The Baker Ballet
The Baker Ballet
A Flawless Performance Calls For An Encore
D. Randy Riggs
IT'S BEEN a long time coming. Yet all it took to break the seemingly indefatigable esprit de corps of Yamaha International's Kenny Robertscommanded road racing domination was a little more of the same. That is, other Yamahas of the same type as Kenny's, strong North American distributor support, a thorough and fastidious master mechanic devoted to the duty at hand, enthusiastic support personnel, camaraderie second to none, and a brilliant and personable rider with a definite goal.
The machines: the OW3I and TZ250; the distributor: Yamaha Motor Canada; the mechanic: affable Bob Work; the rider: Bellingham, Washington’s Steve Baker. Together, they have jelled into a force that has beaten virtually all of the world’s finest pavement specialists since calendar pages have shown the year 1976. At English, French, Italian, South American and, finally, U.S. courses, fans and riders have experienced the “Baker Blitz.”
This time the red, white and black blitz journeyed to Monterey, California’s undulating 1.9-mile Laguna Seca road course, riding a wave of confidence bolstered by a foundation of success. Not many were betting against the effort.
Heat would come from the Roberts camp, of course, but also from the Nixon/Kanemoto team Kawasaki and strong privateer efforts of Randy Cleek, Gary Scott and Gene Romero. Bob Work seemed more concerned with Nixon than anyone, knowing full well that the shortframed version of the Kawasaki 750 in the hands of a tightcourse master like the win-hungry Nixon could send his victory streak plummeting like a hawk after a pigeon.
Roberts was dealing with the complications of the National points chase, a concern not dancing among those of Steve Baker. Ken admitted that what Steve had that he didn’t was strong confidence, and that that confidence would very probably be the sharp edge of the instrument of success. Understandably, Kenny was not his usual square-jawed self. He was preoccupied with worrying about his OW3I, which had been dropped enough times to bring suspicion to frame alignment as the cause of his handling woes.
Yvon Duhamel was actually running better than Nixon on his “Foo-Bar” 750 Kawasaki, but a prang in the 250 Lightweight left him scarred and sore, watering down about half his fire.
The battle, then, would center around Baker and Roberts, barring happenstances, with individual wars going on behind for runner-up spots. Naturally, ferocious battlefields would also be made of Superbike Production, Lightweight Expert and Novice classes.
