Cool 82 works Honda story

UpTiTe
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UpTiTe 10/7/2015 8:41pm
10/7/2015 8:41pm
SouthwestMfg wrote:
Good conversation all around. Don't need to defend Donnie, he was "The" man in 1982. A lot of "what if's" left after he was injured ending...
Good conversation all around. Don't need to defend Donnie, he was "The" man in 1982. A lot of "what if's" left after he was injured ending his career. Just meant to point out how much go-for-it Rick had at 16. That season was a dog-fight with Rick Johnson, Donnie Hansen and Broc Glover going down to the wire. Rick never had it "in the bag", only 6 point seperation in the end between 1st-3rd. Warren Ried was not that far off in 4th on a support ride Suzuki.

Let's just say that relative to what teams run as "production" bikes now, the Yamaha Rick raced would be considered "stock". Not taking anything away from what the guys a Yamaha did to the bike or time spent. The top of the thread, that Honda was and still is IMO quite bad-ass !

UpTiTe, really appreciate your opinions / post. Much respect for anyone who's done time at the national level, it's seriously hard ! (you would think that only reading Vital post's !) Oh and "a piece of wood" with "3rd" on it - very cool !

1982 - we can all speculate on what the Motocross & Trophee des Nations would have been like if Donnie would have raced. He won the last 250 GP in Sweden before being injured . . .



Donnie was fast that year, and getting faster too. It wouldve been cool to see how Donnie ended up, he was going to race 500 in 83 then go back to 250.

For sure RJ had a lot of fight in him in 82, he rode that bike great and once he tasted the win, he just got faster. he was a different rider in 82 than he was in the past. I had a nice battle with him for a few laps at Mammoth in 84 in the 125 class.
anniebertmojo
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anniebertmojo 10/8/2015 7:10am
10/8/2015 7:10am
I was at American Honda race shop a few weeks back getting caught up with some friends and the old works bikes are used as "bench racing" displays










Wandell
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Wandell 10/9/2015 7:15am
10/9/2015 7:15am
Without a doubt, Honda had the trickest works bikes back in the early 80's. The 80 and 81bikes were cool, but they took it to another level in 1982. I'm so glad that Uptite and others that raced in that era are here, I love their insight. He and a couple others from that era have told me before that RJ's 82 YZ250 was extremely trick and Yamaha went to great lengths to make it appear "stock". I seem to remember Yamaha advertising that RJ was riding a "stock" YZ in some old Cycle News adds. I remember as a teenager in 1982 wondering how RJ could even compete with Hansen on that RC250!
anniebertmojo
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anniebertmojo 10/9/2015 6:42pm
10/9/2015 6:42pm
Wandell wrote:
Without a doubt, Honda had the trickest works bikes back in the early 80's. The 80 and 81bikes were cool, but they took it to another...
Without a doubt, Honda had the trickest works bikes back in the early 80's. The 80 and 81bikes were cool, but they took it to another level in 1982. I'm so glad that Uptite and others that raced in that era are here, I love their insight. He and a couple others from that era have told me before that RJ's 82 YZ250 was extremely trick and Yamaha went to great lengths to make it appear "stock". I seem to remember Yamaha advertising that RJ was riding a "stock" YZ in some old Cycle News adds. I remember as a teenager in 1982 wondering how RJ could even compete with Hansen on that RC250!
I was getting support from PC during that era and I got to see RJ's bike up close many times (sometimes they would come by the shop), let's just say they were not stock LOL.

The Shop

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MaxPower
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MaxPower 10/11/2015 10:48am
10/11/2015 10:48am
anniebertmojo wrote:
I was getting support from PC during that era and I got to see RJ's bike up close many times (sometimes they would come by the...
I was getting support from PC during that era and I got to see RJ's bike up close many times (sometimes they would come by the shop), let's just say they were not stock LOL.
No one would have really thought they were showroom stock that was a real fan of moto.
I'm guessing the shock , the fork internals, the yz60 ignition, wheels and porting were changed.
That's pretty much what any privateer could have done. Did you see anything other than those things that you can disclose?
MaxPower
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MaxPower 10/12/2015 2:47pm
10/12/2015 2:47pm
Is that Kenny Keylon riding somebodies Honds (Shultz?) when he was injured?
UpTiTe
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UpTiTe 10/12/2015 9:09pm
10/12/2015 9:09pm
MaxPower wrote:
Is that Kenny Keylon riding somebodies Honds (Shultz?) when he was injured?
Yes that's Kenny, Honda gave him a ride for the 82 outdoors.

Pit Row

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