Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

Lucerne Valley - Red Mountain - Plaster City - Searchlipt - Sidewinder Road - Superstition Mountain - Jean - Rand Mountains - Lucerne Valley - Red Mounb Desert Hotlineown trail. Second was Randy and Dale Jordan. . T ed Hunnicutt call ed and wanted me to thank the many riders who stopped to help him; it was very much appreciated. Ted will be operated on Aug. 20 to ha ve a plate pu t in his ankle which will help the healing process. H e expects to be out racing again in six weeks. Speedy recovery also goes ou t to Dale Criske, We had a tragedy during this race an d our deepes t sympa th y goes out to the famil y and friends of Doug Ballard from all of us at District 37. Godspeed Doug. Chambers/ Wirthlin do it in the dark By Don Akers Photos by Wayne Gales H ENDERSON, NV, JULY 31 Randy Chambers and Crockett Wirthlin were the overall winners in the' first half of th e fourth annual Nevada State Randy Chambers takes his Husky for a little ride in the moonlight. He andCroc~ett Wirthlin won in Nevada. . Ashcraft aces Prairie Dogs HS By Shirley Upp LUCERNE VALLEY, CA, AUG. 15 Dan Ashcraft (Hus) was the hero this weekend at Lucerne Valley as he took the heat, whoop-de-docs and very chal- 24 lenging course in stride and also took the overall win in the Prairie Dogs D-37 hare scrambles. After a five week layoff, there were over 350 anxious riders lined up at 9 a.m. When the first banner dropped, it was Open rider Dan Smith (Hus) who was in the lead about a mile past . the bomb. On his 250 Honda, Bruce Ogilvie was second. Ashcraft was third. Chuck Steams (Hon) was first to the bomb, but then took the wrong trail and was now fourth. Paul Palmer was fifth with a pie-plater in sixth. Seventh was hard riding Phil Cloward. On his small bore. it was Tom Elias charging hard today and running eighth. Jan Morrison was running first Vet Amateur and he was in a hurry as first Vet Expert Bill Saltzman was the next bike through. The second start was fast and furious and out past the bomb, it was Open Novice ace Steve Williams once again in the lead. Second was 25Occ . speedster Brett Shaner. Third was Richard Davis with Dennis Lovell a dose fourth. After the leaders started kicking up the dust there were many riders who had trouble following the ribbon and, ended up off the course. After one loop it was still Smith in the lead. Ashcraft had outpowered Ogilvie and was now second. Third was Steams who was having his problems with checks today. First 250cc was Ogilvie. Dave Wasden, having a super ride. . had moved up to fifth overall. As the riders left home check the leade r started lapping riders before th e smoke bomb. Lack of ra in this time of year and with th e number of riders the dust was everywhere and there was no breeze to move it out of the val1ey. Some ar eas on th e course had riders stringing out a mile to try and get out of the dust. This made for a dangerous situation, and many riders were hurt. Smith picked up a flat tire right out of the pits and this caused him to go over.the bars. Meanwhile Ashcraft was coming on strong and overtook Smith not far;.s>Ut of the pits. The only problem's Ashcraft had from this point on were the dust and getting around the many lapped riders. At the finish it was Ashcraft in for first overall with a nice lead. He said his biggest problem today was "getting around Ogilvie on the first loop. It took me forever !" Dan wanted to thank his sponsors Husqvarna, ProCircuit, Scott USA, Husky Products and Bel-Ray : In for second and first 250cc was Ogilvie. Bruce said the course was OK but he was just outpowered. In for a third was #PI30. Smith didn't give up and stayed in for fourth overal1. Dave Wasden had a great ride today and took sxith.After a fast front tire change in the pits Tom Elias picked up anther flat about a mile out from the pits on the second lap, but never backed off and came in for seventh overal1 and firs t C bike . In the eighth was first Open , Saltzman. with Oren Beck, Jr. taking ninth and second C bike. Rounding out the top 10.was 250cc Expert Ed Pierce, Jr. First 25'Occ Amateur was Jack Trottes who managed to get by fellow Amateur Andy Mathews. Hard riding Jeff Bennington took first Open . ' Amateur. First 250cc Vet today was J im Bringhurst with all time great Mon ty Lee taking second. Jan Mornson was the fastest Vet Open Amateur and took first in class. In the Senior Open class it was Ron Surber riding th e hardest to take another first in clas s today. First Senior 250cc once again was Charlie Goodban. One of our best in the C bike class, Dan Theel, came in for another G bike Amateur win. In the Senior C bike class Walt Baehr took a wel1 deserved first in class. First Novice was up and coming desert ace Jon Gamer. Taking the overal1 win on his 25Occ, Gamer said he had no problems and thought it was a good race . Second overal1 was another 250cc rider, #183x. It was Dennis Lovel1 who took the honor of first Open Novice today. In the Womeri's class Diane Holeman took the win saying it was a chal1enging course for this time of year. Second was Cindy McCown who got off hard after the dry lake but was abl e to finish. Jolene Payne got lost but found the cou rse in time to come in third overal1. Fourth was Debbie Hopkins. In th e Novice race it was Pat Pa yne in for first in class . Second was hard riding Susie Loonsfoot and Sharon Dietz took a well earned third. In the Beginner race it was Brian Myrich taking the overal1 on his C bike, this was his second race and he did some fine riding. Second and first Open was Brian Magenot. First Vet Beginner was Larry Mitchel1 and in the 250cc Beginner class it was Pat Fee who survived a bad get-off and worked his way up to take the first in class today. First Senior was Neil Etherton. The first sidehack team to finish was the tearri of Kenny McIntyre and Les Ketchan who had trouble with the bottlenecks and had to make their Championship night races, jointly sponsored by the Chargers West and . the Gamblers M.e. , The race was set up as a hare scrambles format with eight laps of 10 miles each. Naturally, since it it was a night race , the flag didn't drop until it was good and dark. At 9 p. rn. , when Black Mountain disappeared from sight and the officials were considering adopting braille as the official scoring system , the flag dropped on the first two riders. Two more were sent off every 15 seconds until al1 riders were on the course. . At the end of the first lap Wirthlin brought the bike into Chambers running in firs t place with the John Sterling/Mike Cockrum entry in second. Hard on the heels of the Sterling/ Cockrum .un it was Rick Sherman , bringing in the little TT250 Yamaha to his partner Bill Quinn. (Som etimes, .it's anything for alighting coil.) In fourth place was Brad Hil- : ton, who turned the riding chores over to partner Benny Brown. Nex t in was one half of the racing KinsheIla brothers, Dave, who turned the bike over to brother Mike . At 9:43 Chambers brought in the big 430 Husky and turned it over to -Wirthlin to fin ish their second lap, with the positions behind them unchanged. On lap three Chambers/Wirthlin had to make a short pit stop to replace a burned-out headlight bulb. In the meantime, the hard-charging Bill Quinn had passed the number two bike of Sterling/Cockrum for second. That put his partner, Rick Sherman, only two minutes behind Wirthlin going out of the pits. On lap four first and second remained the same, but Benny Brown put a move on the Sterling/Cockrum bike to take over third. Meanwhile, the steady riding Kinshella brothers were doggedly hanging onto fifth. There were no changes in position on lap five, but on lap six the Brown! . Hilton bike broke, moving the Sterling/Cockrum rig back into third with Mike Kinshella now holding the fourth slot. Laps seven and eight ' showed no position changes, but hot young Amateur Sherman put on a charge on the eighth lap that brought him to the finish line only a minute and a half behind the overall winnersl Not too shabby when you're trying to beat an Open class bike with an underpowered 250cc four-stroke. -

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