Geboers’ Goal: Go Out on Winning Note : Motocross: Belgian will retire as a Grand Prix champion. He seeks victory in his final race.

Eric Geboers made up his mind before the 1990 world 500cc motocross season that he would retire if he won the championship.

On Aug. 5, riding before hometown fans on the Citadelle circuit at Namur, Belgium, Geboers clinched his fifth world title on his 28th birthday. Sunday, in the Motul U.S. Grand Prix at Glen Helen Park in San Bernardino, last event of the season, the little Belgian will ride in his final race for the Honda factory team.

He has won 10 of the 22 individual motos in the 11 Grand Prix events already completed to far outdistance defending champion David Thorpe of England and all other competitors.

“My retirement is as a Grand Prix rider, not as a competitor,” Geboers said after looking over the newly constructed 1.9-mile Glen Helen circuit. “I will probably ride in selected races next year, especially at Namur, but I don’t want to tie myself down to 12 races the way I have done the last 11 or 12 years. I have so many other interests that I want to continue.”

In addition to competing in a full motocross season with races in 11 European countries as well as California, Geboers ran a Belgian national triathlon team with which he trained, flew helicopters and promoted motocross on his own track. And once in a while, for a diversion, he did a little sky diving.

“I know people criticized me earlier this year for trying to take on too much, but I believe the extra work helped me this year,” he said. “I especially enjoy triathlon, but I am not so good because I am not so good at swimming. It made motocross fun again because I had something to take my mind off motocross between races.”

Geboers’ EG Events firm has been awarded the European triathlon championships in Belgium in 1992.

“I have a lot of new things to explore, too,” Geboers said. “I am going to Australia to race a motorcycle in a road race, and I am in contact with Lamborghini to become involved with their offshore boat racing program. And then there is auto racing. I tested a Formula One car at Paul Ricard and I think I did quite well. If I had the right opportunity, I would like to try that.”

He is also promoting a six-race Masters motocross series during the Grand Prix off-season for the sport’s premier riders. The first race is Sept. 9.

“We will have two outdoor races, three Supercross and one beach race. I will ride in them because I made commitments to the promoters before I announced my retirement. If I did not fulfill my obligations, I would not be here and it would have a negative reaction on the sport.”

He clinched the championship with a fifth and a first in the Belgian GP.

“That might have been my best day,” he said. “In the first moto, I came from 15th to third when I crashed into a hay bale. I returned in sixth and finished fifth, but I felt I was riding very well. In the second moto, I came from fifth position to win.

“This was a dream for me as I had always wanted to retire as the champion. This season was not one of my toughest, but my preparation was the toughest. I worked very hard getting ready for the season. I prepared myself so well that I had quite an advantage, both physically and mentally, over my competitors.”

Geboers won the world 125cc championship in 1982 and ‘83, the 250cc in ’87 and the prestigious 500cc in ’88 to become the only rider in history to sweep all three classes. Only Joel Robert, another Belgian, has won more. He won six 250cc titles, including five in a row starting in 1968. Roger DeCoster, yet another Belgian who is the promoter and course designer for Sunday’s USGP, won five 500cc championships between 1971 and ’76.

“The thought of trying to equal Robert has crossed my mind, but I would rather go out on top,” Geboers said. “I had decided to quit if I won, and I will stick to my decision. If I had not won this year, I probably would have tried again next year.”

Geboers has dominated. He has won 10 motos, and the only other multiple winners are American Billy Liles with four and Thorpe and Jacky Martens of Luxembourg with three each. Liles was leading in points when he crashed during practice for the sixth race, the Italian GP, and broke his right leg.

Geboers also may resurface next season as a manager of his own team, with Liles or Australian Jeff Leisk as his rider.

“I would like to start a team in the 500cc class next year with a Honda works bike,” he said. “I would like to run it under my name, the way McLaren does in Formula One. HRC (Honda Racing Corp.) has offered me exclusive rights to a motocross team. If I can find a sponsor, I will put it together.”

Geboers comes by his racing instincts naturally. His older brother, Sylvain, helped introduce the sport in the United States during the early 1970s along with DeCoster, Robert and Torsten Hallman. Sylvain was second to Robert three times in the world 250cc standings, and their uncle, Jef Teuwissen, was a motocross pioneer riding four-stroke bikes on the sandy tracks of Belgium and the Netherlands in the 1950s.

Sylvain is still in the sport as the manager of Donny Schmit, the Minnesotan who won the world 125cc championship this year.

Although Sunday will be Geboers’ final Grand Prix, he says that fact will serve as added motivation to win the two 40-minute motos over the Glen Helen track.

“I wanted to go out a winner with the championship, and now I want to go out a winner in my final race,” he said. “Two weeks ago, I was depressed because I did not think I would be in top condition, but I feel like I am ready now. I hurt my shoulder lifting some heavy things at my home, and I was hurting when I raced in Luxembourg two weeks ago. I had a small crash there and picked up the bike aggressively and hurt it again.

“I am very pleased with the way it has healed, and I hope to be ready for a hard race with the American riders Sunday.”