Got this from
Clubhouse member Tony, a huge Superbike fan:

AMA Superbike racing suffered a tragic loss at the California Speedway
in Fontana, CA this weekend. During Friday night's Superstock
qualifying session, a multi-bike crash which started when rider Jeffery
Tigert lost control of his 600cc Suzuki and let go of the bike entering
Turn 9 at about 100mph on the infield part of the race course.
Tigert's bike slid for about 100 feet through the grass abutting the
track before the wheels dug into the turf near barriers dividing the
section of the track where riders are travelling in opposite
directions. Tigert's bike then flipped into the air, clearing the
three-foot-high barriers and continued to tumble another fifteen feet
after landing before it struck rider Ricky Lundgren head-on as he
exited
Turn four. The accident occurred at 5:40 p.m.PST and Lundgren was
pronounced dead at 6:25 p.m. PST. Tigert escaped with a few abrasions.
The track safety crew was on scene "within seconds" as was the
ambulance.
AMA officials made several changes to the couse in that area prior to
Saturday's racing, including stacking the barriers three high (to 9
feet
total) and adding haybales to the Turn Nine side of the barriers.
On the lighter side, Australian Studpuppy Anthony Gobert ("The
Go-Show")
won Saturday's rain-delayed Superbike Race, beating Aaron Yates to the
finish by a mere 14 one-hundreths of a second, the closest finish in
California Speedway's history.
Gobert is known as one of the fastest riders on the Superbike circuit
and has also done post-race interviews wearing nothing but his Calvins.
Gotta love thoes Aussies!!

Tony "mxslick" Bandiera

Sources:
OC Register, Sunday April 12 2002;
Reference to Calvin shots sent by friends in Australia

http://www.latimes.com/sports/motorracing/la-000024861apr07.story?coll=la -headlines-sports-autoracing://http://www.latimes.com/sports/motor...orts-autoracing://http://www.latimes.com/sports/motor...orts-autoracing

>>
Motorcycle Racer Died After Freak Accident

Motor sports: Lundgren, from La Mesa, was killed Friday [April 5], getting hit by an airborne bike from another crash.

By SHAV GLICK, TIMES STAFF WRITER

Investigations of Ricky Lundgren's fatal motorcycle accident Friday at California Speedway indicated that his fate was similar to that of a highway driver hit head-on by an oncoming driver who crossed the median.

Only this time the oncoming bike had to catapult over a barrier more than three feet high before smashing into Lundgren.

Lundgren, 40, a La Mesa stockbroker with a wife and twin 2-year-old boys, died of injuries at Loma Linda University Medical Center a little less than a hour after being hit in the freak accident. "Another rider, Jeffrey Tigert, came through turn 8A and started to enter turn 9, at which point he lost control of his motorcycle, which then slid across the asphalt," explained Ron Barrick, American Motorcyclist Assn. Pro Racing manager. "Based on reports from corner workers, once [Tigert's motorcycle] got into a grass area it started tumbling, which is nothing unusual.

"As it got closer to the barriers that divide turn 9 from the turn 4 area, however, the [355-pound] bike somehow dug itself into the ground and launched itself approximately five to six feet in the air. The motorcycle then hit Lundgren's Suzuki as he was exiting turn 4."

Tigert, a Suzuki rider from San Leandro, fell off his bike before it got airborne and was treated and released from the speedway care center with scrapes and shoulder pain.

The incident occurred during the second qualifying session for 750 Superstock motorcycles, part of the three-day AMA Yamaha Challenge, which will conclude today on the 2.3-mile, 21-turn course inside the California Speedway oval.
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[ April 13, 2002: Message edited by: twin58 ]