Saturday Saddleback Motocross Racing
S'Back Assoc
at
Saddleback Park
Saturday January 18, 1975
By: Tom Corley
You can never tell just who is going to show up in SAM racing. Ever since the club has been firing off the Pros in two forty minute motos some of the real superstars of MX showed up and often at the same time. This is of course when they are not on the road to Inter:AMA's.
John DeSoto is very consistent and so is Bruce Baron and Mike Gillman of Orange County Cycle and today all but for DeSoto were racing. The new Yamaha factory team must of made it's first racing appearance together today and man they just robbed the Experts of the money. The fantastic three from Yamaha was Jim Weinert who breezed a 250 Expert win, Bruce McDougal who has shown that he can win the 125 Pros on anything, Penton, Honda or his new Yamaha Monoshocker and he did just that but not without having to put up a mean battle against teammate Tim Hart.
Gus Cramer tries to inside line to keep Jerry Trojnar from passing him. Corley photo.
Jim Weinert (or James like on the entry form) fooled me for Pierre Karsmakers at first when he was leading the first moto easily over Gillman, Baron, Bob Stem of the Bike Shop and so on while the 125 fast guys were having lots of problems. Actually everyone ended up with problems in this moto except for McDougal and Hart. Whittier Honda's Bill Glore has lately had plenty of top end problems but in this moto he couldn't keep a chain on. Meanwhile a reliable source told me that McDougal and Hubbs were dicing and both wouldn't let off of the throttle even when a groove that was only big enough for one machine suddenly came up. Well the guy that bit the ground was Hubbs while McDougal gassed it for a perfect win. Bruce Baron knows some kind of starting secret in these races. He either hits the gate in third gear when it drops or something because he's always on top at Sad at first. Baron was hauling in the second in first and then he dropped out, later Bruce told me that he hit the ground pretty bad so after that it was strictly Weinerts game. Bob Stem was doing excellent from behind Weinert and after the race when I talked to Bob the first thing that he mentioned was that Weinert's bike was much faster. Bill Rubly was next in line for Wheelsmith but the main contest that everyone about the track was watching was the one that was going on between Bruce McDougal and Tim Hart. I was in the back part of the track and the two were getting super close, then Bruce looked back and the next thing that I knew Hart was ahead. They were 1-2 for awhile and then McDougal gained the lead again and smoked almost every big bike on the track.
So one could conclude that Weinert had a decisive 250 Expert win over Baron and Jerry Trojnar iMai) who worked into third. Nobody was about to knock McDougal and Hart from the 125 Expert money and they breezed through with the first two spots over Pat Nixon, Scot Clifton (who's top end went into pieces btcause of a needle bearing), Bill Glore, Pat Hubbs and Norman Gomez. Bill Rubly didn't have a full field to race in the 500 Experts and Jeff Whitherell was the only one else to make it to the results.
Ron Tebbs was the other you couldn't get by in the 250 Junior class. Talk about winning every week, it seems like I've been plugging him for winning this class for about a year now. The only time that I noticed him getting dose to being passed was when he went wide and dug up the rocks on the finish corner. Paul Bergquest on a Maico was second behind Tebbs.
There are several super fast pairs of racers in the SAM who are brothers. The Gillman Bros., are always battling the 250 Expert class and they almost look identical. The other fast brother team that wins near every week are the Eide Bros. Russ and Lee do it in the 125's while their smaller kid brother Ryan is a Mini-Crosser and he hooked third in the Beginner class today. Russ and Lee struggle against each other and usually run in the 1-1 spots, if it seems like I write something like this each week well it's because they win each week. Lee whipped the Juniors over Tom Daversa and Joe Signor while the Novices were shut down by Russ who placed in front of Bret Catcott (a Weekly threat), Ken Mattson and Mark Knutson.