Year to Forget Left in Past by New Year, New Memories

By SHAV GLICK

Jan. 7, 2000 12 AM PT

If you are a NASCAR fan, 1999 was another great season.

For the rest of motor racing, however, 1999 was a year to forget.

It was a year of fatalities--Gonzalo Rodriguez and Greg Moore in CART, Casey Diemert and Keith Cowherd at Irwindale Speedway, sprint car driver Kevin Gobrecht in the World of Outlaws, and three spectators at an Indy Racing League race in Charlotte, N.C.

It was a year of major sponsors leaving the sport--PPG as the financier of CART’s point fund, Pep Boys as the title sponsor of the IRL, Kool cigarettes as sponsor of the Toyota Atlantic series.

Goodyear withdrew from CART and IRL, forcing Bridgestone-Firestone to provide all of the tires for those series. Porsche withdrew its team from the LeMans 24-hour race and the American LeMans series, joining Nissan, Toyota, BMW and Mercedes on the sidelines.

Indy 500 winner Kenny Brack has left the IRL for CART. Two-time Indy winner Al Unser Jr. has gone the other way, from CART to the IRL. Robby Gordon and Scott Pruett are leaving CART for Winston Cup. Team owner A.J. Foyt is hedging his bets on the future of the IRL by taking on a full 32-race Winston Cup program with Mike Bliss as his driver.

Tony George poured cold water on hopes that his Indy Racing League and CART might settle their differences and return to one open-wheel racing series that would include the Indianapolis 500 and CART’s strong non-oval races such as the Long Beach Grand Prix.

This year can’t help but be an improvement.

Racing will start this week with the opening event of the Toyota Trucks AMA Supercross series Saturday night at Edison Field in Anaheim, and the Rolex 24-hour endurance race at Daytona Beach, Fla.

A second Supercross will be run at the same site next Saturday, Jan. 15.

In Supercross, as in Winston Cup racing, the biggest race is the season opener. That is because it almost always sells out, and the four Japanese manufacturers--Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki and Suzuki--have their American headquarters in Southern California.

INDY 500

Even though the IRL cut off negotiations for compromise with CART, it did open the doors for a return of CART drivers to Indianapolis when it announced that veteran champ car drivers would not be required to take rookie tests. In the past, even Formula One champions such as Nigel Mansell and Jimmy Clark had to pass rookie tests at Indy before being allowed to race.

Nineteen of the 36 drivers who drove in at least one CART race last year have never driven at Indianapolis, among them series champion Juan Montoya. CART had earlier cleared the way for its drivers to race at Indy by moving its St. Louis race off the 500 weekend.

24 HOURS OF DAYTONA

Sports car racing deteriorated dramatically in the 1990s, but the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona remains on any list of the year’s premier racing events.

Rob Dyson, whose teams won the 1997 and ’99 races, says this about the race that will start Saturday and end Sunday:

“The Rolex 24 hours at Daytona is more than just a car race. It is a mammoth human event. You will start the race and in order to win it, the crew will never have slept, the timing and scoring people will never have stopped, the drivers will have rested fitfully, the car’s engine will have never been turned off and the event itself never lets up.”

This year, Dyson is switching from a Riley & Scott MK3 chassis to a new Reynard with Ford power. His drivers have changed too. Venerable Elliott Forbes-Robinson is back, but Butch Leitzinger and Andy Wallace have been replaced by James Weaver.

KING KENNY

Kenny Roberts, who won two AMA Grand National motorcycle championships before winning three world road racing titles, has been named rider of the century by Cycle News, motorcycle racing’s definitive publication. After retiring, Roberts fielded teams that won four world championships.

“Some guys are born to be able to do things, and Kenny was born to race motorcycles,” said Kel Caruthers, a former world champion who later was Roberts’ crew chief.

Roger DeCoster, five-time world champion from Belgium, was named motocross rider of the century. DeCoster later managed 11 USA teams which won the Motocross des Nations.

Other century recognition went to dirt track rider Jay Springsteen, who won his first race in 1975 and his last one last May, and off-road racer Malcolm Smith, hero of the cycling documentary, “On Any Sunday,” and winner of eight gold medals in the International Six Days Trials.

SO LONG, MANNIE

Most people want to live as long as they can, but sometimes living too long can mean that few are left with whom to reminisce.

Mannie Pineda was a pioneer motor racing writer--also a pioneer Mexican-American sports journalist--in the 1940s and 1950s who kept Pasadena readers aware of who was who in racing. He annually went to the Indianapolis 500 with the late J.C. Agajanian. He was there when Troy Ruttman won for Aggie, and he was there when his good friend from Alhambra, Sam Hanks, won the 500. He told readers about the Novi being built by Bud and Ed Winfield in their La Canada garage long before it ever roared at Indy.

Pineda died Dec. 14 of cancer at his daughter’s home in Rialto at 91, having outlasted nearly all of his old racing cronies.

I am proud to say that I was one of Mannie’s teenage proteges on the long-gone Pasadena Post.

LAST LAPS

Dan Gurney, whose All American Racers Eagles have been a staple in CART champ car racing for many years, is bowing out of CART this year to run one car in the Toyota Atlantic series for son Alex Gurney. Gurney will race a Swift chassis with Hasselgren racing engines. Since Toyota withdrew its sponsorship of the Santa Ana-based team, AAR has been restructured and the personnel drastically reduced.

Matt Alcone, the Orange County entrepreneur who revolutionized offshore racing by proving that catamarans could beat the established V-hulled Super Vees on ocean waters, has retired after winning three national and world championships with the help of throttle man Jerry Gilbreath. Alcone, who began racing in 1994, was recently named to the American Power Boat Assn.’s offshore Hall of Champions.

Page Jones, whose career as one of the country’s brightest young racers was cut short in a sprint car accident in 1994, has become engaged to Jamie Marie Zupanovich of Rancho Palos Verdes. Jones, 27, the son of former Indy 500 winner Parnelli Jones, continues his recovery from severe head injuries suffered in the accident at Eldora, Ohio. The wedding is planned for early 2001.

Jeanne B. Sleeper of Laguna Beach, who produced Supercross events for Mike Goodwin and other promoters, has been recognized by Convention South magazine as one of the 100 outstanding meeting professionals. . . . Dennis Huth, NASCAR vice president for touring operations and international development--among them stewardship of the Winston West and Featherlite Southwest Tour series--has resigned. . . . Southwest series champion Kurt Busch will drive a Ford F-150 for Jack Roush this year in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck series.

Irwindale Speedway will honor its six NASCAR Winston Racing Series champions at the track’s first awards banquet Saturday night at the Glendale Red Lion Hotel. They are Rod Johnson, super-late models; Dusty McDonald, late models; Larry Krieger, Grand American modifieds; Mike Price, super-stocks; Lee Ladd, mini-stocks; and Michael Pope, street stocks.

It’s banquet season everywhere. Dale Earnhardt Jr. will receive his rewards as NASCAR Busch Grand National champion for the second consecutive year Saturday night at the Regent Beverly Wilshire hotel. . . . The American Auto Racing & Broadcasters Assn. will fete its 12-member All-American team next Saturday night at the Long Beach Renaissance Hotel. . . . Also that night, the U.S. Auto Club western states awards banquet is scheduled at the Monrovia Wyndham Garden Hotel. . . . On Jan. 22, the Vintage Auto Racing Assn. will hold its annual party at the Waterfront Hilton in Huntington Beach.

NECROLOGY

John Moorhouse, a champion midget racer during the sport’s heyday, died Dec. 30 in his hometown of San Diego of a lingering illness. Moorhouse won 53 races between 1946 and 1958 and was Southern California champion in 1953.

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AMA Supercross

* What: AMA Supercross, first race of 16-race series.

* Where: Edison International Field, Anaheim.

* When: Saturday. Practice, 12:30 p.m. Opening ceremonies, 7 p.m.

* Defending series champion: Jeremy McGrath, Chaparral Yamaha.

* Defending Anaheim winner: Ezra Lusk, Honda (won both 1999 races).

* Tickets: Edison Field box office, Ticketmaster, participating Yamaha dealers.

* Prices: Adults, $75, $40 and $25. Children, $10.

1999 SUPERCROSS FINAL STANDINGS

No. Rider, Hometown, Vehicle Points

1. Jeremy McGrath, Menifee, Calif., Yamaha 356