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VOLUME 57 ISSUE 50 DECEMBER 15, 2020 P155 was important, but I had almost won the 500cc title, and that was a big deal. The Trans-Am was still a big deal, too. The thing was that we raced so much among all the series, and we just went out every week to win. And don't forget, the supercross season was broken up by the outdoors. Supercross started in February, but it didn't end until October." And even without Hannah, there were plenty of pretenders to the Supercross throne, includ- ing Bell's Yamaha teammate Broc Glover, Team Suzuki's Kent Howerton and Mark Barnett, and Team Honda's Chuck Sun, to name a few. Before the '80 season was over, all of them, as well as Daytona Supercross victor Rex Staten, would be race winners. In fact, after starting off the series by winning the first two rounds in Seattle, Bell finished 11th at round three in Oakland, California. "I twisted my knee," Bell says. "That was pretty disastrous. I had started having trouble with my knees in 1978. When you think about it now, if a guy gets 11th now, it's almost all over for him." But that doesn't mean it was any easier then than now. Be- sides the level of competition a rider had to face, there was also a virtual "sudden death" format in Supercross to keep the competi- tors on their toes. ''Another thing that a lot of people forget is that we had four heat races, and that if you didn't finish your heat race in—I forget what the spot was—but I think they took the top four to the main, and fifth through 12th went to the semi," Bell recalls. "If you had a DNF or a crash, or you broke a clutch cable or had a chain come off in your heat race, you were done. You didn't get to ride the semi. It was just over. And even with our works bikes, that was a time when chains used to fall off, people would break cables or foul plugs on the starting line. Wheels broke. Those are things that modern-day riders can't even comprehend." But Bell had come to win and win he did. Before the 1980 season was through, he would win seven of the 17 AMA Super- cross rounds that year, clinching the title at the penultimate round of the series, the second night of the doubleheader in Philadelphia. And when he didn't win, he was consistent, making every main event and finishing off the po- dium only three times all year. A victory at the series finale in San Diego, California, was just the icing on the cake, with the final points tally showing Bell outdis- tancing Howerton, 395 to 346. While winning the AMA Super- cross title was all well and good for Bell back then, he says he would only come to appreciate it much later, not just because it turned out to be the only title he ever won, but because the fact is that the AMA Supercross Champi- onship has become the most cov- eted motocross title in the world today. Like a fine wine, it has aged to perfection, making Bell a vintage icon in the sport. Those whose names grace the honor roll of the now defunct 500cc Nation- al Championship MX Series wish they had it so good. The situation leaves Bell proud and humbled at the same time. "When I look back on it now, it is the single greatest racing accomplishment that I achieved," says Bell, who retired in 1983. "Five times I finished second in the 250cc and 500cc National Championships. Five times I was the bridesmaid, and those all hurt because I was a contender every time, but to have won even one championship has meant a lot to me, and it [the AMA Supercross Championship] has turned out to be the most important one. At the time, I would have traded my Supercross Championship for the 500cc National Championship in a second, but now, absolutely not. It's the one thing that nobody can take away from me. My cham- pionship is nearly forgettable, but I can say that I have something in common with Ricky Carmichael and Jeremy McGrath. I'm proud of that. You know, the Supercross title is something that became very big, very fast." Taking that last point into consideration, maybe it's not so surprising that Bell won the 1980 AMA Supercross Championship. After all, he too was very big, very fast. CN Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives

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