IN
THE
WIND
P24
HONORING
SARRON
T
he Sarron brothers were cel-
ebrated at the French Grand
Prix in Le Mans, 30 years after
Christian Sarron won the 250cc
World Championship.
He and his brother Domi-
nique, four times a 350cc Grand
Prix winner, ran a parade lap on
a pair of Yamahas – one a 250cc
GP bike, the other the endur-
ance machine they shared to a
Bol d'Or victory.
"It's 30 years," joked Christian
Sarron. "I wish they could find
a new champion so they would
leave me alone."
In fact there have been three
others: Arnaud Vincent and Mike
di Meglio in 125s, and 2000
250cc champion Olivier Jacque.
French Moto2 rider Johann
Zarco was running his Caterham
Suter bike in Sonauto colors as
a tribute to Christian's title, but
had a dire weekend, qualifying a
lowly 20th and retiring from 17th
place after only four laps.
Michael Scott
Christian Sarron (4) leads Eddie Lawson (1) at
Laguna Seca in the 1989 U.S. Grand Prix.
PHOTOGRAPHY
BY
GOLD
&
GOOSE
RUSS COLLINS,
1939-2014
R
uss Collins, one of the leading motorcycle drag racers
and drag bike builders of the 1960s and '70s, passed
away on May 12 in Hawaii. He was 74.
His dual- and triple-engine monster motorcycles, such as
the Assassin, the Sorcerer and others, marked the apex of
outrageous drag racing motorcycle designs of the 1970s. Col-
lins rode those incredibly powerful machines to the fastest
quarter-mile times turned on motorcycles during that time. He
was the first motorcyclist to break the seven-second barrier
and a run he made in 1977 set a record that would stand for
11 years.
Collins was born in Somerville, New Jersey, on August 27,
1939. He grew up with a love of all things mechanical. His
first interest was in cars and he became quite accomplished
as a car mechanic and body man. In 1957, he bought a dilapi-
dated, basket case 500cc Triumph. Collins rebuilt the bike
and started riding on the street. A hot-rodder at heart, Col-
lins gradually hopped up the engine of the Triumph and drag
Legendary drag
racer and bike
builder Russ
Collins passed
away last week.
