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/143873
fu ll 2~ seconds faster than Hansen. Van der Ven was th ird foll owed by Guerr a, j ohan Martens and LaPorte. Ya ma ha 's Dave Wa tso n broke a col larbone in practice and will miss the Trop h ee and Motocro ss des Na tio ns races. With LaPorte h olding a com fortable 15 point lead the pressure was on lobe to perform and hope LaPort e put in one bad moto finish . Down the sta rt straigh t, over the drop a way and in to the first corn er th e pack cha rged wi th H ansen leading the way. Ita ly's Ma ur izio Do lce was seco n d, Da n iel Pea n , Er kki Su ndstro m , jea n -Cla ude Laq uaye a n d jobe fo ll owing. Van der Ven was eigh th with LaPorte 15th. Hansen ha d cl ear sailing in front of h im and bu ilt up a 10 seco nd lead on the thi rd lap. lobe had moved into fo urt h , the n th ird , and secon d on the fo urt h la p. LaPort e was wo r kin g his wa y throu gh traffi c, but ha ving a ha rd time of it. "T h e sta rts here are so im porta n t beca use th e track's na rr ow and it's really hard to p ass," said LaPorte. Pean dropped out, va n der Ven moved up, and it was Hansen by 16 seconds over lobe and van de r Ven, who were onl y a bout two seco n ds apa rt. LaPorte took over fou rt h from Su ndstro m on th e n inth of the 181aps a n d set th e order of finis h for the to p five. A lot of people were expecti ng Ha nsen to fade at th e en d, bu t it wo u ldn 't be. The 250cc a n d Su percross cham p sta yed righ t on li ne an d th rill ed the 12,000 strong crowd with his aer ia l acrobatics over the ma n y jumps on the serpentine co urse. " I just got a couple of good starts ," Hanse n exp lained. "And the bi ke ra n well so there were no problem s." T o say the bike ran well was an understa temen t. The Brian Lunniss-prepared red rocket was unquestionably the fas test bike on th e trac k. " Don n ie wa s p u ll ing me on the straigh ta way," LaPorte said . Wi th the minutes runnin g down LaPorte was making his move a n d h ad the jobe/van der Ven duel in sigh t. He was ready to pou nce on va n der Ven 's mistakes, but instead made on e of his own. " I was trying a n ew line through th e turn on the top of th e hill foll owin g Kees. 1 went in too fast and oversh ot it and almost went down the h ill. Then when 1 came back on the cou rse somebody ran into my front wheel ," hesaid. . Hansen was 15 seconds clear of l obe at the finish , with va n der Ven a n o th er four seco n d s back a n d La Porte 27 beh ind the Dutch ma n. Clearly the m o m e n tum ha~ ch a nged. Between rno tos lobe was loose and confide nt, while LaPorte , . wh o h ad wanted to cli nch it -in the first rnot o , was a little more n ervous. The fin al rnoto of the season was brough t to th e line a little over a n h o ur la ter with LaPort e holdin g a n I I point adv antage ov er jobe. A DNF by La Porte and first or seco n d by the Belgia n and th e title would go back to Belgium. Hansen nailed the start aga in with Pean second ahead of j oha n Martens. Leif Nickla sson, Magn us Hoh ansson an d La Porte, Another few tu rns an d it loo ked lik e the title was decided wit h jobe gett in g kn ocked dow n. "T here's an S-turn after the fir st tu rn," l obe said, "and 1 was go ing th ro ugh th a t when Kinigadner cut straigh t acros s it h ittin g me in th e leg a nd knocking me do wn. 1 th ough t a bou t pulling in after th at , but realized that van der Ven co u ld still ta ke over second in the points so 1 kep t goin g." What he didn 't know at -th e time was that van der Ven was suffering th e sa me fate j ust a coup le of tu rns . ~ ~it, , e CN 00 0') ~ "' CN CN :