SABADELL-TARRASA, Spain, April 9, 1972 For the manufacturers’ teams that compete in World Championship motocross every year, the Gran Premio de España near Barcelona marks the end of the long European winter. When the Swedish riders have put away their cross-country skis and the Russians have stored their long coats in mothballs, the riders and mechanics convoy their vans to the coast of Spain to greet the Spring sun and the first Grand Prix of the season. Mechanics are eager to see what engineering miracles the opposition has performed in their shops during the winter, and the riders try to judge how hard their competition has been training through the off-season. The competition shops had been busy. Some new and interesting machinery was unveiled at Barcelona this spring. Suzuki, the defending World Champion, arrived with bikes that showed only minor refinements over last year’s models. There were some frame and suspension changes, but Suzuki had swept the Championship in 1971 and the bike was already well developed. Two brand-new machines apiece were provided for the Suzuki works riders, World Champion Joël Robert and another Belgian, Sylvain Geboers. Robert won the Spanish Grand Prix last year and then went on to win seven more Grands Prix to break the longstanding jinx that whoever won the first GP wouldn’t be World Champion at the end of the season. Geboers, who is a Flemish Belgian from the northern part of that country, suffered a serious knee injury in 1971, but after training extensively during the winter, he came to Spain determined to give Robert a fight for the title. Husqvarna rolled out three very special lightweight 250s for its top team riders: Arne Kring, Bengt Arne Bonn and Uno Palm. The bikes have American-made titanium frames, alloy tanks, six-speed gearboxes and a trimmed-down engine that is barely recognizable as a Husky. Gaston Rahier, a Belgian who rode for CZ in last year’s

Trans-AMA series, now has a contract with Husky, and he chose to ride a more conventional five-speed with special light components. Olle Pettersson, the Swedish rider who was instrumental in the development of the Suzuki GP machine, came to Spain with a hand-built Kawasaki that the Japanese factory had whipped together in about two months’ time. During one of the morning practice sessions when the Japanese and the Swedes were preparing their machines with racks of shiny tools and organized bins full of spares, the Russian riders and Czechoslovakian mechanics of the CZ team rolled into the pits. Their battleship-gray vehicles were still grimy from the arduous trip across Eastern Europe, and behind the doors was a tangle of spare wheels, engines and road-weary riders. At first glance, their racing machines looked like worn-out veterans that had belonged to a junior rider on unemployment. Actually, the CZs had special frames and lightened engines, and some were five-speed models, but they looked like hell. The bulky, hand-built alloy gas tanks were feather-light, but they gave the bikes an aura of cobbiness. One of the mechanics had a suitcase stuffed with coarse black tools, but later one of the riders was making adjustments on his shift lever with a rock. And it was the wrong-sized rock. But the Chee-Zeds ran, and the Russians rode them like the wind across the steppes. Some people in the pits knew the Russians were fast, but when they came out for practice in greasy sweatshirts and baggy leathers and lapped the course with times equal to the Suzukis and Huskys, their threat was established. The course was laid out on both sides of a small valley, so it had lots of uphills and downhills, including one breathtaking drop-off where the bravest riders jumped 20 feet over the edge and then gassed it down a steep hill as tall as a two-story building. During practice, Joël Robert flashed around the course, rapidly wagging the bike back and

forth in midair or carrying the front wheel the length of the main straight. In contrast, Sylvain Geboers rode slowly through each section, looking carefully at every bump and hollow. From their first lap, the Russians were slamming into the banks and riding sideways about half the time. The Russians go fast with brute strength and daring, while Geboers rides with intellect. But Robert is the champion, and he lets no one forget it. He tears around the track effortlessly with a style and flair that almost disguises his blinding speed. Robert is the fastest, but for a hoot and a holler the Russians are more fun to watch. Through two days of practice, the track surface was hard and dusty. A little overnight shower after practice on Friday had helped the dust problems, so the dark clouds on the horizon Saturday evening looked almost beneficial. But it was still raining Sunday morning, and it continued to drizzle through the preliminary support races. By the time the international riders ventured out from their vans and tents to start the introduction ceremonies, the pretty flag girls had to slosh through ankle-deep puddles – and it was still raining. When the starting barrier triggered 40 steaming motorcycles into action, small rivers of orange mud were gouging channels across the course, but Robert’s Suzuki cut through the mire like a knife and he was clearly in the lead going into the first turn. When the leaders came back in sight after the first lap, two Russians, Guenady Moiseev and Pavel Roulev, were in second and third and growling after Robert like hungry Siberian wolves. Olle Pettersson had the Kawasaki in fourth place, ahead of Gaston Rahier and Uno Palm. Geboers lay in seventh place, but he was on the move, and one by one he charged past Palm, Rahier and Pettersson. At this point, it was a three-man race. Robert held the lead, but the Russians weren’t giving an inch. Geboers was solidly in fourth,

but Pettersson dropped back with a watered-out engine and Palm bailed off briefly. Alexei Kibirine, another Russian, was moving up. Halfway through the race, Roulev’s engine went sour, and Geboers took over third place. The works Suzuki rider kept the gas on and slipped past Moiseev into second place, behind Robert. Now the Suzukis were first and second, with Moiseev and Rahier third and fourth. Geboers made it clear that Robert was still under pressure and cut the gap down to seven seconds before the checkered flag fell. After 40 minutes in the mud, Alexei Kibirine picked up fifth place on a CZ with a silver-painted high pipe that looked like it wouldn’t finish a two-lap sprint around a parking lot. Between races, everyone tried to clean the mud out of eyes, carburetors and cameras. There was a pause in the pit work while everyone took shelter from a brief but intense hail storm. The mounted Spanish soldiers just turned their horses’ haunches to the wind and hunched under their ponchos. Out on the course, corner men put down their flags and moved some hay bales to cover a dangerous buried cable that had been exposed by churning knobbies. Gaston Rahier got the holeshot in the second start and he rounded the first turn ahead of Geboers, Uno Palm and Joël Robert, who doesn’t like to be anywhere but first. Robert swept around Palm and charged past

Geboers, but just as he drew close to the leading Husky rider, Rahier clipped a hay bale that had been moved between races and went sprawling on his back in the infield. Robert smacked the fallen bike and did a flying W over the handlebars. Robert got up in a rage and chased Rahier into the crowd, where he popped him in the mouth before they were separated by the turn marshals. Gaston started Joël’s bike for him and then rejoined the fray while Robert rode sullenly back to the pits, using his left hand on the throttle. he first-lap melodrama left Geboers in the lead, with Uno Palm second, ahead of Spanish National Champion Jorge Capapey, on a Bultaco, and Englishman Jimmy Aird, on a Husky. Next came two wild Russians, Vladimir Kavinov and Alexei Kibirine. The Russkies blasted past Capapey on the next lap, and after a few minutes the race settled into a pattern, with Geboers well in command and Palm defending against Kibirine. Geboers was all business, but Palm enjoyed showing off for the Swedish cameraman by doing fourth-gear broad-slides down the front straight. By now Kibirine had enough muck in his eyes to plaster a wall, but he continued to race, and he finished just ahead of Gaston Rahier, who had picked himself up and motored into fourth place. And that kind of perseverance paid off, because after both motos, Kibirine and

Rahier were scored second and third overall, behind Geboers. When the clock finally ran out in the season’s first Grand Prix, only eight machines were still thrashing through the mud. Just finishing two 40-minute motos in the tiring mire and blinding spray was a challenge for even the world’s best. But the victory was Sylvain Geboers’, and he had earned it. Geboers had won the opening round, and reigning World Champion Joël Robert had failed to finish. When the Champion Spark Plug girls gathered around Sylvain with flowers and kissses, it looked like he was well on his way toward fulfilling his ambition of being crowned World Motocross Champion. But one week later at the Grand Prix of France, the specter of the Spanish jinx reappeared when a slower rider made an unexpected move into Geboers’ path during practice and his right ankle was broken in the ensuing crash. Robert won both motos of the French Grand Prix with lusty but futile opposition from Pavel Roulev, Guenady Moiseev and Alexei Kibirine, who finished second, third and fourth, respectively. Geboers is expected to be off the track for at least five weeks, and unless one of the inconsistent Russians develops into a superstar, Joël Robert will walk into his sixth Championship and the unlucky Sylvain Geboers will have to wait yet another year.