Cycle News

CN III ARCHIVES BY LARRY LAWRENCE A s Colin Edwards takes a lap of appreciation upon his recent announcement of retirement, it's worth a look back 20 years ago to the 1994 season when the Texan broke through to score his first AMA Superbike victory and the rather uncon- ventional method that he says led him to the break- through. To set the stage it's important to note that in the early 1990s Edwards was the hottest property in road racing in America. The young kid from Tex- as had broken records in WERA as a novice then finished second in his very first AMA pro race. In 1992 he soundly won the AMA 250cc Grand Prix title. In '93 Edwards was then hired to ride for the Vance & Hines Yamaha Superbike team, and wins and championships were expected. Instead of a continuation of his meteoric rise, Edwards hit a roadblock. Even though he qualified fastest numer- ous times and led large portions of races, Edwards couldn't seem to get over the hump and get a win in Superbike. Had Edwards topped out early? Was he destined to fade into obscurity? Edwards even began to have doubts. He won- dered if he could ever get that breakthrough win that could catapult him on to higher heights. The young rider turned to an unlikely source for an- swers – the very '90s solution of motivational tapes. Amazingly the tapes seemed to help. Ed- wards began to believe in himself again. Suddenly brimming with confidence, the breakthrough came at Mid-Ohio in 1994. Edwards will forever have a soft spot in his heart for the central Ohio track, the site of his first AMA Superbike win. The question coming into Mid-Ohio that year was, could the Ducati/Troy Corser juggernaut be stopped? The Australian (who would go on to win that year's championship) had won three of the previous five rounds coming into Mid-Ohio. Many figured that Corser, who liked tight, techni- cal circuits, would find Mid-Ohio to his liking. It was somewhat surprising then when Corser only managed fifth in qualifying. That placed him even behind Miguel Duhamel and the Harley-Davidson VR1000 Superbike, which qualified on the front row in fourth. Earlier in the season if you would have predicted the Harley on the front row you might very well be deemed crazy, but Duhamel was squeezing performance from the Milwaukee- made machine not previously seen. The reason that the Harley was on the front row was not so much improvements to the bike (even though H-D Racing Manager Steve Scheibe re- ported that the bike was slimmed down to 363 pounds via attention to detail), but simply the hard riding by Duhamel. It was obvious to even the ca- sual observer that Duhamel was riding harder and faster than any other rider out there. Almost overlooked in the excitement was Ed- wards, who secured the pole at Mid-Ohio with a record 1:29.176 at 96.887 mph on his Vance & Hines Yamaha YZF750. It was the young Texan's first pole since Road America in 1993. "When I raced 250's I felt that no one could beat me," said a rejuvenated Edwards. "I'm trying to get that feeling back and winning the pole is the first step in that process." Pascal Picotte and Jamie James qualified sec- ond and third and were both under the old track EDWARDS' FIRST SUPERBIKE WIN P102

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