Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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Kawasaki and Triumph! Dick Mann was the first rider in '71 to score a second road race National victory after taking the top spot in Kent, Washing- ton. He had a fierce battle with Kel Carruthers. Perhaps the biggest story coming out of Kent was that several riders, including defending series champ Gene Romero, were caught using forged medical paperwork for their racing licenses. The 15-day suspension sidelined Romero for the Ascot TT. He still came back to lead the championship for much of the middle of the season. At Pocono in August, Mann won yet again on his BSA and took over the points lead in the process. Frustratingly for Car- ruthers, it was yet another race where he was virtually side by side with the leader coming out of the last corner, but the low-end grunt of the BSA meant that Mann was able to power to the finish line just ahead of Carruthers. Yvon Duhamel was clearly the fastest rider on the track at Pocono, but his thirsty Kawasaki triple caused him to take two fuel stops to the single pit stops of the other teams. It finally all came together for Duhamel and Kawasaki at a hot and humid Talladega in early September. After three seasons of coming so close, the friendly French Canadian scored the victory on the Superspeed- way by way of blazingly fast pit stops. He still had to make one extra stop than the rest of the contenders, but the team had gotten the refueling down to under five seconds! Duhamel finally claimed the $10,000 prize for giving Kawasaki its first AMA National victory. The final road race of the season was also the final round of that year's championship. It was the first AMA National at the newly completed Ontario Motor Speedway. Ontario that year was arguably a bigger motorcycling event than Daytona. The race, called the Champion Spark Plug Classic, featured the biggest purse in AMA racing history and that attracted world-class riders like Phil Read, Barry Sheene, Rod Gould and John Cooper. Read and Gould ultimately ended up not racing since their bikes were not ready or hadn't been homologated before race weekend. The 250-mile event was run in two 125-mile segments. A great crowd of 33,000 showed but rattled in the 150,000-seat facil- ity. In the first leg, Duhamel and Nixon battled back and forth. The difference was fuel mileage. Nixon could go the entire 125 miles without a fuel stop, while Duhamel had to pit. Nixon took the win, Cooper was second on a factory BSA and Carruthers third. In the second segment, it was Nixon leading early before crashing in oil in a turn. The oil collected many of the leading contenders and caused them to pit for repairs. Cooper somehow made it through without going down and led, only later to be passed by Romero, who was riding the wheels off his Triumph trying to win the series champi- onship. Unfortunately, a broken throttle cable cost Romero any opportunity he had for the win and, ultimately, the champion- ship. The race came down to Cooper and Carruthers. The two swapped the lead numer- ous times in the closing laps. Carruthers led coming out of the final turn, but almost predictably now, Cooper's BSA 750cc Triple had the power advantage, and he passed Carruthers just before the line. That gave Cooper the overall victory and the $14,500 prize money (about $106,000 in today's money). The following year things changed drastically. The British companies were suffering, and racing budgets were slashed, leaving just a couple of factory rides remaining. The days of dozens of factory and factory- supported riders were gone, only briefly to return in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The '71 season certainly marked a turning point in the motorcycling industry. The British and Ameri- can bikes were waning, and the Japanese brands were on the rise, on the track, and in the showroom. CN CN III ARCHIVES P130 Subscribe to nearly 50 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives