Cycle News

we were novices." Roberts said he distinctly re- members seeing Wincewicz race for the first time. "It was down at the Daytona Short Track races at the old Memo- rial Stadium," he says. "John came down there as a novice going fast on a Honda 250cc four-stroke." Roberts was a scrapper. He had to be. His dad owned a Ya- maha shop, and he was racing the Yamaha vertical twins against the dominant Harley-Davidson V-twins. "I remember as a Junior racing in Ohio and Dave Despain was an- nouncing," Roberts said. "He was making a big deal of me racing a Yamaha against Scotty Parker on the Harley. I was down low on the groove and Scotty was up high rid- ing the cushion and we ran side by side the entire race." Duma was the first of the Class of '79 to leave the racing game. In August of 1980 at the Indy Mile, Duma was involved in a big one. "I was drafting down the back straightaway on Ronnie Jones," Duma explained. "Coming out of four, Chuck Springsteen crashed, and I had nowhere to go and ran over him. We both ended up in the hospital. I was beat up pretty bad and didn't know if I would be para- lyzed or what. I asked my wife to marry me that night in the hospital and just sort of started a new life." Charlie Roberts hung up his leathers after the Springfield Mile in 1985. He was coming off a big crash as well, one in which he'd busted up his shoulder. He came back and missed the Springfield Mile by one spot in each of the heat race, semi and LCQ. "Some- one came up as I was packing up and offered me the right money for my race bike and that was it," Roberts said. "It was the hardest thing to deal with, not realizing my dream of becoming Grand Nation- al Champion. When I look back at it, though, I'm happy I was able to chase the dream and compete at the top level." Today Charlie, or "Chas" as his buddies call him, lives in the Chicago area and works in insur- ance. He was named manager of the year in 2005: The president of the company somehow found out about his racing career and when he was given the award at the an- nual banquet, they announced him up to the stage as "Charlie Roberts, Grand National Champion." Wincewicz said Rainey was his nemesis coming up through the ranks. "He had those fast Shell Thuet Yamahas 250 two-strokes as a novice," Wincewicz said. "I had that little Honda four-stroke and he'd smoke me on the straights. Let's put it this way, I was sure glad when we turned Junior, and I got to ride a Harley." Wincewicz tried like crazy to avoid the fate of so many riders of the Pacific Northwest of becoming a TT specialist. And, naturally, he went on to become a TT specialist. John raced on and off through the mid-1990s, and went on to com- pete in sprint cars out of Wash- ington State—backed by a dealer- ship, Whitney's Chevrolet, out of Montesano. Jones had a long and success- ful racing career, winning 10 na- tionals and finishing ranked in the top 10 in the AMA Grand National standings for 11 straight years. He went on to become a race pro- moter. Of course, nearly every enthu- siast knows the careers of Wayne Rainey and Scott Parker, both Hall of Famers and two of the most successful motorcycles racers in the history of the sport. Rainey recovered from a rough start in Grand National racing, found his niche as a road racer and went on to win three 500cc World Champi- onships. Parker went from Rookie of the Year and it just kept getting better. He became the all-time AMA Grand National Champion- ship-wins leader and holder of nine national titles. The Class of '79 will go down in history as one of the most memorable rookie classes in the history of AMA racing. These six riders, who came from varying backgrounds and different parts of the country, all came together 28 years ago in a contest to see who could become the best new pro- fessional racer. They have since gone their separate ways but are now forever linked by that unforget- table rookie season. CN This Archives edition is reprinted from issue #34, August 29, 2007. CN has hundreds of past Archives editions in our files, too many des- tined to be archives themselves. So, to prevent that from happening, in the future, we will be revisiting past Archives articles while still planning to keep fresh ones coming down the road. -Editor P114 CN III ARCHIVES

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