Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/141021
ยท MA~R'KI NAllS ANO THER "ASCOT TT '" ~ w Z w ~ U >- U Left to right: Sloan, Van Leeuwen, Hatelev, and win ner Brelsford. Chec k the ex pressions . Ph o t os by Dan Mah oney GA RDENA, CAL ., April 22 , 19 72 - If the first IT of th e season at Ascot is a gui de to National wins it will be Mark Brelsford and his Ha rley-Dav idson at Ascot o n National night, May 6 . T he former two time winner o f the Ascot National IT dominated th e Ex pert class righ t fro m th e tim e trials on th rou gh th e h eat race , tr oph y dash and main eve n t. He had a full secon d on the fie ld in ti me tri als an d then was an easy heat race win ner. Mark's fi r~t real test came in th e heat race against riders such as Skip Van Leeuwen, Eddie Mulder an d Gene R ome ro . Romero, riding a borrowed mach ine fro m Bob Bailey, made it to the second tum of the first lap before the Triumph engine b lew wide open . Van Leeuwen crashed m id way in the race b u t go t back u p to q ualify for the semi. Mu lde r was the only challenger an d finished second. J oh n Hateley to o k the h on ors in the second heat wi th Eddie Wir th coming [ fro m far back to pass th ree riders on the final lap for secon d pl ace. Brelsford then cranked up strong fo r th e two lap troph y dash. racing and wheeled in first again to take the Dale Brown Long Beach award . Hateley, Sl o an and V an Lee uwen fo llowed in that o rder. Dusty Coppage retu rned t o racing fo r the first time this year and has switched fro m Yamaha back to Triumph. He is now teamed with Van Leeuwen but the two could p ull n o better than a fifth and a seventh in the final. Brelsford took the lead after only a h alf a la p and was off an d ru nnin g. Mulder nailed down second ea rly in th e race and the show was provided by Hateley who was n o wh er e close in the early stages. T hen the Van Nuys flyer came fro m the back and started picking off positions one by one. He passed Van Leeuwen for third place on lap 10 but the laps ran out before he could overtake Mu lder. Wirth crashed on the tenth lap but was not inju red . Mike Haney re -passed Van Leeuwen for fourth place on the 13 th lap. Colorado's Rick Deane was the only rider to drop ou t due to mechanical troubles. , Joe Brown, the Houston Junior IT winner, backed up his January win with another in the Junior final. He led his Yamaha from start to fmish over Alex Arms trong, Tim T ho mas, Devon Sow ell an d Sco tt Brelsford. A I Bak er crashed fo r th e second ti me in 24 h o urs, doing an over-the -h andlebars type th in g in the early lap s. Bro wn started on the pole , Armstrong off the line fro m last starting position. Danny Hockie, the h igh ly-regarded rider up from the Amateur sportsman ranks. looked as good, or better, in the IT as he does on the oval. Hockie had to come from behind twice on h is Ossa to to p Dan White and Rick Hocking to win the Novice final . Half mile aces John Gennai and Scott Erickson ran. Scott ran fifth. Gennai, who was the number one scrambles rider in the nation last year, failed to transfer from the semi to the Novice 250 final. (Results on page 36)