MOTOR RACING : Season Will Start Revving Up in the Southland

Motor racing, which has been relatively dormant on the local front for several months, shifts into high gear this weekend.

Internationally, the United States 500cc Grand Prix of Motocross at Glen Helen Park in San Bernardino is the most significant. It is the first round of a 15-event series for the world championship and has attracted riders from 13 countries, headed by defending champion Georges Jobe of Belgium.

Jean-Michel Bayle, a Frenchman who lives in Redondo Beach and rides for the U.S. Honda team, won last year’s event after a duel with Jeff Ward, a veteran Kawasaki rider from San Juan Capistrano. Bayle, who also swept three American motocross series titles last season, will be back to defend at San Bernardino.

Bayle, who got off to a slow start this season after being injured in an off-season moto, apparently is back in top form after winning two of the last three stadium events. Ward, an early entry, has withdrawn to undergo minor surgery on his shoulder. The surgery will not keep Ward from his other racing commitments.

Another Kawasaki rider, Jeff Matiasevich of La Habra Heights, is the only high-ranked American rider entered.

This is the 18th USGP held in California since Willy Bauer of West Germany won the inaugural at Carlsbad in 1973 and is the third promoted by former world champion Roger DeCoster at Glen Helen. Eric Geboers of Belgium won in 1989, the year he also won his second 500cc world championship.

Qualifying is scheduled Saturday to reduce the entry field of 67 to 40 for Sunday’s championship. The format for world competition has been changed this year. Instead of two 40-minute motos, there will be three 25-minute motos.

For support races, the White Bros. Four-Stroke Classic will replace the 125cc motos that were held the last two years. Among the favorites are Ty Davis of Hesperia, defending world four-stroke champion; Greg Zitterkopf of Chino, 1989-90 champion, and Rex Staten of Fontana, world veterans champion.

On the domestic scene, it’s the weekend for season openers:

Saugus Speedway will officially open its 53rd weekly schedule Saturday night with a program of NASCAR sportsman, Grand American modified and pro stock--a new name for street stock--on the one-third mile flat oval. Lance Hooper, 24, whose father Ray, brother Ray Jr. and uncle Wayne also won Saugus track championships, will open defense of his 1991 sportsman title in a new Pontiac Trans Am.

Ventura Raceway will hold the first of a televised five-race “Saturday Night Thunder” series of United States Auto Club midget races, which will be shown live on ESPN. Page Jones, who won 11 races last season, and Sleepy Tripp, six-time USAC Western States champion, head the entries along with Robby Flock, last year’s Ventura champion. Qualifying Friday night will set the field Saturday night’s main event.

Cajon Speedway in El Cajon will play host to the NASCAR Featherlite Southwest Tour for its opening stock car show Saturday night. Rick Carelli of Denver, who won two weeks ago at Mesa Marin to take the lead in defense of his series championship, will drive a Chevrolet V6 in the Budweiser 100. He also won last year’s race on Cajon’s three-eights mile paved oval.

Orange Show Speedway in San Bernardino will start the 1992 season Saturday night with its sprint bomber championships, plus a train race and destruction derby.

The speedway motorcycle racing season will open Friday night at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa, home track of International Speedway, Inc., for the past 24 seasons. Speedway bikes are 500cc, run on alcohol, turn only left and have no brakes. Defending national champion Mike Faria and former champions Bobby Schwartz, Steve Lucero and Brad Oxley will be back for the weekly races. Gary Hicks, surprise winner of the Spring Classic last month, also is entered in the Coors Light season opener.

Road-racing motorcycles of WERA will be at Willow Springs Raceway in Rosamond for the annual California Cycle Jam on Saturday and Sunday. Featured will be 180 m.p.h. Formula USA and 250cc Formula II cycles, plus a four-hour national endurance race. Entries include Rich Oliver, F-USA champion; Donny Greene, national F-II champion; Colin Edwards, winner of the Daytona 250 last month; and Team Suzuki Endurance, seven-time winner of the WERA national endurance championship.

Keith Code, who left racing several years ago to conduct a motorcycle riding school, will return to racing in the F-II race along with Kurt Hall, a former F-USA champion who also rides for Team Suzuki in the enduro. Qualifying and the enduro final are Saturday, with finals on Sunday for the two Formula races, plus three Superstock races.

INDY CARS--The 16-race Indy Car season, which opened two weeks ago with Emerson Fittipaldi winning on a street course in Surfers Paradise in Australia, will resume Sunday with the Valvoline 200, an oval track race, at Phoenix International Raceway. Rick Mears, who has been on the pole for the past four Phoenix races and scored back-to-back victories in 1989 and 1990, will be the favorite. Fittipaldi and Mears both drive Marlboro Chevys for Roger Penske.

Lyn St. James announced Wednesday that she will attempt to become the second woman to drive in the Indianapolis 500. St. James, who has won several major endurance races, will drive “The Spirit of the American Woman,” a Lola Chevrolet sponsored by JC Penney and owned by Dick Simon Racing. Simon was also the car owner when Janet Guthrie became the only Indy 500 driver in 1977-78-79.

DRAG RACING--Pro stock champion Darrell Alderman, who received a suspended sentence after pleading guilty to federal charges of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, had his appeal to return to racing rejected by the National Hot Rod Assn. Alderman was sentenced to five years of probation and fined $10,000 by U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wilhoit in Lexington, Ky., but the NHRA ruled that his racing suspension will remain in effect until at least January of 1994, at which time he may appeal again.