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cycle road racing in the 1970s, with Ontario, Daytona and Imola all holding similar events. Like Ontario, Imola would be run in two 100-mile legs, and when the flag fell for the first heat, it was North America challenging for the win. Kawasaki teamsters Yvon DuHamel and Art Bau- mann, much as they had done at Daytona just weeks earlier, were involved in a pitched battle with each other. But both men trailed Daytona-winner Saarinen, each taking turns at challenging the World Champion from Finland. Behind them was Paul Smart, who had ridden a Ducati to a sur- prising victory at Imola one year earlier. On a Suzuki for 1973, he now found himself being chased by Ducati teamsters Bruno Kneu- buhler and Bruno Spaggiari. The British writer is getting his pounds and pence worth as Saarinen begins to pull away. But deeper in the pack, Harley-David- son rider Cal Rayborn is making a case for an extra service fee. Cycle News' editor Friedman makes no bones about the fact that the Rayborn's H-D is slow, giving up a staggering three sec- onds per lap to most of the other riders. As if the horsepower dis- advantage isn't enough to plague Rayborn, the big V-twin has now started leaking oil, causing him to skitter like a hog on ice—er, oil. Add insult to injury? Rayborn is still healing up from a Daytona crash, which resulted in a broken collarbone. "Now he begins to slip and slide around," wrote CN, "and in the flailing around, his collarbone, which has just begun to knit from his Daytona crash, lets go. Somehow, Calvin continues…" The comparison of athletes whose glory years were both sepa- rated by time and affected by other circumstances is a fool's game. Rayborn versus Roberts versus Rainey is a race that won't happen on these earthly shores. But when once asked if Cal Rayborn was indeed America's greatest road racer, 1972 Grand National Champion Mark Brelsford responded, "Without a doubt." The Suzukis and Kawasakis are out of the picture, with Du - Hamel's machine even making a flaming exit. Kneubuhler has crashed his Ducati. Rayborn courageously soldiers on to a fourth-place finish. A Herculean effort, though the best was yet to come. When the riders left the grid for the second heat, it was Saarinen again out in front. In second (with his freshly re- broken collarbone), Rayborn is in pursuit. Giving up several seconds on Imola's fast, long straightaways, he and his H-D are pushing hard in the course's tighter sections. "I could feel," Saarinen said afterward, "his breath on my neck." "Calvin was slipstreaming at the beginning of the straights and over-revving his motor," wrote Friedman. "He was doing everything. You really should have seen it." If life were a Hollywood movie, Rayborn's gritty effort would've netted him the win this day. Even without a script, he still might've topped Saarinen in the race. We will never know, because while clinging to within one second of Saarinen, Rayborn's Harley-Da - vidson sputters and finally stops. A faulty magneto is the culprit. Saarinen cruises on to an easy win. For the second year in a row, Bruno Spaggiari, a spry 41-year- old vet, takes runner-up honors for the day. Every American rider has either crashed or broken. By the end of the year, both Cal Rayborn and Jarno Saarinen will have left this world behind, killed in separate crashes in which nei - ther rider was at fault. Imola would be the last time the two Daytona champions would ever meet on the racetrack, and they put on one helluva show. Whatever our British sportswriter had to pay for this ticket, it wasn't enough. CN Finn Jarno Saarinen beat the best of the best at the Imola 200. VOLUME ISSUE JULY , P147 Subscribe to nearly 60 years of Cycle News Archive issues: www.CycleNews.com/Archives