Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

I Cross Cou ntry Round 13: IronmanGNCC GRAND NA TlONAL CROSS COUNTRY SERIES • tiv e 29-somethin g for th e top 16 Pr os; th en th e sec ond dropped to 26:59 for leade r Watts and very low 27s for the next six players - Lafferty, Smith, Haw k, Blackwell , Edmondson and An d rews. But it was AM / PRO Yama ha 's Rand y Hawkins who tu rned the fas test lap , a 26:55, to move up to ninth. For the second race in a row, Team Green Kawasaki rid er Fred An drews, second in series points, led early only to succumb to bike damage and d rop out of the. eve n t. After battling with Smith for th e h ol eshot a nd the early lea d , Andrews a lmost simul ta neously crim ped his throttle cable and smashed h is pipe during an encounter with a tw ig ea rly in the third lap. He was forced to settle for a season total of 165 points. "I caug ht a twig on my thro ttle cable a nd yanked it wi de o pe n ," said And rews, "a nd 1 was jus t starting into a cornfield , so 1 didn ' t realize it untill go t (Left) An inj ury-Induced midseason hiatus prevented Shane Watt s from winn ing th is year 's GNCC title, but the humble Aust ralia n was victo rious at no less than six rou nds, inc ludi ng this fina l stop. (Below) Newl y rec rowned champion Rodney Smith (1) and Fred Andrews (3) dice off th e start. Smith led late , but settled for second afte r a crash. Smith turned th e fast est lap of th e race on the third go-around , a 26:39, to lead Watts by two seconds an d Lafferty by 10 through the scoring barrels-,Hawk, on a YZ400, and Blackwell, on a YZ250, also turned in lap tim es in the 26s, bu t they had lost the lead trio . Edmondson was o n the move a nd joined th e Hawk / Blac kwell battle on the fou rth lap . Watts led lap four after a lightningquic k pit stop. He led Smith by 12 seconds and Lafferty by 14 at the end of the fourth circuit, but the three would close qua rte rs aga in on the fifth lap. Attrition wo uld beco me bru tal on lap fou r. Until that point, only Josh McLevy, And rews, Tony Vanet and Kelby Pepper had retired . Rand y Hawkins had a seal blow on his rear-brake mas ter cylinder,rr endi ng his cha rge . Fellow four-strokers Jason Cater (on an XR400), Steve Leivan (on a YZ400) and Haw k also ground to a , halt. " It just sta rted sp u tte ring and pop-' ping after the second lap ," said Ha wk. "Finally, it just qu it ru nn in g. It would turn over, but it wo u ld n' t fire, so I hit the car b with a rock and it s tarted . It ' was still spitting and sp uttering, like it was running on a half-cylind er. When I finally go t it ou t of the gu lly, I was back with th e 250cc A rid ers, so th ere was , not hing 1 cou ld do bu t just ride back to the pits." r i By A.R. Flatbush 26 eRAWFORDSVILLE, lN, ocr. 24 eam KTM's Shane Watts claimed his six th win of the 1999 Grand Na tio n al Cross Co u nt ry se ries and jumped to fourth in poi nts at the season finale . Th e likable Australian and his 12Scc KTM survived a three-hour battle wit h newly crowned GNC C Cham pion Rod ney Smith and former End uro champ Mike Laffert y to take the lead wit h three miles to go and ultimately win by 23 seconds . Althoug h th e champi onship had a lr ead y bee n d ecided , the race provid ed pl enty of action and dram a, as only half of the 23 Pro starters finished the lronman GNCC. Wattsy' s win earned him braggin g rights for the next three or so mont hs, as the 2000 se ries w on 't s ta rt until next s p ring , a n d it proves that hi s w in in Uhrichsville, Ohi o, was no fluke. Watt s has seemingly put his k nee injury behind him. The injury forced him to miss four rounds and pull out of two others during th e vear. This w in lau nched th e 125cc pilot from seventh.to fourth on the year, despite o n ly scoring points at seven ro und s in the best-nin e-of-1 3 series . Watts has a second to go with his sixpack of firsts, while Smith's second-p lace finish in Indiana let him "throw away" a third and increase his nine-round total to 175 (four firs ts, five seconds) . Th e co rnfie ld s ta r t se nt eac h ro w aro und two huge hay-bale 180s and two 90s be fore head ing in to the w o od s . Smith and And rews ba ttle d for the h oleshot with Watts, Laffe rty. iBarry Hawk, Robbie Jenks , Chuck Wood ward an d Paul Edmondson hot on their tails, Team Green 's Jimmy Jarrett and Yama- - ha's Dou g Blackwell tangled in the second turn a nd were o ut o f the to p 20 go in g into th e w ood s, but th ey both turned up the wick and quickly caug ht the pack. Th e hare scra mb les champ, Blackwell , had clawed his way into the top 10 mid way into the first lap, with Jarrett dropping his teammate Andrews to 10th after capitalizing on miscues. Lafferty led the first trip throug h the barrels ahead of Smith and Watts, each a second apart. Ha w k ha d hi s YZ400F Yamaha in fourt h, seven seconds off the lead trio but three seconds ahead of SCR Yamah a's Jenks . Woodward w as six th on his KX250. Next came Edm ondson, Blackw ell and Jarrett. As Watts, Smith and o th e rs d id not walk th e course beforehan d, the first lap wa s a conserva- to the ot her side and wen t to shut off the gas . It wo u ldn' t sh u t off, so 1 ha d to throw her into the trees . I ha d two to choose from , so I picked the smaller one . That smashed my pi pe and pretty much ended my day. I tightened up there at first, bu t the bike was ru nnin g grea t, and I loosened up on the seco nd lap but then trage dy struck." He had to return to the pits, with no chance of cha rging to a points-bett erin g finish . However, his fate was better than Team Suzuk i's Steve Hatch, who sits in third on the year. Hatch broke four toes while tr aining in Arizona on Tuesday after an encounter wi th a TV-sized boulder, and he couldn't attempt to better his best-of-nine total of 160 a t Crawfordsville. .' Jarrett, who had cha rge d from 21st to seventh, had his ride end und er simi lar , circu ms tances on lap six. . "After the pit," Jarrett said, "it started running progressively worse, and~ then it just quit like it was ou t of fuel. I do n't know what it is, bu t we'll find ou t! when w e tear it d own. " r Watts a n d Sm it h p inned it on th e J final lap , with the champion lead ing the fierces t challen ger for next season int o ' the final 11 miles. Smith led at the mas-.' 1 sive uphill and mos t of the way around the last loop, only to auger in a mUdhole~ at the 8-mile ma rker. Watts slid by for an easy win with a 26:46 lap time and a~ victory ma rgin of 23 secon ds over Smith , a nd 1:07 o n La ff erty . Bla ck w ell ," Edmo ndson, Jenks , Joel Dengler, Blair '

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