Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Cycle News 1999 07 21

Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles

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ust before leaving for the Las Vegas Su perc ross in lat e Apri! , I g ot a ph one call fro m a guy.named Pau l Taublieb. Hunched over my d esk w ith the telephone receiver in one hand and a keybo ard beneat h the fingertips of the other, [ imp atientl y waited for Taublieb to ask me some sort of qu estion like, "When is Cycle News going to do an article on the Suzuki SV6S0?" or "W ho wo n the d irt track race last weekend?" 1 was wrong . Taublieb aske d no time-suckin g, annoying question of an y kind , and he wasn' t even calling to annou nce the op ening of his new Web site. Instead , Taublieb was soliciting something, and before he cou ld finish telling me that he wo rked for LXD, a company th at prom otes fre es ty le motocross competitions and that was currently work ing on an event for ESPN's XGam es, [ was so ld . Wh at Taublieb was really selling was the opportunity for me to be a jud ge at the actu al event , which was scheduled for the last week in June in San Francisco. Without hesita tion an d without askin g my boss, I dived in. On ce I had comm itted, Taublieb told me that hi s secre ta ry wou ld call and arran ge my flight and hotel reservations in the near future. Weeks went by, and the only phone calls [ got were the usual "Who w o n th is?" a nd "Whe n is Cycle News going to te st that?" qu esti ons, ins tead of the "Window or aisle sea t?" kind . I began to wo rry . After ou r initial conver sation, no soon er d id Taublieb hang up the phone than ' 1 started dialing it to tell all my friends an d famil y that I was going to be a judge at the X-Gam es. Had I gone to the Vegas Supercross and the Glen Helen, Hangtown, and Sou thwi ck National Motocross races boa stin g about some thing that wasn' t even tru e? Everyo ne wo uld think I was a ph on y. [ started to get a funn y feeling that someone from my pa st was playing a joke on me and that Pau l Taublieb was their alter ego. The possibility th at Taublieb was just a figm ent of my imagination due to lack of sleep also crossed my mind. Staying up Sunday night tryin g to wri te race cove rage for a Monday morning deadline does fu nny thin gs to your head . Finally, I decided to make other plans for th e d ays th a t I th ou ght I w as su ppos ed to be spend ing in San Francisco . My options were not that bad, actually. [ cou ld either go to the Mammoth Mountain Motocross, a ttend ' th e Best in th e Desert Silver State 300, or jus t sit at home a nd h id e fro m th e em ba rra ssm en t of J b eing a b ig talker and prod u cing n o res ul ts. Ju st w he n it looked lik e I.w as going to be riding the couch insiead of a • tro lley car, I go t a call from Judie at LXD. As I sa t in m y wi ndow se a t o n th e way up to Sail Francisco, 1 couldn' t wait to tou ch down so [ could head straight d own to Pier 30/32, wher e th e en tire extreme festi val was takin g place. Once on th e gro u nd, I dragged 3 1/2 days' worth of lu ggage to th e loading- and unl oading zone, where 1waitedto board the shu ttle that LXD had arra nged for m y transportation . Th e SFO Airporter shu tt le, which was an old Greyhound bus co m p lete with old upho lst er y, old br akes, and an old -wo ma n dri ver, pulled up to the curb after I had waited only a few minutes. After the d river sna tched m y bags fro m m y hands and .rny back and threw them in the storage compartm ent underneath the bus a lo ng with everyone else's luggage, we we re off. Once we got into the downtown area of San Francisco, [ could n' t believe m y eyes. Nearly every street for miles was bl ocked o ff b y temp orary ch ain-link fenc es, d et our signs, and ped estrians floo d ing th e street s. I th ought th e XGames was ta king pl ace on a massive pier in San Francisco, not the entire city. As the bus d river screeched her brakes an d cu rsed at th e grid locked traffic , I overheard a pa ssen ger behind me as k, "What are all the streets blocked off for?" Just as I was abo ut to proudly chime in, the woman sitting in the aisle acros s from me beat me to it. . " It 's t h e G a y Pride p arad e," s he answe red, to my astonishment. I took a closer look ou t the window and sa w a tall, broad-shoulder ed lady w alkin g d o wn the s t ree t w ith a n A da m's appl e . I g uess th e X-Games wer e takin g place at the pier, after all. The bu s dri ver continued to maneuver her w ay through her d etoured route, a nd a t the fir st sto p she co lle cted the transit fee from all the passengers, handed ou t receipts to those who need ed them , and announced that this was her final da y working for the SFO Airporter . At one pa rticu lar intersec tion, she w as required to make a tight right-hand turn that w as no t p art of the normal bus rou te, bu t b ecause of the p arade, she w a s rerouted down thi s narrow twoway street. At first it did not appear as though she wou ld make the turn wi thout taking some p arked cars and e,:,en so me moving ones wi th her, but as one passe nger p oin te d ou t, "Th a t w as a dose call, but you made it." In a cackling la ugh, th e bus driver rep lied, "I don 't care. It' s my last day!" Everyon e ap plau ded . The last s to p wa s the San Fra ncisco Hilton , w hi ch serve d as th e X-Ga mes h otel headquarters . With m y b ag s, I entere d the swank hotel lobby an d was surprised to see it packed with people, some stand ing, some sitting on their luggage, but all of them im patient. I walked through the smoke-filled hall to the hu ge front desk, and before I could pr esent my nam e, the man behind the counter blurted out , "Th e compu ter s ar e d own and we won't check anyone in until 2 p.m." I turned a ro u n d a nd lo ok ed a t m y watch , wh ich di splayed noon, s traigh t up, and I was su pposed to be ata judges' meeting at Pier 30/32 at 1 p.m. I had no idea h ow far it was to the pier; and [ wasn' t abo u t to carry all my bag s down there, either. Who knew w here I wou ld be able to put them ? The camera - which I sold a motor cycle in ord er to pay for was m y biggest conce rn . I turned back ar ou nd , ready to as k the clerk if th ere was so me w he re I cou ld put my ba gs, wh en he blurted ou t, "If you want, you can leave your stu ff at the bell desk." I reluctantly left my belongings with th e bellhop in a pil e of other p eople' s belongings before heading ou tside to hail a cab. The cab driver also had an improvised ro ute that he used to ge t aro u nd the hoop la of th e col orful parade, but before long I was dropped off onto a cobbleston e crosswalk across the street from the X-Gam es venue, which was just as colorful and jus t as loud as the celebration on the other side of town. The pier was incred ible. A temporary arena for nearly every extreme sport, . wit h the excep tio n of s treet lou ge and wake boardin g, had been cons tru cted with the San Fran cisco Bay and the big Bay Brid ge as a backdrop. The northeast corne r of the pier is w here the freest yle motocro ss cou rse was located, and after meeti ng Taublieb and the rest of LXD, I go t m y fir st g li m p se o f w ha t w ould esse ntially be my home for 2 1/2 days. Tha t Sund ay a fte rnoo n , th e judge s had the first of many meetings at which we were in stru cted o n the lOO-point judging scale a nd th e electronic keyboards that recorded our im pression of each rider's perform anc e. [ was on e of a five- ma n panel wh ich a ls o inclu ded Davey Coo mbs from RacerX Maga zine, Matt Schlingman from Wid e Open Magazine, Jon Freeman of Crusty Demons of Dirt fam e, and Jordan Burns, part-owner of the Moto XXX Team an d al s o th e drummer o f Strung Out. Jeff Davis, a professi onal fr eestyl e sno w bo a r d ing judge, was thrown in, with th e titl e of h ead judge . Da v is was th ere to help things run smo othly, keep us in line and rem ind us that "it" wasn' t abo u t "us ," the judges. "It" was abou t the athletes. The en tire event was about the athletes, but lucky for us , Davey Coombs, m yse lf, and a crowd of other prisongoers es ca ped long eno u gh to ca tch a ca b d own to th e pi er , w he re Alc atraz boat tours left regularly. Un lucky for us, all the to urs for th e day were book ed . Our trip was a wash, and the vigorous sched u le of being an X-Games judge did not allow an y other day trips arou nd the city, just late night s in the hote l lounge. Even wa tchi ng othe r eve n ts was not easy, because w e spent a lot of time ge tting the ju dg ing procedure d own pat. On Tuesda y, th e d ay of th e actu a l recorded event , nearly every man, wo man and child on Pier 30/ 32 looked on as nine extreme freestyle motocrossers took flight. Each rid er took tw o sepa ra te 7S-seco nd semifinal runs on the sm all jump course. that was wrapped around the BMX jump course, the event for which the X-Garnes is best kn own. After two ru ns each, the five best riders .were moved into the finals based on their performance. You' ll likely never see the final ou tcome on film, because neith er ESPN nor ABC showed it in their coverage of the eve nt. Fifteen -year-oldTravi s Pas tra na we n t into the finals w it h a su bs tantial lead, and af ter his first run, he mathematically already had the wi n in the helmet ba g. On the final run of the entire c om petition, Pastrana used a berm as a tak e-off ramp, laun ching him and his RM12S into the San Francisco Bay. The crowd we n t wild, the riders went wild, the jud ges went wild , the Save The Bay people went wild. Though Pastrana was not instructed to not take the ju mp, part of his $10,000 purse, und erstandably, wen t to fishing th e Suzu ki out of the ba y. Th e rema ining p art w en t to th e Save The Bay Foundation. A t lea st he got to keep his X-Games gold medal. Need less to say, freestyle motocro ss mad e a hu ge spl ash at its debut performan ce in the X-Games . The entire event w as eve n m or e exciting th an th e bus eN rid e fro m the ai rport to the hotel. 30 Y AR E SAGO... JULY 29, 1969 20 YE SAGO... AR JU LY25,1979 1 0YEARS AGO... JULY1 1989 9, ohn DeSoto and Mert Lawwill sha red the cover of . th is version of Issu e #28. Th e "Flyi n' Hawaiian" was in the news again as he made his re tu rn from an injury w hile competing in Europe. Lawwill (H-D), o n th e o t h e r h a n d , ha d just won the Ca stle Rock Natio na l IT in Wash ington. He w as followed across the finish line by local favo rite Sonny Burres (Tri) an d di rt track' s gra nd old ma ster , Dick Mann (BSA)... "Tri- . als - a tru e sport" was a feature that took a goo d look at the sport of observed trials, w hich was rapidl y ga ining popul arity in America... American Eagle took ou t a two-p age ad vertiseme nt to boast of its raci ng success during the month of July. In Brisban e, Cali forn ia, Dave Smith wo n the SOOcc Int erna tional class on his 40S Talon , wh ile a sim liarly mo un ted kid by the name of Brad Lackey won th e SOOcc Junior class... We ran a "Movie Review" about a flick th at was d u e ou t shor tly. The plot cen tered aro und two free-sp irited bikers w ho left Los Ange les in search of America. Cast memb er s included Peter Fonda, Denni s Ho p per and Jack Nic ho lson. Take a guess... he p avem ent met the d irt on the cove r of Issu e #28, as Mark Barnell (30) and Mike Bell (29) duked it ou t at the Su pe rbowl of Mo tocross, while Kenny Roberts challenged a th ro ng of ,TZ7S0s on his works YZRSOO at Sears Point Int ernation al Racewav. How di d they fare? Well , Barn ell (Suz) topped defending event champion Bell (Yam) to w in the Superbowl o f, Motocross at the Los Angeles Coliseum. Gaylon Mosier (Kaw) was third . Up no rth , Roberts han dily rode away ' to the vic tory in Rou nd 14 of the Wins ton Pro Series, leadi ng Skip Ak sland (Yam) and Gene Rom ero (Yam ) acros s the finish line... Elsew her e, Honda took out an ad tou tin g both its XRSOO-based dirt tracker and its hot-ri ding Junior, Jeff Haney. It seems that Haney was racki ng u p an impressive s tring of vic to rie s aboard the Jer ry Griffith-tuned machin e, incl uding two stra ight wi ns a t Cast le Rock and a win a t the old Sid ewi nders circuit in Or egon. Must've been the bike? .. Thanks to Frenc h motorcycle magazine Mo to Jou rnal. we got a look at the exo tic Honda SOOcc GP b ike, the focal point of a $9 million bud get earma rk ed tow a rd br ingin g Hond a the World Champion ship . icky Johnson (Ho n) may have wo n the Una dilla 2S0cc D.S, Grand Pri x mot ocross in New York, bu t he w as fo rce d to s h a r e t h e s p o t lig h t w ith motocross's gra nd old ma ster, Bob Hannah (Suz), who was riding his last race before retiring. Provi ng that "The Hurricane" could st ill s to rm, Han nah went 9-12 for nint h overall... Co nfusio n reign ed supreme at the Belgian SOOcc Gra nd Prix road race, as several restarts and two sets of resu lts forced the race resu lts to be declared un official pend ing ajudication of the protests. However it went. America figured to be cove red , as it seemed likely tha t either Wayne Rainey (Yam ), Edd ie Law s-on (Hon) or Kevin Schwantz (Suz) wo uld be declared as the winner... After Eric Ceboers suffered through a terrib le first moto in the Italian SOOcc GP mo tocross, Jeff Leisk (Hon) picked up the slack and went on to score the overall win, w ith Dave Thorpe (Hon) finishing second overall. The resul t left the trio wit hin 25 poin ts of each other in the cham pionship chase... In Czechoslova kia, American Trampas Parker (KTM) won the 12SccGP motocross over fellow Yank Bobby Moore (KTM) and Italian rider Sandra Puzar (Suz), J T R In I i i! III :i ~ " • 75

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