From a press release issued by Frank Angel:

BARNES FINISHES NINTH IN LAGUNA SUPERBIKE ROUND

Monterey, CA – Michael Barnes rode the Prieto Racing Suzuki GSX-R1000 to a ninth place finish at the AMA Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Championship at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca. From twelfth place on the grid, Barnes immediately moved up to tenth position on the start, maintaining that position through the first half of the race. On lap fifteen, Barnes moved up to ninth, his eventual finishing position.

Barnes had been dragging his shift lever most of the race, and on lap twenty-three the lever gave up the fight, breaking off and falling into the belly pan. With some effort Michael was able to shift into fourth gear, and rode the last six laps of the race without a gear change.

Michael was once again the top Superbike finisher on Pirelli tires. “As I said before, the Pirellis have been absolutely fantastic all season. I can’t say enough good things about the confidence that they’ve been providing, they were so consistent from the start of the race to the finish that I couldn’t ask for more”, said Barnes.

Michael and Prieto Racing look forward to the next AMA Superbike round at Mid-Ohio.


More, from a press release issued by American Honda:

AMA/Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Series
Round 12: Monterey, California
July 12, 2003

Red Riders experience rough seas in Monterey

With over half of the 28-lap Laguna Seca Raceway Honda Superbike Classic in the books, it appeared that Erion Racing Honda’s Kurtis Roberts was a shoe-in for at least a runner-up finish in the premier AMA event. Starting from the second position on the front row, Roberts spent the opening laps in fifth place challenging Honda’s Ben Bostrom. The battle amongst teammates was classic, and Roberts eventually came out on top of the all-Honda RC51 scuffle for fourth place. After overtaking Bostrom, Roberts went on a charge that didn’t stop until the young Northern Californian reached second place. From there he spent several laps trying to minimize the lead of eventual race winner Mat Mladin, but on lap 24 Roberts was forced to pit row after his rear tire spun on the rim, causing a severe vibration.

“The rear tire started spinning on the rim,” explained a disappointed Roberts, who up until that point was bidding for his seventh podium finish in 12 Superbike rounds. After the tire change Roberts mitigated his damages by re-entering the racetrack and completing the final few laps to finish 11th. The disappointing result was still good enough for Roberts to maintain his fourth place standing in the points race.

Roberts wasn’t the only Honda rider to have tire difficulties. Bostrom, who has enjoyed much success at Laguna Seca Raceway in the past, qualified for the Superbike Final on the second row and admitted to a struggle in finding his form during practice and qualifying. When it came time to race, Bostrom finally found his form, but he also found out that his rear tire did not hold up to the temperature of the extremely warm California racetrack.

“The bike was working great during the race, the best that I had ridden all weekend,” said Bostrom, who maintained fifth place for a majority of the event. “Unfortunately the tire went bad and it was causing the bike to hop around a lot. There wasn’t much we could do. The positive thing that came out of it is that we ended up with a good motorcycle. So good that I feel I could have been up front.”

With Roberts out of contention, Bostrom advanced one spot to fourth, where he eventually finished. Meanwhile, Honda Road Racing’s Miguel Duhamel, himself a past Superbike winner at Laguna Seca, was trying to advance the #17 RC51 ahead of its sixth place qualifying position.

“I struggled with my set up over the weekend,” said Duhamel of his four-day weekend in Monterey. “We were zigging when we should have been zagging, but I take responsibility for that since I’m the guy that tells the crew what I want and they just try to give it to me. Unfortunately we couldn’t find the set-up we needed.

“We were up there for a few laps with Kurtis and Ben,” continued Duhamel, “but then it just got too dangerous to keep that pace with my set-up. I brought it home in sixth, got us some points and I’m looking forward to improving on that throughout the rest of the season.”

There’s no doubt that Duhamel, Roberts and Bostrom will all improve their results when the Red Riders head to Lexington, Ohio on July 25-27 for round 13 of the AMA/Chevy Trucks Superbike Series.


AMA/Pro Honda Oils 600cc Supersport Series
Round 8: Monterey, California
July 12, 2003

Zemke red hot at Laguna Seca

The Honda Superbike Classic dawned with a sea of Red Riders entered in the eighth round of the AMA/Pro Honda Oils 600cc Supersport Series at Laguna Seca Raceway. In addition to the Honda CBR600RR-mounted series regulars such as Miguel Duhamel, Jake Zemke, Roger Hayden, Alex Gobert and Marty Craggill, full-time Superbike racers Ben Bostrom and Kurtis Roberts stacked the Supersport class in support of the Honda-sponsored race weekend. Regardless of their presence, it was Zemke, not only a Supersport regular but also a class favorite, who headed the Red Rider effort. The 27-year old from nearby Paso Robles, California finished the 17-lap race in second place.

Zemke qualified for Friday’s Supersport race in the third position on the front row and his stellar spot on the grid, no doubt aided his first-turn holeshot to Laguna Seca’s famed Andretti Hairpin; both times. Before the 42-man field could complete a lap around the 2.238-mile circuit, a down rider forced a red flag and the event was restarted. The restart was no problem for Zemke, who again pulled ahead of the pack, but not every Red Rider was able to duplicate the results of their original start.

Bruce Transportation Honda’s Marty Craggill jumped the restart and was assigned a stop- and-go penalty, which prevented him from finishing better than 17th. Duhamel did the opposite of Craggill, not reacting quick enough to the restart.

“I really messed up the second start and then I got pinched out on the top of the hill (going into turn one),” said Duhamel, who qualified seventh and started well within the top ten before the restart. “I was 15th on the first lap.”

Duhamel, a three-time winner of the Supersport class at Laguna Seca since 1995, weaved his way through traffic to a seventh place finish behind teammate Bostrom. Bostrom too had to deal with the extra effort of advancing around traffic when the 29-year old failed to qualify better than eleventh. Combined with a tenth place start and the fact that he hasn’t raced a CBR600RR since the series kick-off in Daytona, Bostrom got caught behind a train of slower riders, forcing some scary moments at times.

“I ran off the track trying to pass them,” said Bostrom of his brief moment in the dirt. “Then I had to come back by all the guys that passed me. At that point it was too late to make anything happen.”

The youngest member of Erion Racing, 19-year old Gobert was slowed in the same group of riders as Bostrom. Once he was clear of the group, Gobert raced to a tenth place finish, which boosted Gobert to third place in the series points standings.

Ahead of Bostrom and Gobert, Erion Honda’s Zemke, Roberts and Hayden were making things happen. Zemke unfortunately lost his lead, but was defending second place valiantly. Meanwhile, Hayden silently lurked behind the lines waiting to pounce. As it turns out he capitalized from many of his competitors misfortunes, including one from his teammate Roberts. Roberts used the restart to get an eighth place start and then used the first four laps of the race to move to fifth place. Unfortunately Roberts’ charge would go no further than lap five.

“I leaned my bike over so far that I bounced the engine case on the ground,” said Roberts. “That lifted the bike off the ground and that’s never good.”

Luckily Roberts survived the ugly crash unscathed and headed back to the paddock to prepare for Saturday’s Superbike Final. Hayden hung in for the long haul and finished fifth, his best result since placing runner-up at a rain-soaked Road America circuit in early June.

The nail-biting race for second place came down to the final lap. Zemke, Damon Buckmaster and Ben Spies headed out on the 17th lap in a tight enough formation to throw a blanket over the trio. After completing the 11-turn Laguna Seca circuit and crossing the uphill sloped finish line Zemke and Spies put some breathing room on Buckmaster, but not between themselves. Zemke’s CBR600RR won the drag race for second place by 0.416-seconds. The result marked Zemke’s best Supersport finish in the series thus far, which has been full of ups and downs for the approachable racer.

As the series heads east to Lexington, Ohio’s Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course on July 25-27, Zemke hopes to improve his round eight results by one step up on the podium, and he hopes to take a sea of Red Riders with him.


AMA/Chevy Trucks Formula Xtreme Series
Round 9: Monterey, California
July 13, 2003

Hayden just misses Formula Xtreme podium

Nestled within a hidden alcove in the oak-studded rolling hills of the Monterey Peninsula, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca basks in a storybook kind of setting immortalized by author John Steinbeck. However, like many things beautiful, Laguna Seca holds hazards and challenges aplenty beneath a skin-deep veneer. Undulating through the California countryside, the tight and technical track proved to be the undoing of many riders in the AMA Formula Xtreme race, as Erion Honda’s Roger Hayden battled to fourth, just off the podium, and Jake Zemke netted a seventh-place finish.

At the start, Ben Spies garnered the holeshot, with a thick knot of riders pressing right behind. As the running order sorted out, Zemke and Bruce Transportation Racing’s Marty Craggill found themselves in sixth and seventh place respectively, with Hayden close behind in tenth. Zemke began a ferocious charge to the front of the pack, taking over second place in convincing style on lap two. By the close of the next lap, Craggill took charge of fourth place, with Hayden trailing right behind in sixth.

But just as the three-man Honda brigade seemed poised to solidify their gains, things came unraveled. As Craggill pitched left and downhill into Laguna’s breathtakingly spectacular and justly notorious Corkscrew, a trailing rider centerpunched Marty’s rear wheel from behind, sending both riders tumbling to the tarmac. “I have no idea what that guy was doing,” Marty said later as he was having ice packs taped to his banged-up left wrist. “He didn’t offer any explanations or apologies.”

Double trouble struck the Red Riders on the same lap when AMA officials flagged Zemke for a stop-and-go penalty for jumping the start. The enforced delay relegated the number 98 bike to seventh place, which Zemke maintained all the way to the checkered flag.

The quick attrition left Hayden as the sole Honda front-runner, and he was engaged in a three-man battle for fourth place. The right to lead this group see-sawed back and forth a few times before Roger took over fourth place for keeps on lap 13 of the 17-lap race. “I felt pretty good towards the end of the race,” young Hayden recounted after the race. “I felt like I was getting faster during those last three laps. We got into some lapped traffic, and with one guy, Josh Hayes went inside and I went wide, which turned out to be the better way around the lapper. Then I used some more lappers to pull out a little gap, and it all worked out pretty good, at least good enough to give me a fourth-place finish.

“I’ve been working on smoothing out my riding style, and it’s been paying off pretty well. This is a good result, and now I want to build on my momentum and get on the podium at the next race.”


And now a question from a reader, via e-mail:

What’s the deal with tires spinning on the rims in AMA Superbike? I understand that the engines are powerfull, but MotoGP engines are even more, and I haven’t heard of this issue with them. One episode was blamed on hitting a curb. What about the others?

Andrew M. Cross, Jr.
Lexington, Kentucky


More, from a press release issued by Team Suzuki News Service:

TREMENDOUS FIFTH FOR GREGORIO

Team Suzuki Press Office 14th July 2003.

Team Alstare Suzuki Corona Extra rider Gregorio Lavilla took an extremely hard-fought-for fifth in the second race after a hard and painful crash in race one. The Spaniard was highsided at one of the fastest parts of the course and badly bruised his right hip (the one he broke in Monza a couple of years ago), right foot and hand and had difficulty in walking after the crash. Nevertheless he started the second race and amazingly got up into third place before he ran out of strength. He continued to fight for a podium, but could not prevent being overtaken by Chris Walker (Ducati) and Regis Laconi (Ducati) in the final part of the race. The first race was won by Italian Frankie Chili (Ducati) after Ruben Xaus (Ducati) and Regis Laconi crashed out. Second was series leader Neil Hodgson (Ducati), with young Briton James Toseland (Ducati) third. Ruben Xaus took command after just three laps and from then on in; he was never headed on the way to the chequered flag. Second was his team mate Hodgson, with Chris Walker (Ducati) third.

GREGORIO LAVILLA Race 1: DNF Race 2: 5th
I was so determined to get a result in the second race after my crash in the first. Nothing was going to stop me from a finish and although I was in third position for a while, I knew I couldn’t keep Walker and Laconi behind me. At the end of the race, I was dead! I hurt my right hip, foot and hand and gave myself a good battering all over. Because of this, I couldn’t move around on the bike like I wanted to. And Laguna Seca is a very physical circuit and you need to move around a lot. Because my number one was badly damaged in the first race crash, I had to use my spare bike and it was a bit different, so all in all I am pretty happy with such a good finish. In the first race, I had made a really good start (in the second start) and was comfortable in third place. But the bike was losing grip almost from the beginning ­ I had never ridden a bike quite like it ­ as it was spinning everywhere. Maybe we should’ve changed the rear tyre after the race was red-flagged on the first lap. Maybe the change of temperature affected it more then we realised. But I highsided and that was the end of the race for me. ­ A real pity because I was confident of a good result.

Yoshimura Suzuki USA rider Mat Mladin led the first race for six laps and looked a podium contender, but faded a little and ended up fourth. His team mate Aaron Yates was involved in the first lap five ­rider pile-up, but made the re-start and finished sixth. Mladin did not start the second race (under the weather and unable to give 100% -according to the Yoshimura Suzuki USA press release). Aaron Yates was in fourth place in race two, but crashed out of contention at the last corner after 24 laps.


More, from a press release issued by Troy Corser’s publicist:

2003 World Superbike Championship
Round 8, Laguna Seca, Usa, Sunday 13th July 2003
Crowd: 92,000 (3-day figure), Weather: Dry, mostly sunny 24 Deg C.

FRUSTRATION FOR TROY
Troy had a frustrating day at Laguna Seca, ending with a DNF in the second race after a hard-fought-for eighth in the first. Laguna Seca was always going to be a difficult track for Troy and the Petronas FP1, but after the first race, Troy was thinking of another top eight finish in the second. But a broken spark plug cap ruined Troy’s chances of a pair of good finishes and left him thinking of what could’ve been. Troy made a good start in race one, but was then involved in a five-rider melee at turn one and was forced to take to the gravel trap. His Petronas stalled and Troy appeared to be out of the race, but the red flag was put out and Troy was able to make the re-start. He rode consistently in the re-start and ended up eighth. Italian Frankie Chili (Ducati) won the 28-lapper after race leaders Ruben Xaus (Ducati) and Regis Laconi (Ducati) crashed out. Second was series leader Neil Hodgson (Ducati), with James Toseland (Ducati) third.

Troy made a good start in the second race, but his Petronas FP1 started running hot after about three or four laps. He tried to carry on, but when the bike went onto two cylinders he knew his race was over, so he pulled into the pits to avoid further damage. Ruben Xaus won the race, after taking command after three laps, with team mate Hodgson second and Chris Walker (third).

TROY Race 1: 8th Race 2: DNF
I feel a bit frustrated because I really thought I could leave here with a pair of top eight finishes and that would’ve been a good result considering qualifying. I suppose I was fortunate that the first race was red-flagged because that would’ve been a no-score otherwise. I had nowhere to go in the pile-up, but I kept the bike upright and went into the gravel. The bike stalled and I couldn’t get it started again, so it’s just as well there was a re-start. The gear lever had to be replaced because it was so badly bent, but that was all. The tyres worked consistently, but I was losing the back end running into corners, so it took me a few laps to change my lines and adapt. I got a good start in race two and overtook a few riders into turn one, but it wasn’t long – maybe three or four laps – that the temperature gauge began moving erratically. The water temperature went up to about 115 C and some of it sprayed over me, but I wanted to keep going. The suddenly the bike went onto two cylinders and slowed dramatically, so I had no choice but to pull in. It was a shame because I’m sure I could’ve had another top eight finish.



More, from a press release issued by Yoyodyne:

Bravo Frankie, Bravo!

Morristown, – Marvic and Yoyodyne congratulate Pier Francesco Chili on his Superbike win at Laguna Seca. Frankie’s Ducati, equipped with Marvic Piuma magnesium wheels, finished ahead of the nearest competitor in the race by 3.06 seconds.

With this win, Marvic now has wins in World Championship 125cc, 250cc and Superbike racing. In the US, Marvic recently added wins in Prostar Drag racing.

In order to celebrate this World Superbike win, Yoyodyne will include $306 worth of Carbon Fiber or Rearsets with every set of Marvic Magnesium wheels purchased now through the end of July.

About Marvic and Yoyodyne. Marvic is Italy’s oldest manufacturer of Magnesium racing wheels. Wheels are produced for motorcycles ranging from 125cc GP bikes to Big Bore Drag bikes. Yoyodyne is the North American agent for Marvic, as well as a manufacturer/distributor of motorcycle racing products.


More, from a press release issued by Corona Extra Suzuki:

CORONA EXTRA SUZUKI SHINES AT LAGUNA SECA AMA AND WORLD SUPERBIKE EVENT

In front of the world Superbike Series media and an estimated 90,000 fans, Corona Extra Suzuki rider Adam Fergusson put both of his GSXR race bikes on the podium at a beautifully sunny Laguna Seca this weekend. The Team was without the services of Jimmy Moore who is recovering from injuries sustained at the last event in Brainerd.

In the Formula Extreme race, Fergusson, starting from number two on the grid, got a good start, settling into third spot after the first lap. The three leaders quickly opened a gap on the rest of the field. Second place Jake Zemke had jumped the start and had to pull in for a stop-go penalty which he did on lap three leaving Adam in second but with a fair deficit to make up on the leader Ben Spies. Though he started to close the gap Fergusson just was not able to make a challenge by the finish. A clearly happy Fergusson said; ” I didn’t try too hard to get by Jake (Zemke) because I saw the meatball flag for him (which tells the rider they have a penalty) so knew he was going to pull in. But by the time he did Ben (Spies) had just too big a gap on me. Still I am very pleased to put the GSXR1000 on the box and make it a 1,2,3 for Suzuki!” Fergusson remains 5th in the Formula Extreme championship but is now tied for points with fourth place Zemke. Moore is 11th.

The sunny weather also shone on Jordan Szoke in the Superbike event where Jordan got his best result of the season – 7th. Szoke, who qualified 9th, got a good start and started mixing it up with a number of riders. He passed four or five then set out on a lonely quest for the next, but they had already got away. Jordan said; “I worked my through a bunch of guys but by the time I got clear I couldn’t see the guy in front so I settled down to ride my own race”. Szoke is currently 11th in the Superbike championship.

In the Superstock event, Fergusson qualified in third and after a good start quickly worked up to second. He held second until lap 10 when a number of front-end slides slowed him down and costing him the position. He settled down into a rhythm and rode to the finish well clear of fourth. Fergusson said; “After about 10 laps the front end started sliding slowing my corner speed. After Tommy (Hayden) got passed I tried to hang with him but kept losing the front end so decided that third was OK rather then falling off trying for second!” Fergusson is 4th in the Suzuki Genuine Accessories Superstock championship. Moore is 10th.