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50 Years of Pro Motocross: 1992
Davey Coombs

Davey Coombs

50 Years of Pro Motocross 1992

April 29, 2022 3:45pm
by: Davey Coombs
  • Home
  • 50 Years of Pro Motocross
  • Recapping the Full 1992 AMA Motocross Season
Delmont, PA Steel City Raceway Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross Championship

Welcome back to the MAVTV+ 50-Day Countdown to the opening round of the 2022 Lucas Oil AMA Pro Motocross Championship, which got a huge boost today when we found out that Ryan Dungey is coming back! In this countdown we are working through each of the 50 years of AMA Pro Motocross, and today we are 1992, a very strange season for sure.

After emerging from the 1991 season with all three AMA titles (SX, 250 MX, 500 MX) Jean-Michel Bayle made it clear to American Honda that he wanted to go back to Europe and begin a new career in road racing. Honda held firm and exercised his contract to stay one more year on the AMA circuit, which JMB did so begrudgingly. His heart just wasn’t in it. He was still remarkably fast, but only when he wanted to be, like in the St. Petersburg, Florida Supercross race, where later in the race, in just two-and-a-half straightaways, he goes from fourth to first, passing Jeff Stanton, Damon Bradshaw, and Guy Cooper. Check it out at about the 13-minute mark:

Jeff Stanton and Damon Bradshaw
Jeff Stanton and Damon Bradshaw
Jean Michel Bayle
Jean Michel Bayle
Damon Bradshaw on the cover of Cycle News.
Damon Bradshaw on the cover of Cycle News.
1-900-INF-MOTO was a results hotline that you called after the races to see who won, at like .50 cents a minute!
1-900-INF-MOTO was a results hotline that you called after the races to see who won, at like .50 cents a minute!

Still, Bayle would finish on the SX podium 12 times out of the 16 rounds and win two races (St. Pete and Las Vegas). He was just 11 points behind the leader when the series ended. Bayle also went ahead and rode and won the 500cc U.S. Grand Prix at Glen Helen, racing as a favor to Roger De Coster, the co-promoter of the event as well as the man who brought him to America in the first place.

The real supercross battle in ’92 was between Bayle’s Honda teammate and Yamaha’s Bradshaw. For most of the series the 19-year-old Bradshaw had the upper hand, winning nine rounds, the record to that point for most wins in a season. But he didn’t the one he needed, which was the final round at the Los Angeles Coliseum. That race was delayed for several weeks due to the riots in Los Angeles that followed the acquittal of three police officers accused of beating a black man named Rodney King. During that period the outdoor nationals went on, one week before the LA SX was finally set to take place on July 11, Bradshaw crashed hard at RedBud. Still, he went into the last SX round with a six-point lead and simply needed to finish third if Stanton won.

Unfortunately for Bradshaw and Yamaha, the press got to him. Damon rode his worst race of the season and had trouble moving forward from the start, despite the fact that his teammate Jeff Emig was purposely staying behind him, as was Bayle. In the end, with Bradshaw stuck in fourth, well behind the top three of Stanton, Mike Kiedrowski, and Guy Cooper, JMB went ahead and passed him as well. Stanton crossed the finish line as the 1992 AMA/Camel Supercross Champion.

The final SX began a remarkable three-week run for Stanton. After winning the LASX and the title, he then went to Unadilla and won the 250cc USGP for the third year in a row, then one week he clinched the ’92 AMA 250 Pro Motocross Championship, his third in four years, just as he had done in SX. That’s quite a run!

But then just as he did in ’89 and ’90, Stanton could not bag the final leg of the triple crown, the AMA 500 Nationals. Instead, it was Kawasaki’s Kiedrowski who garnered the title by just three points over Stanton. JMB’s last race was also the last for Jeff Ward, who had won the 500 National at Steel City the previous weekend. At Budds Creek, Ward ended up third and Bayle fourth.

In the 125 classes, the same two riders that won the 125 East and 125 West—Brian Swink and Jeremy McGrath—won their respective titles again, only in ’92 there were no longer teammates, as Swink moved over to Team Suzuki. McGrath would also get to do a few rounds on the 250, testing the riders for a move up in 1993. His best finish was a fifth at Tampa. No one at that point had any idea of just how good he was going to turn out to be, nor how quickly it was going to happen!

Damon Bradshaw on the cover of Dirt Bike Magazine.
Damon Bradshaw on the cover of Dirt Bike Magazine.
Damon Bradshaw
Damon Bradshaw
The 1992 Hangtown Motocross Classic
The 1992 Hangtown Motocross Classic
Jeremy McGrath on the cover of Cycle News.
Jeremy McGrath on the cover of Cycle News.
The 1992 AMA Supercross program.
The 1992 AMA Supercross program.
Jeff Stanton on the cover of Cycle News.
Jeff Stanton on the cover of Cycle News.
Brian Swink in Cycle News.
Brian Swink in Cycle News.

Finally, the 125 Nationals. Kawasaki’s Mike LaRocco got the drop on everyone by winning the opening round at Gatorback Cycle Park in Florida. He would stay towards the top of the leaderboard for the first ten races, and then had a lead of 47 points over Yamaha’s Jeff Emig, who won a 125 National for the first time at RedBud in July. LaRocco and Emig also teamed up with U.S. Grand Prix racer Billy Liles to win the ’92 FIM Motocross of Nations in Australia on a so-called “B team” after all of the other top Americans—Stanton, Bradshaw, Kiedrowski, and more—all decided against going because there were still two nationals left to be held after the MXoN.

The last four motos would prove absolutely disastrous for LaRocco. He suffered two DNFs at Steel City, which threw the series into a dead heat with overall winner Emig. And then right after the start of the last race of the season at Budds Creek, LaRocco busted his shifter on a big tractor tire that was marking the track. Just like that the long-gone Jeff Emig was the ’92 AMA 125 National Champion!

Here’s a handy season-in-review with many of the ’92 outdoor nationals.

1992 125 Class Points Finish

Motocross

125MX Standings - 1992

PositionRider Hometown Points
1Jeff Emig Jeff Emig Independence, MO United States430
2Mike LaRocco Mike LaRocco La Porte, IN United States411
3Ron Tichenor Ron Tichenor Palm Harbor, FL United States348
4Doug Henry Doug Henry Torrington, CT United States316
5Larry Ward Larry Ward Woodinville, WA United States297
Full Standings

1992 250 Class Points Finish

Motocross

250MX Standings - 1992

PositionRider Hometown Points
1Jeff Stanton Jeff Stanton Sherwood, MI United States270
2Mike Kiedrowski Mike Kiedrowski Canyon Country, CA United States214
3Jean Michel Bayle Jean Michel Bayle France187
4Damon Bradshaw Damon Bradshaw Charlotte, NC United States167
5Larry Brooks Larry Brooks S. Pasadena, CA United States157
Full Standings

1992 500 Class Points Finish

Motocross

500MX Standings - 1992

PositionRider Hometown Points
1Mike Kiedrowski Mike Kiedrowski Canyon Country, CA United States229
2Jeff Stanton Jeff Stanton Sherwood, MI United States226
3Jeff Ward Jeff Ward Mission Viejo, CA United States195
4Jean Michel Bayle Jean Michel Bayle France158
5John Dowd John Dowd Chicopee, MA United States114
Full Standings
Jeff Emig, the 1992 125cc Class AMA Motocross champion.
Jeff Emig, the 1992 125cc Class AMA Motocross champion. Fran Kuhn
Jeff Stanton, the 1992 250cc Class AMA Motocross champion.
Jeff Stanton, the 1992 250cc Class AMA Motocross champion. Fran Kuhn
Mike Kiedrowski, the 1992 500cc Class AMA Motocross champion.
Mike Kiedrowski, the 1992 500cc Class AMA Motocross champion.

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