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Dougie Lampkin (Mon) took top honors at the Spanish Cup Trials in
BejarlPuertollan, Spain, on April 8. The
win was Lampkin's second in the World
Championship Observed Trials Series.
Second in Spain went to Marc Freixa
(Sher), followed by Albert Cabestany
(Bet), Jose-Manuel Alcaraz (Mon)
and Jarvis Graham (Sher). After three
of eight rounds, Lampkin has the series
points lead with 57, followed by Freixa
with 41 and David Cobos with 37.
Cobos (Mon) finished sixth in Spain.
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Rodney Smith (Suz) scored the overall
win at the Big Buck Grand National Cross
Country in Cross Anchor, South Carolina,
on April 8. Finishing second was defending
champ Shane Watts (KTM), followed by
Jason Raines ,
have devoted hundreds of hours to
repairing, maintaining and clearing many
of the area's trails, which are in danger of
permanent closure due to extreme political pnessure being applied by local environmentalists. CERA plans to continue
with trail repairs and are looking forward
to providing a quality Fools Gold Enduro
in 2002. In lieu of the enduro, CERA will
be hosting a 'Work and Ride" weekend
on May 5-6. For further information, go to
www.cera.org or www.ama-d36.org.
Round two of Gene Romero's
E-moola.com West Coast Flat
Track Series, scheduled for April 7 at
Fast Fridays' Speedway in Auburn, California, was rained out. Romero said that
he and Fast Fridays promoter are looking
at potential dates for the race to be
rescheduled, but nothing has been confirmed. The next round of the series is
scheduled for April 21 at Bakersfield
Speedway in Bakersfield, California.
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The press saw a short film of the bike running at PhHJip Island,
and were told that the new machine, an in-line four, was a ver:y compact unit It uses Yamaha's favorite live-valves-per-cylinder design.
But many details were kept secret, including the cubic capacity,
believed to be less than the 990cc allowed by the new rules.
Yamaha has chosen four cylinders rather than live (with the
same 319-pound minimum weight limit) because "we wanted to be
able to lit the motor into our existing GP chassis," said Sakurada.
Yamaha would not answer questions about detailed technology
- for example, how the compact size has been achieved. When
asked how many main crankshaft bearings are used, the reply
was: "Several."
Technology from the motor would "filter back" to production
machines, they said.
They expect to race both two-stroke and four-stroke factory
machines next season, but expect that the four-stroke would be the
more likely championship candidate.
Yamaha has not yet decided whether John Kocinski would test
the machine again.
"The contract was Just for one test with Kocinski. We have not
yet examined all the data from the test, and we will decide later
whether to ask Kocinski to test the machine again: said Sakurada.
Honda's new four-stroke, meanwhile, will take to the tracks for
the first time next week, with GP rider Tohru Ukawa scheduled to
test the V-live RC211 V at Sugo. Until now, only a mock-up of the
machine, with a V-four ex-Superbike motor, has been seen.
Michael Scott
•
The Houston Cyclefest weekend at Houston Raceway Park will include a
SuperTT event on Sunday, April 22. An
exhibition race will be run during Saturday
night's GNC half mile, with a full SuperIT
program scheduled for Sunday_ The
supermotard-style course will incorporate
the clay oval, an infield IT section and
paved road course with amateur classes
for all supermotard, motocross, dualsport and IT-capable dirt-track machines
to be run. For more information, call
949/768-4626 or visit www.supertt.com.
Yamaha's Anthony Gobert spent
three days in Malaysia last week, testing
the Suzuki Eight-Hour machine, along
with two Japanese riders. Gobert visited
the Sepang Circuit with Yamaha's Tom
Halverson, though there's no guarantee
that he'll run the Eight-Hours. "It's up to
the factory," Yamaha's Larry Griffis said.
"We looked at it as an opportunity to
have all the factory guys there and get
time on the bike.' Gobert arrived back in
the U.S. on Friday night and was to be at
n __ •
It's official: John Dowd will ride a KTM
in the 2001 AMAIChevy Trucks National
Motocross Series. According to KTM
team manager Selvaraj Narayana, Dowd
will compete in the 250cc class aboard a
KTM 520SX four-stroke. The New Englander will receive limited support from
KTM, as well as full backing from ERP
and Cernics. Factory Connection will tune
Dowd's suspension. Dowd recently started riding for the first time since haVing his
knee operated on follOWing last year's
National Series. Narayana says that
Dowd is very happy with his new deal and
will soon head to California to test and
get ready for the series opener at Glen
Helen Raceway, on May 13.
A delay in the delivery of new engine
parts to cure engine problems both here
in the U.S. and in the World Superbike
Championship, as well as the health of
one of its riders, has caused the American Honda road race team to pull out
of the multi-team test scheduled for April
10-12 at Road Atlanta. 'We did not
receive all of the parts that we were hoping to receive from Japan for this test, so
it was not going to be worth our while to
go out there and spin our wheels,' American Honda team manager Chuck Miller
said. The team has postponed the test
for a week so they can "make it a more
productive test.' All of the factory AMA
Superbike teams are scheduled to take
part in the April 10-12 Road Atlanta test.
Word began to circulate over the weekend that Honda might not take part, and
Miller confirmed it. It's no secret that
both the American Honda and Castrol
Honda World Superbike teams have had
engine problems. Nicky Hayden was
knocked out of the Daytona 200 with
engine troubles early on, later rejoining
the race on a spane RC-51. In the second
leg of Sunday's World Superbike race in
Kyalami, South Africa, the VTR-1000 SP2's of both World Champion Colin
Edwards and teammate Tadayuki
Okada retired with engine problems.
Okada had been taken out of the first
race at Kyalami, and the first race of the
first round in Valencia, Spain, with "electrical pr.oblems,' often a euphemism for
engine trouble. It's a safe bet that at least
one of those retirements was enginerelated and was likely similar to the problem Hayden suffered at Daytona. While
the Hondas were running at Daytona,
they were clearly faster than they'd ever
been at Daytona, at least according to
the riders who tried to stay in their draft.
