Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1970's

Cal-Expo Speedway - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1Iy Pat Jones SACRA~IE1\TO CAL., June 16 , 1972 , - Gus Lauer ignored a badly damaged knee and used his pole position to capture the Scratch Main event at the first speedway mee t this year at Cal Expo. Lauer. using a home-made fihcrgalss brace to strengthen his injured left leg, led all th e wav to beat Bu tch Corder and third pl ace man Joh n C unningham. T he lI an d icap ~Iain went to J e rry Bau gh w h o started . o n th e scratch line and w as n eve r th re at e n ed . 1t was th e f irs t Main eve n t w in in Baug h's career. Carl C ran ke finis he d second from the 2 0.yard line and Corder was th ird, starti ng fro m the 4 0. The w ild es t event of th e even ing wh ich saw a capacity crowd of 3 ,500 jam the State Fair track, Was the handicap consolation. Stu ~lorky, who has been moved from the 40-yard line to the 3 0 after a series o f disapp ointing finishes, did a sereis of flips on the back straight but escaped without injury . One lap later , John Dieu let a c o m f o rt a b l e lead vanish by unaccountably hitting the wall while ru n n in g all alone. Paul Minor Jr. su rvived the event to finish ahead of Barclay Trehal an d Rich l\lac:'lurray. T he Scratc h Consolation was won by Pat Ro on e y w ho sim ply jum ped evervone into the firs t tu m and led all the ·way. Carl Cran ke was seco nd and J im Doron finsihed in third. Napa Speedw ay - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1I y Pa t J o nes NAPA , CAL., June 10 , 19 72 - Rich Maclvlurray swe p t to firs t pl ace in both Main Events a t th e Cl ass A Speedway races h ere. T he Ren o rid er, wh o carries on lv a 20-y ar d h andicap , h ad to d efeat J,;h n Fishburn in b oth races to do it. In th e Sc ratch 1\lain, MacMurray ju mped to an earl y lead and Fishburn and Butch Co rd e r, winner of last wee k ' s Scratch. Mai n, w aged a soli tary battle for second place w ith Fish burn finally shutt ing Co rd er o u t on th e last lap . J im D ore n , the fourt h rider in the Sc rat ch Ma in, n ea rly got steamrollered in th e back stretch when the float fell o ut of hi s carburetor and his b ik e rolled to a graceful stop in the middle of the action. Doron, lo o kin g 'a t the bright side, happily informed everyone that he found the missing part after the even l. T he Handicap Main was also an easy win for ~ lac1\lurray. Corder finished second and Pat Rooney edged Fishburn for th ird. The Scra tc h Consolation saw so me of the fastcst action of the night as Carl Cra n k e di d a 40-foot w heelie off th e line and still led the pack into the firs t tu rn . C ranke d id most of h is four lap s o n the b ac k wheel and still m an aged to nip Ba rclay T reh al for th e win. Mik e Corc oran of S ac rameu to was t hird. Ed Schwei tze r h ad noth ing but /:7 , Grif f on s t.j )-!!J,!Ji. o

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