MOTOCROSS AT COLISEUM : At 30, Ward Wants to Jump the Barrier of Age

Motocross is a young man’s sport. No one 30 or older has won a Camel Supercross since Mike Goodwin put it in a stadium in 1972.

Jeff Ward, 30 today, would like to change that statistic. The muscular Kawasaki rider from San Juan Capistrano, a world minibike champion before he was a teen-ager, is one of the favorites in tonight’s Coors Light Challenge at the Coliseum. It is the final race of the Camel Supercross series.

Ward is already the oldest to win a Supercross. He accomplished that two weeks ago at Oklahoma City when he became the only rider in American Motorcyclist Assn. history to win eight consecutive Supercross seasons. And he is the oldest of the two dozen or so riders who campaign regularly on the American Motorcyclist Assn.’s national circuits.

Known as the Flying Freckle during his precocious years, “Wardy”--his latest nickname--finds the fuss over his turning 30 and being the “old man of motocross” rather amusing.

“It’s funny. Last year when I had a birthday, I was just another guy 29,” he said while inspecting the Coliseum course. “Now I’m 30, only a year’s difference, and everyone is making a big deal out of it.”

Kawasaki, for whom Ward has ridden since he switched from minibikes to motocross in 1977, is throwing him a birthday party before the race. The nicest present he could get would be an extension of the contract that expires this year.

“The way I feel now, and the way I’ve been riding, if I can keep free of serious injuries, I think I can race three or four, maybe five more years,” he said. “I’ll admit, it’s getting tougher each year to come back after getting hurt, but I like the challenge.”

Ward, who won the Supercross series in 1985 and ’87 during a stretch when he and now-retired Rick Johnson dominated the sport, missed a chance to win a third series this season when he sprained both wrists at Houston and missed the second race.

Despite the painful injuries and riding with heavily bandaged wrists, Ward came back a week later to finish second at Anaheim. He has five second-place finishes this year and is fifth in the $200,000 point fund standings.

Jean-Michel Bayle, a two-time world champion French rider from Redondo Beach, already has clinched the $100,000 champion’s bonus, but only 26 points separate the next four riders--Damon Bradshaw of Charlotte, N.C.; defending series champion Jeff Stanton of Sherwood, Mich.; Mike Kiedrowski of Canyon Country and Ward. The winner of tonight’s 20-lap final will receive 25 points.

“Motocross is much more professional than it was when I started out,” Ward said. “A lot of guys back then just rode for the fun of it, and there wasn’t all the training and strategy and things like that we have now. You just rode as hard as you could until you got tired, but then Bob Hannah came along and started beating everybody regularly. When we wondered why, we found out he was running 10 miles a day out in the desert, and so everyone who wanted to win got into serious conditioning. Racing is still fun, but you’ve got to work a lot harder between races or you’re left behind.”

Ward is one of three in tonight’s motocross who have won at the Coliseum, where the course features a run up 70 rows of seats at the east end of the stadium, through the peristyle arches and out the other side with a flying jump off the concourse to the playing field below.

Stanton and Bradshaw, last year’s winner, are the others.

“The Coliseum is special for me, being it’s my hometown track,” Ward said. “But I also like it because it is one of the fastest Supercross tracks with the long straightaway on the back side.”

Ward’s biggest thrill in a 25-year career, however, came in 1985 when he won his first Supercross championship with a fourth-place finish in the season finale at the Rose Bowl.

“I came to the final race tied with Broc Glover in points, and he finished fifth and I was fourth,” Ward said. “That was about as exciting a race as I can remember. I won my first Supercross championship by two points.”

Officials say new, enlarged parking lots will be available surrounding the Coliseum with increased lighting and security. The gates will open at 5 p.m.