Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

At th e end, he fend ed off Capirossi by .148 of a second, com pleting the 30- . lap, 65.4-mile race in 44 minutes, 49.622 seco nd s. Aprilia Ge rmany' s Ralf Waldman n was a popular third, recovering from a near collision with Shinya Nakano on t h e 13t h lap to pass the inju red Japanese 'rid er cleanly six laps lat e r. H e wa s 8.882 s econds be hind Capi ro ssi , with Nakan o fourt h, t h e Chesterfi eld Elf Tech 3 Yam aha rider racing through th e pain of a n injured right elbo w and wrist that nearly prevented him from riding. Rossi not onl y took over the cha mp ionship lead, he opened up a ya wn ing ga p of 18 points, 165-147, over Ukawa. Nakano is third at 125. After a season spent struggling on a d evelopment chassis, Ita lian teenager Ma rco Me land ri wen t to th e s tandard H ond a RS125 fra me, reason in g th a t it would wo rk better on the tight bends of the Sachsenring. He wa s righ t, and the result was his firs t win in nearl y a yea r, since the 199$ Czech GP at Brno . Melandri, 16, had remar ked the previous day that he felt his ri val Emilio Alzamora, 26, of the Via Digital Honda team, was riding dangerousl y. Yet it was Alza mora he'd first have to pass, and then have to fend off, the Spaniard making a spirited last-lap run, on ly to come up just short. It was Alza mora' s thi rd ru nner-u p finish, and all h a ve been close. Ad ded u p , the com b in ed deficit by which he has fallen short for the three races is .299 of a second . The lead serum was four strong, wi th Giv i Ho nda LCR ' s Lucio Cecchi nello finishing third, .538 of a second behind Alzamora, while Va sco Rossi Ra cing Aprilia's Roberto Locatelli was fourth, ano ther .729 of a seco nd back. Despite finishing third for the third tim e thi s year, Alzamor a's consolation wa s b eing able to close on cha m p ion ship le a d er Ma sa o A zurn a . . Th e Ben ett on Pla yl ife H ond a r id er w a s eigh th and now leads the title chase by 10 points, 157-147, over Alzamora, aft er n ine of 16 ra ces. Locat elli is third at 113. (Left ) Alex eriville (3) charged through fr om his poor starting position to eventually challenge Roberts. (Right) When push came to shove, however , Roberts had what it took to score his third SO cc GP win of O the seaso n. . 500cc GRAND PRIX For the first time in years, Ame ricans ran one-two in a 500cc GP, with Roberts leading Kocinski off the start and No rick . Abe a close thi rd as th e crash co u n t, w hich wa s alr ead y a record, continued to mount. Marlboro Yamaha's Max Biaggi was the first to go, low -siding on lap one, followed soon after into the gra vel trap by Luca Cad al o ra , wh o ma y no t h a ve tamed the p o w erband on th e p ea ky MuZ as much as he would have liked (see qualifying sidebar), beC ause he was flicked off hard in a downhill left. Then it w a s N obuatsu Aoki 's turn, on the four th lap. It was Aoki 's second crash of the weekend . By n o w it w a s th e fifth lap , a nd Roberts and Kocinski had a sma ll margin. Then came Ab e and Barros, with Criville shad owing fellow Spaniard Checa and overta king him in turn one on the sixth lap . Now he was up to fifth a n d on th e move. At abo ut the sa me time, Barros passed Abe for third . Barros' lap time was over eight-tenths of a seco nd faster than Roberts, a clear indica tion that he was a force to be reckoned with, and that Roberts wanted to contro l the pace, saving so methi ng for the end . " I tried thre e or four lap s to get a ga p Roberts gets number two T ea m Suz u ki's Kenny Roberts Jr. could tak e very little com fort from his second pole position of the yea r. Yes, he wa s fas test, but the top 11 we re on the same seco nd, the secend -closest qualifying sess io n ever. And th e front ro w wa s made up of four different brand s for the first time in a nyo ne's memory . Robert s' fast time had come in Friday'S qu alifyin g sess ion. He felt the time would stand up for the weekend, and on Saturday aftern oon he chose to work on race setup instead of one hot lap. The pla n worked . Not only did his circu if record lap time hold up, by a scant .124 of a seco nd over Alex Barros, but he was able to use the session to ru n a numbe r of very competitive lap tim es whi le d oin g end ura nce testing. "I asked (chief engineer) Warren (Willing) an d (crew chief) Bob (Toomey) thi s morning, ' Do yo u think this is a fron t-row time?'" he said of his 1:27.318. "We all decided it'd be a frontrow time, and m entall y I wanted to ge t in the co nserva tive mod e an d try to test race stu ff. If you look at our lap times, they were all 28s. I expect that's wh at th e race should be - they were 285 a nd 295 last yea r. And we haven't had a p roblem qualify ing, an d I don 't care abou t po le because I don' t ge t anyt hing for the pole. But I d o get stuff for wi nning races, so that' s why I wanted to test." Rober t wa s working on several thin gs. "Just getting the wei ght balan ce correct," he sai d. "Tha t' s the toost important thing o n a 500, because wh en the gri p goes d own , you want the bike to stay balan ced . If it goes too much to the front, you star t pu sh ing the front . If it goc'S too mu ch to the rear. yo u sta rt sliding:' Roberts was also on the provision al pol e Friday, after which he'd sa id , "I think we're able to rid e our bike a little bit more aggressively than the Honda guys, but they' ll catc h up to us by on John (Kocinski), and it wasn' t happening," Roberts sai d . "A nd I thou ght, 'You kno w, if I keep pushing, I'm going to wear m yself ou t and burn m y tir es up: I would say seven laps into the race, I just ki nd of wan ted to see what was go ing to happen. And I could hear the ot her bikes in so me corn ers, and so I was just kind of in m y mind trying to see w here they were ga in ing on me and w here th ey w ere ge tt ing away a little bit: ' Somehow, the Sachsen rin g manages to cra m 19 comers into its 2.18-mile layou t, putting a premium on h a nd li n g over po wer, a situa tion which favors the underp owered Suzuki. The hot weather took its toll on tires, but Roberts may be the most comfortable rid er in the field wh en slid ing the rear . On the seven th lap , Barros had Kocinski, and he set out for Robe rts, the field tigh tenin g up as Crivil le closed on Abe and then passed him on the eighth lap. Barros s melled blood , h opin g th e Su zuki of Roberts was chewing up its tires, as it d oes after a fashion, and the shark wa tch was on. Barros gave him a look on the inside toward the end of lap nine, but waited - Roberts' lap time was slower th a n th e rest o f th e to p seven. That bunched th e fiel d right back up, an d it was anyo ne's rare . the time we get to the race, especially if we have a not her dry day tomorrow an d a dry warmup. They'll be coming ." They did com e, bu t od d ly in the form of Movi Star Honda Pons' Barros, who took seco nd, in front of the Team Biland GPJ MuZ Weber of the re turning Luca Cadalora, wit h Carl os Ch eca makin g it four makes on the front row by slotting the Marlboro Yamaha into fourth. Barros mig ht have stolen the po le from Roberts had he no t hit tra ffic late in the session. The :U 8-mil e Sachsenring is seen as a glorified go- kart track wit h 19 co rners a nd therefo re 19 oppo rtu nities to be balked . Even Robe rts go t held up in the second session wh ile goi ng for a flyer. Like everyone, Barr os had wa ited until the final five minutes to fit a soft rear an d go for the pole, and he nearly d id . "I' m not first because I found a lot of rid ers in the last five minutes," the 28-yea r-old Brazilian said . Even with the second-fastest time , Bcl ITOS wasn't hap py w ith the fro nt tire on his NSR, though he was confident he cou ld win. Cadalora loo ked like the happiest kid on the block, bea ming after tu rning a time just .093 of a second slo we r than Bar ros, good for thi rd best. What he may have been mos t pro ud of was tha t it was his technical expertise that a llowed the tea m to tame the high-powered engine. "Yesterd ay after practice I spoke to the team and explained that this fine engine is so strong that it wouldn' t rea lly matter to sacrifice five or 10 horsepower if we can gain ,1 smoother power delivery on this track:' Cadalora said. "A nd I ask ed them to lower the cylinder ports by a fract ion ." The team lowered the ports of the four cylinders, takin g a fractio n of a mill imeter away a nd remachining the squ ish in the cylinder head to mak e up for the loss. "It makes all the d ifferen ce, beca use now it' s so much ea sier to contro l the pow er out of the many slow turn s of this track," Cada lora said. , Cadalora also d ismi ssed as idl e gossip a ll the specu lat ion that he'd been sacke d from the team in favo r of New Zeala nder Simo n Cra!a r. It was sim ply the inju ry at the Dutch IT in Assen that kept him away from the follow ing British GP. Top Yamaha honors wen t to Carlos Checa, th e Spa n iard rebounding fro m a Friday crash to post the fou rth-best time. Checa was new to the track, having sa t out last year's ina ugu ral On the 10th lap, Barros we nt cleanly under in th e fi rs t of the d oub le le ft s leading to th e fini sh chic ane but oversho t it, and Rob erts came back insid e, the pair collid ing on th e second of th e tw o lef ts when Ba rros came d own on Roberts. He was off in to the gravel and cou ld n't sa ve it. He'd remount and finish eighth. Barros had the.followi ng view on the inci dent: "Robe rts' movement was not correct. My rh ythm was faster than the rest of th e riders. Fro m now on I will treat him the same way." Roberts, of cou rse, disagreed. "We ll, if you know anythi ng abo u t racin g, I d id n' t touch him , he tou che d me ," Ro berts sa id . "Th e guy on th e inside on a correct line has the rig ht of way , you could say . And I knew Barros was behind me, and I could hear .his bike. I was expecting him to co me by ther e, wh ic h h e di d . I th en got und e r h im before the next corner. Wha tever he did after that is his own problem. That's racing . He d idn 't wa nt to give up the lead tha t he had for one comer, an d I di dn't want to give up the correct line throu gh the corne r. I didn't give up my line and he did n't give up his. And he was on the wrong one -tha t's why he fell down." Rob erts had a momentary breather, bu t Criv ille was coin ing . race following his seve re cras h in the British GP at Donin gton Park. This cras h, his 18th of the year, happened when he got on the gas too soo n, ran off onto the grass an d tumbled. Sp ill nu mber 19 came in Satu rday's free pra ctice. The afte rnoon qu alifying session was better. Ch eca ea rn ed his first front-row start since the French GP in May by putting in a lot of seat time . "My secret here is simple: Just go out and ride, rid e, ride: ' the 26-yea r-old Spa niard said. "This is the way I like to d o it. I a m still trying to understand the character of the bike, but I think we are slowly adapting to su it each other." Kan em ot o Hond a 's John Koci nsk i led off the seco nd row aft er be ing fourth fastest on Friday. Like the others, Kocins ki ran int o traffi c del ays and was bum ped back a row. The congestion convinced him the race could be problemat ic. "This is going to be a really d ifficu lt race because it' s so har d to ove rtake here," Kocinsk i said. "The only way to be in -with t1 chance of ge tting a goo d result is to get a good start." Marlboro Yam ah a's Max Biaggi wa s sixth, slow ly dropping d own the cha rts, then making a mistake on what would have been his fastest la p. xause the lap I made a mistake on I had been "Irs a sha me l.... fast est in th e T1 and T2 (inte rmedia te ) sections, so I thi nk I would've been on the pole or second: ' said Biagg i, who was only 5 19 of a second uff pole. "With five minutes to go , I came in for another rear so I could have another go at pole , but there was too mu ch traffic ." The tortuou s track should have better su ited Ap rilia's Tetsuya Ha rada. Instead he cras hed afte r losing the fron t end on qualifying tires, and that meant h is time for a one-off lap was over. It was on ly his seco nd cras h on the v -twi n Aprilia, but i t ma de h im reali ze ho w bum py the track wa s and ho w t.~ asy it was to lose the front end . "For me, it was im po rtant to ge t a good place on the grid, because it's very hard to overtake here: ' Harada said . Antena 3 Yama ha- D'Antin's N orick Abe took eighth, opting to do very little ad justment to his YZR-Yamaha . " I used th e same settings as yesterday and ,,;11 stick wi th the m for the race, because, although we tried a few adjustments, nothin g felt a s good," he sai d . '" '" '" r:D '"> 3 ...., 19

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