Photo by Henny Ray Abrams.
In 1992, an 18-year-old Colin Edwards won the AMA 250cc Grand Prix National Championship in his first attempt. That title led him to a Superbike ride on the Vance & Hines Yamaha team and with that came great expectations. In his rookie Superbike season, the young Texan failed to win a race and there were a lot of “I told you so’s.”
On July 17, 1994, a 20-year-old Edwards squashed those naysayers and went out and won his first AMA Superbike race and he did so at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, removing the rather large monkey from his back.
“If you’ve got the 250 dialed in 80 percent, you just go out and ride it and win,” Edwards said after the elusive first win. “If the Superbike is dialed in 80 percent, you finish sixth. Right off the truck, the bike was great this weekend. We made a spring change on the rear and that was about it. I don’t think I was pressured to win. I had some great races last year. I showed people last year and this year kind of proved it. With a pole and a win, your confidence is bound to be good. It doubles. I’m pretty high right now, but we’ll see.”
If there were those who had given up too early on Edwards, there were also those who gave up too soon on the 1994 AMA Superbike Championship. Just when it seemed Troy Corser had the title in hand, the Australian and his Fast By Ferracci Ducati had their first non-finish of the season. Combine that with Edwards’ teammate Jamie James finishing second and suddenly there was a bit of drama at the top of the point standings.
Edwards’ victory came after the youngster’s second career pole position that he earned with a lap record. Edwards didn’t get the best of starts but he fought his way through to the front and watched the others falter. The final laps were dramatic as Edwards battled with his veteran teammate James and eventually youth prevailed.
Third place went to Muzzy Kawasaki’s Takahiro Sohwa, the Japanese star finishing on the podium for the second time of the ’94 season. Sohwa’s teammate Steve Crevier was fourth and those two sat third and fourth in the championship.
Dale Quarterley followed up on his first-career win from a year earlier at Mid-Ohio to finish fifth, besting Yoshimura Suzuki’s Thomas Stevens, Smokin’ Joe’s Racing’s Mike Hale, and Australian first-timer Scott Doohan.
With three races remaining in the 1994 championship, Corser left Ohio with a 16-point lead over James.
