Brian Berney, riding a Yamaha RZ500, leads Honda Interceptor mounted John Jacob in a WERA event at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wis., sometime in the mid-1980s. Berney used the considerable power of his big two-stroke to win three classes that day. (Larry Lawrence photo)
Rider Files 
I was there
Rz500 were lightning
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Marshall,
From what I’ve heard from the riders who raced them, the RZ500 didn’t handle all that well, but if prepped well they could fly on the straights.
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Marshall, it’s true, they were, when “sorted out” very fast in a straight line… HOWEVER, they were evil handling, and the only way to win on them was to park them VERY wide at the apex, and point and fire them out of the corner, and pray that the straights were long enough! :-)))
Elkhart was a GREAT track for the RZV500R, with its huge straights, and higher speed corners. But I have to say that “The Kink” and going into “Canada” were real heart stopping, breath holding, moments on every lap.
On that day in 1984, I actually won 6 consecutive races… But they were not all on the RZV500R… Some were on my Eric Gore tuned RZ350 Superbike, which was a little terror to the bigger bikes!
Great times…
BrianB.
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