Hancock Rides at Costa Mesa; Hamill Passes

Greg Hancock, fresh from a third-place finish in the World Speedway Motorcycle Grand Prix in Denmark last weekend, will be at the tiny Orange County Fairgrounds oval in Costa Mesa tonight to defend his Coors Light U.S. Speedway championship.

Hancock and Mike Faria, the 1990 and ’91 national champion from Apple Valley, are taking time off from their European schedules to ride at Costa Mesa. Billy Hamill of Monrovia, who upset defending champion Hans Nielsen of Denmark to win the world title, will not ride in the nationals because of a dispute over engines.

“They put in a rule at Costa Mesa barring bikes with a lay-down engine--horizontal instead of the conventional upright configuration--which I’ve been riding all year,” Hamill said from his home in England. “I’m disappointed, but I don’t even own a bike with an upright engine, so I won’t be there for the nationals.”

The rule was made, promoter-rider Brad Oxley said, because “the new-style lay-down bikes are faster and more expensive, and would have put local riders who race here every week at a disadvantage because none of them have that style bike.”

Hancock, like Hamill, raced at the Costa Mesa track before he headed for Europe, where speedway racing is a major sport. He and Hamill race four times a week--Tuesdays in Sweden, Wednesdays and Saturdays in the British League as a member of the Cradley Heath team and Sundays in Poland.

At Costa Mesa, Hancock will ride an upright bike owned by Lee Cohen, who also supplied the bike when Hancock won the nationals last year in a run-off against two-time champion Bobby Schwartz.

“I had to go to Europe [to reach the top level of racing], but American speedway is the heart and soul of my career,” Hancock said.

Schwartz, who won the U.S. title in 1986 and ‘89, will be back for his 17th appearance in the national finals.

Other riders include Oxley, the 1987 champion from San Juan Capistrano; Steve Lucero of Riverside, the 1988 winner; Gary Hicks, Shawn McConnell, John Aden, Andy Northrup, Rob Pfetzing, Jesse Finch, Jim Sisemore, Bart Bast, Don Odom, Ed Castro and Louis Kossuth.

Speedway bikes are capable of going from zero to 60 mph in 2.5 seconds--and have no brakes. The 190-yard Costa Mesa track is the smallest speedway oval in the world.

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Planned stadium reconstruction has left the American Motorcyclist Assn.’s Supercross schedule without two of its most lucrative sites for 1997.

Anaheim Stadium, which attracted a record 65,254 last January to watch Jeremy McGrath demonstrate his talents, will not be available, nor will San Diego’s Jack Murphy Stadium, where 48,202 were on hand two weeks later. Anaheim Stadium is to be down-sized, Jack Murphy enlarged.

In an attempt to make up for these losses, the AMA has scheduled two events in the Coliseum--where the sport of stadium motocross was founded by Mike Goodwin in 1972--on Jan. 11 and Jan. 18. There is a possibility that construction in San Diego may be delayed, and if so, one of the Coliseum dates would be switched back to Jack Murphy Stadium.

It will be the first time since 1993 that the Coliseum, with its distinct peristyle jump, will have a Supercross event.

Motor Racing Notes

POWERBOATS--The Powerboat Magazine Ventura Offshore Grand Prix, the first national championship event on the West Coast since 1983, will be run today and Sunday off Ventura Harbor. Entries include 46-foot Skaters owned by Laith Pharaon of Saudi Arabia and Jack Carmody of Austin, Texas. Both boats are capable of 150 mph. Racing will be over an 8.8-mile course visible from shore. . . . When high winds and rough water forced cancellation last Sunday of the Las Vegas Cup Formula One races, it left Greg Foster of Orange as the winner, based on semifinal heat results, and gave former Southern Californian Scott Gillman, now of Basalt, Colo., his third season championship. Gillman won races in Saskatoon, Canada, and St. Louis in the eight-race series.

SPRINT CARS--The Don Peabody Memorial race, a Sprint Car Racing Assn. event scheduled for Nov. 16 at the Pomona Fairgrounds, has been canceled because the track cannot be prepared in time. . . . The 11th annual Quaker State Classic, another SCRA event originally scheduled Nov. 1-2 at Bakersfield Speedway in Oildale, has been moved to Nov. 15-16 to avoid conflicting with the World of Outlaws event which will be at Perris Auto Speedway on Nov. 1-2.

SPORTS CARS--When Tommy Kendall finished fourth in the final Trans-Am race last Sunday in Reno, successfully defending his championship, he joined the late Mark Donohue as the only drivers in the Trans-Am’s 30-year history to have won three series titles. Jaime Galles, who finished second behind teammate Ron Fellows, drove his last race. Galles is retiring as a driver to help his father, Rick, run the family’s team in the Indy Racing League.

NECROLOGY--Ivan Baldwin, a legendary stock car driver from Highland who raced at Orange Show Speedway in the 1960s and ‘70s, was killed in a highway accident last Sunday near his home in Mount Pleasant, N.C. Baldwin, 49, first raced at Orange Show in 1964 and won his last major event, a Southwest Tour race, on the same track in 1986. In recent years, he had been a race-car builder.