Motor Racing : Eddie Lawson Now the Winningest U.S. Rider on International Circuit

When Eddie Lawson won his 23rd world 500cc motorcycle road race last month in the Austrian Grand Prix it moved him past the legendary Kenny Roberts as the winningest American rider in the history of the international racing circuit.

Only Giacomo Agostini of Italy, with 68, and Mike Hailwood of Great Britain, with 37, have more career 500cc Grand Prix wins than Lawson, who is in his sixth season. Roberts won 22--and 3 world championships--in 6 years. Only two other Americans have won more than 3 races, Freddie Spencer with 20 and Randy Mamola with 13.

Lawson, who won world championships in 1984 and 1986, is leading this year in search of his third after winning 4 of the first 10 races in the 16-event season.

Although it is an 11-hour flight between his Yamaha team headquarters in Milan, Italy, and his home in Upland, Lawson flies back and forth as often as his schedule permits.

“It’s worth it, even if I only get six or seven days at home at a time,” Lawson said during his most recent visit. “I need it to get away from the frantic pace we keep in Europe where we’re in the spotlight day and night.

“Spending a few days with my folks and friends in Upland and Ontario gets me back in the proper frame of mind. It’s like getting my battery charged. I usually go dirt biking in the desert or take my boat down to the (Colorado) River and race around. It’s also good to see the sun. Even the smog looks good sometimes.”

During one two-week break in his schedule, Lawson decided to visit Holland instead of coming home.

“I never saw the sun once, and then when we went to Belgium for the race, it rained,” he said. “That was too much for me.”

Another reason for Lawson’s commuting is to oversee the construction of a new home in San Antonio Heights, where Upland stretches north into the San Gabriel Mountains. Lawson hopes to move into the $700,000 mansion that he helped design in the fall.

“My mother looks after things, like picking out color combinations and wallpaper and stuff like that, but I like to get home now and then to check on how it’s coming along,” he said.

In the meantime, Lawson lives in an old stone house on 13th Street that he plans to give to his grandfather after the new house is completed.

Although in Europe Lawson is as recognizable as Magic Johnson or Fernando Valenzuela in this country, he is an anonymity in Upland--or anywhere else in the United States.

“At home, my next door neighbor doesn’t know me, and if he did, he’d have no idea what I do,” Lawson said. “Personally, I don’t mind it that way, but it’s unfortunate for the cycle industry.

“At races in Europe, we have to have escorts to get from the motorhome to the track. There’s just no privacy. The fans crowd in around us the way they do baseball and football players over here.”

Lawson also said that riding a motorcycle is a way of life in most European countries, the way driving a car is here.

“There is no negative connotation about a motorcycle, the way it seems to be in the United States. I think that’s because so many people ride them and they’re accepted as a necessity. For instance, you can go into the finest restaurant wearing your leathers and you’ll get served as if you were wearing a suit and tie.”

Lawson finished third in the 1987 world standings behind Wayne Gardner of Australia and Mamola, his best friend, but this year he appears ready to reclaim the championship. Despite a disappointing tenth place finish last Sunday at Rijeka, Yugoslavia, Lawson leads Gardner, 165-149, in points.

It was the first time Lawson finished worse than fourth this year and was caused by a fall during practice on Saturday.

Lawson, who has not fallen in a single race this season, was knocked off his bike in a collision with a slower rider and injured his shoulder. “Eddie was in a lot of pain and because the track is the most physical and tiring of any on the schedule, all he could do race day was ride around and try to get as many points as he could,” business manager Gary Howard of Tustin said after talking by phone with Lawson. “He’ll see a doctor this week in Austria and hopefully will be ready for Sunday’s race at Paul Ricard (course) in France.”

Lawson’s team is one of the most cosmopolitan in sports. Kel Carruthers, the team manager and chief mechanic, is from Australia. The crew is from Italy, the tire engineer from France, the suspension engineer from Sweden, the engine builder from Japan, one rider from the United States and the other (Didier de Radigues) from Belgium.

“The international language is English so it’s easy to get along,” Lawson said.

At 30, Lawson is one of the oldest riders on the Grand Prix circuit, but he has no plans of retiring.

“I’ll be around a couple of more years, at least. As long as I’m on top, and being up front comes easy, there’s no reason to think about stopping. Especially if I can keep the young guys behind me.

“There are a lot of headaches, but not when I’m on my bike, racing. I thoroughly enjoy being at the track, on the bike. The worst part is doing what my sponsor wants.”

By that he means press conferences where, in Europe, they’re like a Super Bowl media circus.

“After I won the championship in ‘86, Marlboro flew me from Los Angeles to Singapore to Paris, with a stopover somewhere in India, then to Geneva and back to Los Angeles. All in less than a week. Earlier this season, we flew from Milan to Greece to Italy to Paris for a couple of hour-long press conferences.

“Living in the United States, you can’t imagine the attitude toward motorcycle racing around the rest of the world. In Japan alone there are 30 bike magazines, full color slick jobs that come out three days after every Grand Prix. Over here, there are one or two magazines that print our results, but they don’t come out until several months after the race.”

This season will always be a memorable one for Lawson, a 1976 graduate of Chaffey High School in Ontario, because of his win at Laguna Seca, on the Monterey peninsula. It was only the third Grand Prix ever held in the U. S., and the first outside Daytona Beach, Fla.

“Everybody I ever knew around Upland and San Bernardino County was there, along with my mom and dad, grandparents, girl friend, everybody, and I could hear them all screaming, ‘Eddie, Eddie, Eddie,’ every time I went by. It was a great race. I started back about sixth and had to work my way up before I finally passed Gardner and then Niall MacKenzie (of Scotland) to win.

“Winning in front of my hometown friends was like winning a world championship. It was a great thrill, that’s for sure.”

STOCK CARS--West Coast fans of NASCAR Winston Cup racing will have an opportunity to show their support Sunday when stock car racing goes big time on pay-per-view television with the AC Spark Plug 500 coming from Pocono Raceway at 8:30 a.m.--for $9.95 to $12.95, depending on cable operators. . . . Modifieds, sportsman and hobby stock Figure 8s will share the spotlight Saturday night at Saugus Speedway. . . . Hobby and mini stocks will race Friday night at Ventura Raceway. . . . Sportsman and street bombers go Saturday night at Cajon Speedway.

MIDGETS--Six-time Turkey Night Grand Prix winner Ron Shuman will challenge defending champion Sleepy Tripp in a U.S. Auto Club Western States main event Sunday night on the quarter-mile dirt oval at Ascot Park. Tripp is a runway leader after winning the regional championship three times in the last five years. Also on the program will be a three-quarter midget main event, featuring defending champion Dennis Hart and TQ points leader Gary Schroeder.

SPRINT CARS--Shuman, points leader in the Parnelli Jones Firestone/California Racing Assn. series, will also race tonight at the Speedrome in Indianapolis and Saturday night at Ascot Park in a 30-lap main event. Shuman leads Mike Sweeney by 73 points after winning last week. Also back this Saturday is Lealand McSpadden, who has seven CRA wins to Shuman’s eight, including three at Ascot.

MOTOCROSS--A busy weekend is in store for riders in the CMC’s Dodge Truck California summer series with racing Friday night at Ascot Park and Sunday at Sunrise Valley Cycle Park in Adelanto. . . . The final qualifying race for the Ventura County Fair stadium motocross championship Aug. 19 will be held Saturday night at Ventura Raceway. . . . National champion Rick Johnson and former champion Bob (Hurricane) Hannah will face foreign riders Sunday in the 250cc United States Grand Prix at Unadilla, N.Y. Johnson won the race last year when it was held at Hollister, Calif., while Hannah won in 1986 at Unadilla.

SPORTS CARS--Last year, after Dennis Aase was seriously injured in a crash while testing a new GTP car at Riverside, Chris Cord took over the Dan Gurney-prepared Toyota GTO car and won the International Motor Sports Assn. championship. Two weeks ago, Cord underwent major abdominal surgery and this time it was Aase’s turn to get the car back. The IMSA veteran responded by winning a 500 kilometer race at Road America in what was his first sprint race since the Riverside crash. Toyota will soon announce resumption of its GTP program with Gurney preparing cars for Willy T. Ribbs-Juan Manuel Fangio III and Aase-Cord. . . . The California Sports Car Club will hold a series of regional championship races this weekend at Willow Springs Raceway, near Rosamond. Also, Sunday will be a Russell Pro Series race.

MOTORCYCLES--The second half of the speedway season opens this week with national champion Brad Oxley and former champion Bobby (Boogaloo) Schwartz hooked up in one of the closest championship races in recent history. Oxley, by scoring heavily in the handicap division, has 4,927 points to 4,169 for Schwartz with racing tonight at Ascot Park’s South Bay Speedway, Friday night at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa, Saturday night at Speedway USA in Victorville and Wednesday night at the Inland Speedway in San Bernardino’s Glen Helen Park.

OFF-ROAD--Edna Lott was named to succeed her late husband, Walt, as president of the High Desert Racing Assn. Lott died July 2 during the running of an HDRA race near Barstow. Mrs. Lott was vice president since the organization was founded in 1978. One race remains on the 1988 schedule, the Nevada 500, Sept. 9-11, a run from near Las Vegas to Tonopah in central Nevada and back to Las Vegas.

DRAG RACING--Pro stock champion driver Bob Glidden, angered over allegations of cheating, filed a $30 million slander suit against promoter Billy Meyer and Meyer’s International Hot Rod Assn. Glidden and Bruce Allen both withdrew from the IHRA Northern Nationals last week rather than accept an open inspection of their cars’ engine cylinder heads. This caused both to be suspended for the remainder of the season, but the lawsuit cited published stories quoting Meyers’ allegations that Glidden dropped out to avoid being caught cheating.

INDY CARS--Scott Pruett, the Trans Am driver who upset the favorites in an International Race of Champions last month at Riverside, will replace injured Kevin Cogan in the Marlboro Grand Prix this weekend at the Meadowlands. Cogan broke his left forearm in a crash last Sunday in Toronto. . . . Marlboro, not to be outdone by Winston, has offered $1 million to any driver who wins all three CART races at the Meadowlands, Michigan and Miami. It is a copy of the Winston plan in which Bill Elliott won $1 million two years ago for winning 3-of-4 designated NASCAR races. . . . Mike Groff, 26, a former Super Vee driver from Northridge, passed an Indy car rookie test at Indianapolis Raceway Park and is expected to make his CART debut Sept. 25 at Nazareth, Pa.

SUPER MODIFIEDS--Defending USAC champion Billy Vukovich III, who choose to race Indy cars during the early part of the season, has returned to super modifieds and will race Saturday night at Madera Speedway. With Vukovich out of the points race, Dave Hamilton leads Mike Swanson by a single point.

LAND SPEED--With Bonneville Speed Week only a month away, early bird performances last weekend included Al Teague, 320.056 m.p.h. in the Speed-O-Motive Special; Rick and Nolan White, 261.703 in a Chevrolet streamliner; and father Bruce and son Dan Crower, 225.05 in a modified roadster powered by a 1937 straight 8 Nash.