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VOLUME 58 ISSUE 14 APRIL 6, 2021 P113 F rom all indications, the 1979 AMA Grand National Championship/Winston Pro Series promised to produce one of the best battles for become AMA Rookie of the Year since 1972, when Gary Scott, Kenny Roberts and Mike Kidd moved into the Expert class. So read the story penned by Gary Van Voorhis in Cycle News in May of 1979: The top six Junior riders of 1978 made a full assault on the Grand Nationals the next season—all of them trying to earn the prestigious Rookie of the Year honors. Topping the rookies who en- tered the 1979 season as first-year Experts was Michigan's Scott Parker, who was the top Junior rider in 1978. Ranking behind Parker was Californian Wayne Rainey. Coming in behind Parker and Rainey in the Junior standings were John Wincewicz of Oregon, Tommy Duma of Ohio, Charlie Roberts of Illinois, and Ronnie Jones of Oklahoma. Among the group, Parker held the distinction at the time of being the youngest rider to attain an Ex- pert ranking on the championship circuit, turning 17 on November 21 of 1977. The rest of the group fell in the 18- to 19-year-olds category. All the rookies were on hand for the season opening TT and Short Track Nationals at the Houston Astrodome, though Jones and Rainey were the only two who made it to the National in the Short Track race. Both did well, with Jones scoring a fifth and Rainey taking ninth, with both riding Ya- mahas. Incidentally, Jones' fifth in the Houston Short Track bode well for him winning Rookie of the Year, since that finish was equal to the best ride of any of 1978's rookie candidates. "I remember how tired I was after only 10 laps," Rainey said in the Michael Scott book: Wayne Rainey: His Own Story. "I thought, 'Wow, I'm really going to have to shape up.' I never rode that hard in my life. Until then, races would be over in three or four minutes. The Nationals were 25 laps, 15 minutes or more, and that was a long time. My arms were getting pumped up, my tongue was hanging out, and I was dead beat. It was a whole new experience for me." Ronnie Jones remembers being a wide-eyed kid, full of wonder as he made his Pro Expert debut. "Not knowing what to expect, and racing against all these guys who'd been my heroes... Even with all that, I had so much confidence that I was as good as anyone out there. It's just something that comes with being an 18-year-old kid ready to take on the world." Parker had similar feelings to Jones, and he entered the season with sky-high expectations. But he fell to Earth after not making the main in either the Short Track or the TT in the Astrodome. "I'd pretty much kicked every- one's ass my Junior season, and I just knew it was going to be the same when I turned Expert," Parker recalls. "We showed up at the Astrodome and I didn't qualify for either program [Short Track or TT] and I thought, 'What the hell! These guys mean business.' I wasn't thinking about Rookie of the Year so much, I was just trying to go out and win races." Parker turned the season around later in the year when the series hit the bigger Miles and Half Miles. He got on a roll, scored a slew of podiums and even won at Du Quoin and Indy, and it was the man from Michigan who went on to become AMA Rookie of the Year. "You know, I battled these guys as Juniors," Parkers says. "And these were the days when there would be so many riders that sometimes you'd win your heat and not even make the main. And rac- ing against Chas, Ronnie, Wayne, Tommy and them, helped me to get to a whole new level. We pushed each other, and I feel all those guys had some part of helping me win the championships I won, just by racing me as hard as they did." Duma said that all through the years most of these guys who came in together as rookies in 1979 continue to stay in touch. "I mean, we raced each other tooth and nail, but we became pretty close off the track," said Duma. "I still keep in touch with most of those guys. I've stayed at Wayne's house and went on vaca- tion with Ronnie." Jones was even the best man for Roberts at his wedding. That's the kind of friendship these guys built. And they still remember the battles. "Tommy was unbeatable on Ohio pea gravel," Jones remem- bers. "And Charlie beat us all when Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives