily did not go down. "Someone got into me and got their wheel caught on my foot. 1 couldn't get it off me, and I was shaking and shaking it, and people were going around me, and finally 1 got it off." It was Tortelli who was hung up on Button's boot and, as a result, he went down. As the lead group raced over the finish-line jump and into the second turn, Tortelli remounted his CR250, hell-bent on catching the leaders. By the third lap, Tortelli had gone from 40th to 20th place. Meanwhile, Windham, Henry a.nd Lusk were involved in a heated battle for the lead, and just before the halfway point. of the moto Lusk 'went by his Honda teammate to take over the point. Once out front, Lusk put a lot distance between himself and the battle for second place between Windham and Henry, which soon would include Albertyn. "This track suites my riding style," Albertyn said. "I'm just ready to kick ass." The former World Champion did just that, in fact, in his first outing. Albertyn gated far out of the top 10, and by lap 11 of the 19-1ap affair he had passed Henry to claim third. Four laps later Albertyn passed Windham, moving into the runnerup spot, where he would finish the moto. Henry and Emig circled the finat few laps in fourth and fifth all the way to the finish. "1 didn't have a lot of confidence going into the first moto," said Emig, who made a serious threa t to pass Henry to take fourth but just-could not make it happen. "We've been off with some of our settings on the bike, and it takes some time to build confidence when you make changes. We made major changes from the first National to this weekend. 1 finally ran all right, though. My times were decent, but not real good.," Back in sixth place was LaRocco, who first had his hands full with no rear brake and then later with Tortelli. "I got through the first lap pretty good," LaRocco said. "T was sixth and 1 went wide and got a rope around my back brake. I launched off a jump and had no back brake, so 1 went down." LaRocco got up and somehow man- aged to get his brake back and hold Tortelli off as well, relegating the Frenchman to a seventh-place finish, ahead of Button, Lamson and Ward. Lamson was less than happy with his ninth-place finish. "It seemed like more guys passed me than 1 passed guys," said Lamson, who won the 125cc class last year at Hangtown via a 2-2 score. '1t kind of sucked. My arms were pumped up for over half the race. 1 was too worried about everybody behind me. Next moto I've got to pick it up." MOTOTWQ Lamson did pick it up at the start of the second moto, but he gated only as high as sixth. In the lead was the booming YZ400F of Henry, who grabbed an unsurprising holeshot on the uphill

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