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AMAIMBNA 250cc Grand Prix Series Round 1 : Daytona International Speedway By The Californian led off the start of the shortened 15-lap race (all the support classes were shortened because of inclement weather on Friday that caused the postponement of two classes) and was never headed, though he was pressured early on by defending race and series champion Chuck Sorensen on the Stargel Aprilia. At the end, however, Oliver was PAUL CARRUTHERS PHOTO BY HENNY RAY ABRAMS DAYTONA BEACH, Fl, MAR. 9 ittingly, Rich Oliver, the all-time win leader in the AMA 250cc Grand Prix class, won the 40th and final running of the AMA 250cc Grand Prix Series at Daytona International Speedway. The 41-year-old Oliver and his Team Oliver Yamaha won for a sixth time at the famous race place in central Florida for his 61 st career victory in the class. With the AMA discontinuing the 250cc Grand Prix class next year as part of its road race series, there won't be any more 250cc GP races at Daytona International Speedway, so Oliver gave us all something to remember with a send-off that was typical Oliver. r 38 MARCH 19. 2003' C II C • (Below left) Brit Simon Turner (111) rode his ell-Randy Renfrow Honda RS250 to third place. (Below right) Oliver won his sixth career race at Daytona and his 61st In the 250cc class. e n e _ s 11.4 seconds clear of his former protege after turning up the pace on the seventh of 15 laps and pulling away to a clear victory - the 61 st of his stellar 250cc Grand Prix career. A distant third today went to Brit Simon Turner on the ex-Randy Renfrow, Priority Racing-backed Honda RS250, putting three different brands of two-strokes in Victory Lane. Jensenstern.com's Colin Jensen rode his Aprilia to fourth, clear of the battle for fifth that ultimately went to Ed Sorbo over Sunsports-backed Perry Melneciuc. Because qualifying was basically washed out, the grid was set based on last year's championship finishes. Thus, Sorensen started from pole position, with Oliver on the outside of row one. Oliver used his spot to jet to the front in the first corner, riding around the outside to take the lead. It was a lead he would hold throughout the race. though not without some early pressure from Sorensen. For the first half-dozen laps, the gap between the two friendly rivals was only half a second or so, but that changed when they started to hit traffic. "You can get balked here, and I got balked a few times in the chicane," Oliver said. "I'm a little conservative with people at Daytona usually, because I don't know them all. A lot of time you get people who don't ride very much who come down here and do this race. I don't have a lot of data on these people that I'm passing or lapping, but you've got to get through them. If you can get through them and if you can tie together some clean laps, even if there are a bunch of guys in the way, sometimes the junk will hit Chuck, and sometimes it will hit me. I was just hoping to get lucky and get a little traffic break." The breaks in traffic seemed to go Oliver's way, but it was on the seventh lap that he really took control, putting in his best lap of 1:53.929 to pull out more than a second on Sorensen. From there the veteran steadily stretched his advantage until it reached 5.6 seconds after 11 laps. Then it went to 6.7, 6.8, 10.8 and finally 11.4 seconds at the finish line. "It's great," Oliver said. "I love Daytona. Daytona has busted me up hard last year, and then I had a blown motor one year, but we've always just been running well here the last three years when I got back to 250s after Superbike. But I never have been able to win, except when I raced Roland Sands that one year. And that was on myoid '96 Yamaha, which I had a lot of comfort miles on. I knew that bike really well. So this is my first' win at Daytona on my more modern 2002 Yamaha TZ250, so it's exciting that we're making some serious progress with that bike. It was an exciting race for me because I knew that I wanted to run out front with Chuck, and I knew that if we could pull away out front,' that would eliminate a lot of complications with the race. I knew that with the weather had been, I wanted to lead as many laps as I could because there is a point for that, and we didn't get any points for qualifying. Chuck is always great to race because he pushes me, pushes me and pushes me."