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Kerker/SBS WERA National Endurance Series: Round 12
The Humans zoom to Blackhawk victory
By Larry Lawrence
S. Beloit, IL., Sept. 15, 1990
Andy Fenwick and Steve Rodden rode a Dave Zupan built Yamaha FZR 1000 to victory at the eight hour WERA National Endurance at Blackhawk Farms Raceway. It was the second WERA Endurance victory for the Waukegan, Illinois based team this season. The Human’s racked up the mileage during the eight hour event. The winning team completed 658.8 miles at an average speed of 82.35 mph on the 1.8 mile circuit. The path to win number two was made a bit smoother since defending series Champions Team Suzuki Endurance skipped the Blackhawk round to concentrate on the upcoming 24 Hour race at Willow Springs Raceway. Hall ‘N Still Racing with Michael Martin, Bruce Baldus and Randy Gaddey finished second, ten laps behind HRT. Team Dreaded’s Kathleen Coburn, Matt Winnacker and Dave Stevens pulled off a rare feat by placing a Yamaha FZR 400 Lightweight class machine in the winners circle.
The Human Race Team was looking forward to racing at Blackhawk Farms. The team considers Blackhawk their home track and rider Andy Fenwick is the track record holder. Rodden had never seen the track before, but it didn’t take long for the San Francisco rider to get down to very competitive times on the HRT Yamaha.
Fenwick put the Human’s out front from the beginning of the race. Turning laps in the 1:16 range, Fenwick put a lap on the rest of the 30 bike field in the first half-hour. Bob Sandy had the Hinshaw Racing Honda RC 30 solidly in second. The Hinshaw Honda was completely stock and Sandy later lauded the bikes handling but was impressed with the bikes power, “I’ve never ridden a motorcycle that handles so well, but it’s a good thing it does handle. I was getting killed coming out of the turns.”
Team Dreaded rider Winnacker embarrassed a lot of guys on bigger bikes in the first hour. Winnacker was going so fast on the twisty sections of the track on the team’s Yamaha FZR 400, that even riders on big 1100 cc machines couldn’t catch him.
Royale Racing held off a tightly bunched group of teams that were fighting for fourth place early in the race. Doug Henry had the Royale Suzuki just in front of Bruce Baldus with Hall N’ Still, Action Suzuki’s David Harman, Chris Hughes of Motion Systems Racing, Raw Racing’s Kirk Reuille and Robert Wrublevski of Team Machine.
Teams to run into problems in the first hour included Sam Speed Racing and T-Storm Racing who crashed together on turn one on the first lap. Both teams were able to make quick repairs and reenter the race. American Spirit Racing was not so fortunate. ASR rider Dave Raber was attempting to make a pass on Royale Racing in a battle for third, when he got too hot into turn one, crashed and broke his collarbone.
As the race progressed, HRT continued to extend their lead. Hinshaw Racing remained in second but Team Dreaded got on the same lap as Hinshaw by going longer between pit stops. Action Suzuki dropped out of the race with transmission problems on their Suzuki. TBA Racing made a jump from tenth to fourth place during the second hour.
Hinshaw Racing’s luck went sour during the third hour. First the teams bike ran out of gas on the track. According to team owner Darwin Hinshaw, the bikes owners manual showed that the RC 30 had a one gallon reserve capacity. “I don’t think there is quite a gallon in reserve. We were just getting ready to pit when the bike sputtered to a stop”, said Hinshaw. The bad luck wasn’t over for the team. Shortly after getting back on the track after refueling, Hinshaw went down in the last turn. The bike was immediately back in the pits being worked on. Even after all their bad luck Hinshaw never dropped below eighth place.
Team Machine lost a transmission on their Yamaha and went back to the paddock to do an engine change. After completing the change the team went on the finish 17th overall.
Raw Racing was hoping to close in on Deals Gap Racing in the Lightweight class standings. Deals Gap had crashed in practice and had several mechanical problems during the race. Unfortunately for Raw, the team was involved in a race ending crash during the third hour.
TBA Racing was on track to have their best finish of the season. Going into the sixth hour, the Indianapolis based team had a lap lead over third place Hall ‘N Still. TBA has been plagued by mechanical ills all season and the trend continued at Blackhawk. A broken transmission put the team out of the running.
Another team that has been bothered by frequent transmission problems during the season is RKN Racing. Race after race the Knoxville, Tennessee based team has led their class only to succumb to mechanical ills. Team captain and rider Robert Nutt hoped that they had figured out a way to keep their bike running. “We are putting in new gears between each race. For this race we borrowed a gear box from a bike that was in the shop of one of our sponsors Yamaha of Knoxville”, Nutt explained. Their solution to the transmission problem worked like a gem. RKN’s Mike Reed and Billy Eisenacher finally got the reward of winning the Mediumweight Superbike class.
With two hours left in the race the top three positions were solidified. The Humans could now put their Yamaha on cruise control with a nine lap lead. Hall ‘N Still riders Michael Martin and Bruce Baldus, new to Blackhawk, were getting used to the track and were safely in second. Team Dreaded continued their excellent performance, running in third.
In the closing stages of the race, Honda of Niles got within a lap of Team Dreaded but couldn’t get any closer. Honda of Niles would gladly settle for fourth place overall. It was the Ohio teams best overall finish of the season, and more importantly, their sixth straight win in the Mediumweight Production class. As at Memphis Motion Systems Racing gave Honda of Niles a good race, but Motion Systems was forced to change brake pads late in the contest.
At the end it was the Human Race Team winning over Hall N’ Still and Team Dreaded. For HRT the race gave them a glimmer of a hope of winning the championship. “The year we won our first title we didn’t win many races. With all of the miles we made today, I think we still have a chance of catching Team Suzuki”, said Fenwick after the race.
National Endurance Results of Round 12 from Blackhawk Farms Raceway
1. Human Race Team Yamaha 366 Laps
2. Hall ‘N Still Rcg. Suzuki 356
3. Team Dreaded Yamaha 352
4. Honda of Niles Honda 350
5. Motion Systems Rcg. Honda 347
6. Hinshaw Rcg. Honda 346
7. Royale Rcg. Suzuki 345
8. Cycle Speed Rcg. Yamaha 343
9. Darotune Racing Suzuki 335
10. Team Swine Dudes Suzuki 331
Sprints
Buse the man at Blackhawk
By Larry Lawrence
S. Beloit, IL., Sept. 16, 1990
Charlie Buse is a veteran of dozens of races at Blackhawk Farms Raceway and he used his knowledge of the challenging 1.8 mile circuit to come up a two-time winner in WERA sprint action. Buse of nearby Mt. Horeb, Wisconsin, rode his Suzuki GSXR 750 to wins in B Superstock and A Superstock. In the only other race he entered, B Superbike, Buse raced for the lead the entire way with Kawasaki ZX-7 mounted Bob Sandy. At the finish Buse was nudged out by Sandy by just a few feet at the checkered flag.
Buse’s first win came in the combined A Superstock / A Production race. Buse put his blue and white colored Suzuki into the lead heading into turn one. Dave Hansen tucked in behind Buse for second. Buse continued to lead as the pack roared by on lap two. Hansen was being hounded by a mob of production bikes that included Dean Hayes, Matthew Winnaker and Paul Volpe.
In the middle stages of the race Buse turned a couple of near perfect laps to pull away from the hot second place battle. Hayes was able to put his nimble Yamaha FZR 600 in front of Volpe’s Suzuki GSXR 750 on the last lap to take the win in the production class. Hayes won three novice races during the day, beating many experts in the process.
Reuben Frankenfield took an exciting come from behind win in the D Superbike contest. Frankenfield missed the warm-up lap and was forced to start from the back of the grid. Kurt Koops was the early leader of the race, but dropped out with mechanical problems. Brian Conley then took over the lead riding his Yamaha FZR 400 just ahead of Ducati 650 rider Charles Lang. By the half-way point of the race Frankenfield had moved up through the field passing Tim Keen to move into third place. On the final two laps the Cincinnati rode at breakneck speed to catch and pass Lang, then Conley to take the victory.
Frankenfield had a feeling he could catch the leaders. “I followed Conley in practice and felt I could pass him on several parts of the track.”
RESULTS
A Superbike Expert: 1. Stan Marcinczyk (Suz)
A Superbike Novice: 1. Matthew McCurrie (Suz)
B Superbike Expert: 1. Bob Sandy (Kaw); 2. Charles Buse (Suz)
B Superbike Novice: 1. Paul Volpe (Suz); 2. Matthew McCurrie (Suz); 3. Charles Lang (Duc); 4. David Shine (Yam); 5. Leon Marcinczyk (Hon)
C Superbike Expert: 1. Brian Lance (Suz)
C Superbike Novice: 1. Dean Hayes (Yam); 2. Michael Leffler (Yam); 3. Scott Temple (Yam); 4. Charles Lang (Duc); 5. Jim Young (Yam)
D Superbike Expert: 1. David Folz (Yam); 2. Kevin Fardoux (Yam)
D Superbike Novice: 1. Reuben Frankenfield (Yam); 2. Brian Conley (Yam); 3. Charles Lang (Duc); 4. Tim Keen (Yam); 5. Russell Graff (Yam)
A Superstock: 1. Charles Buse (Suz); 2. Dave Hansen (Suz)
B Superstock: 1. Charles Buse (Suz)
C Superstock: 1. Brian Lance (Suz)
A Production Expert: 1. Matthew Winnaker (Kaw); 2. Steve Heilman (Hon)
A Production Novice: 1. Dean Hayes (Yam); 2. Paul Volpe (Suz); 3. Scott Temple (Yam); 4. Jim Young (Yam); 5. Chris Demopoulos (Yam)
B Production Expert: 1. Matthew Winnaker (Kaw); 2. Steve Heilman (Hon)
B Production Novice: 1. Dean Hayes (Yam); 2. David Shine (Yam); 3. Chris Demopoulos (Yam); 4. Gregory Nowling (Yam)
C Production Expert: 1. Matthew Winnaker (Kaw); 2. Steve Heilman (Hon)
C Production Novice: 1. Dean Hayes (Yam); 2. Michael Leffler (Yam); 3. David Shine (Yam); 4. Chris Demopoulos (Yam); 5. Gregory Nowling (Yam)
D Production Expert: 1. Matthew Winnaker (Yam); 2. David Folz (Yam)
D Production Novice: 1. Brian Conley (Yam); 2. William Sweeney (Yam); 3. Russell Graff (Yam); 4. Mark Petniunas (Yam); 5. Richard Greco (Hon)
Formula II Expert: 1. Jeff Vos (Rtx); 2. David Folz (Yam); 3. Kevin Fardoux (Yam)
Formula II Novice: 1. Thorton McPheeters (Yam); 2. Brian Conley (Yam); 3. Charles Lang (Duc); 4. Andrew Perkins (Hon); 5. Tim Keen (Yam)
Formula III Expert: 1. Paul Morris (Kaw); 2. Harry Morse (Hon)
Formula III Novice: 1. Miles Hardesty (Kaw)
Clubman Expert: 1. Steve Heilman (Hon); 2. Paul Morris (Hon); 3. Kevin Fardoux (Yam)
Clubman Novice: 1. Mark Fleischman (Yam); 2. Mark Slavens (Hon); 3. Jeff Bandstra (Hon); 4. Miles Hardesty (Kaw)
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