MOTOR RACING ROUNDUP : Prost Uses Spare Car, Wins Fifth of Year

Alain Prost won his sixth French Grand Prix in a spare car Sunday, leading a one-two sweep for Williams-Renault.

Prost completed the 72 laps at the Magny Cours, France, with an average speed of 115.718 m.p.h. in the 190.139-mile race. It was the fifth victory of the year for Prost, who beat Damon Hill by less than a second.

Hill started from the pole and held the lead for the first 26 laps. Prost got the lead for good two laps later after each driver changed tires.

Prost, who has won 49 Formula One races, took no chances during the race but made a risky decision before the start.

“This morning I did a lap with the regular car. It wasn’t perfect. I took the spare car and did three laps and it was good,” Prost said. “It hadn’t been used in five races, but that shows the Williams team preparation is good.”

Michael Schumacher of Germany took third in a Benetton-Ford, more than 21 seconds behind the leading pair. He overtook Ayrton Senna in the final stages of the race.

*

Paul Dallenbach, a third-year driver from the Colorado mountain town of Basalt, became the fastest driver in the 71-year history of the Pikes Peak Auto Hill Climb by winning the open-wheel division in record time. Dallenbach, 26, drove up the 12.42-mile gravel road in 10 minutes 43.63 seconds. That broke the race record of 10:44.22, established minutes earlier by Japan’s Nobuhiro Tajima in a four-wheel-drive, twin-engined Suzuki.

Bill Mears, the patriarch of the Bakersfield racing family, won the stock truck division of the Pikes Peak Hill Climb in 15:17.40. The race was Mears’ first return to active competition in almost 20 years. Finishing second was Mears’ son Roger, 46, and third was grandson Roger, Jr., 29.

Other winners included Leonard Vahsholtz of Woodland Park, Colo, in the super truck and stock car John Norris of Los Angeles in the high-performance showroom stock division.