Copyright 2001, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

By David Swarts

According to VIR Public Relations Coordinator Laura Comstock, the three-day paid attendance for the September 27-30 Virginia International Raceway Lightning AMA Superbike National was 25,000, with 15,000 people passing through the gate on Sunday.

Although the attendance was a pleasant surprise for organizers, the relative smoothness of the race weekend was no accident. VIR staffers–including Comstock and co-General Managers Jack and Vicky Abbott–attended several AMA Nationals at other venues throughout 2001, gathering input. “We have to thank the staffs from some of the other facilities that we visited because they were very helpful to us,” said Comstock on Tuesday, October 2. “Everything went very smoothly. The AMA, Ron Barrick especially, Chet Burks Productions, the teams, the riders, everyone was so easy to work with. And the spectators were just awesome. We didn’t have any problems with any spectators, and the campers left this place so clean you wouldn’t believe it.”

The track also expects increased sales of membership in the VIR Country Club. “Later this month we will have our grand opening of the Country Club itself,” continued Comstock. “The TV time we got on Speedvision and Fox Sports Net was invaluable. There are so many people that don’t even know that we are open yet. Now they will have an opportunity to actually see the facility and see how nice it is. I know I plan on staying up as late as I have to tonight to watch the races on Speedvision.”

And what about those much-talked-about mini-still trophies? “Connie Nyholm (co-developer of VIR, along with Harvey Siegel) came up with the concept for the trophies. She has a brother-in-law, L.B. Nyholm, that is a steel worker in Sweden. So the metal part, the actual steel part, was crafted in Sweden. The little jugs were also hand-crafted by a local artist, Vicky Vaden. I thought they were quite unique and, from an artist’s standpoint, quite valuable. We can’t even say how much they cost because L.B. hasn’t even billed us for them yet. He is a big motorcycle enthusiast and may not even charge us for them.

“The next thing for us is to spend this week going over the spectator surveys that we handed out and figure out where people came from for the event, how they heard about it, what they liked and didn’t like, and start planning for next year.”

Using the 2000-season attendance figures as listed in the 2001 AMA Pro Racing media guide for comparison purposes, VIR’s three-day attendance of 25,000 would have ranked the race as the seventh-best-attended event behind Laguna Seca, Daytona, Road Atlanta, Mid-Ohio, Loudon and Road America; and ahead of Brainerd, Pikes Peak and Willow Springs.

From a press release issued by Ducati North America:

Race Report
AMA Chevy Trucks Superbike Round 10
September 30, 2001
Virginia International Raceway

The AMA 2001 Chevy Trucks Superbike Championship season came to a close today with the grand finale race – a challenging 42 laps covering 94 miles. It was held for the first time at Virginia International Raceway and required a mandatory pit-stop that create some confusion midway through the race. Ducati rider Andy Meklau finishing the race in seventh position, Steve
Rapp finished ninth, while Larry Pegram finished in eleventh ahead of newly crowned Champion Mat Mladin.

Steve Rapp stayed on after the Pro Thunder race to take one lucky winner for three hot laps of the Virginia racetrack on the back of his modified 996RS. The ride, an initiative of one of HMC Ducati’s technicians looking for a way to help the victims of the September 11 assault, raised an astounding $2,770 for the Red Cross. Winner Jeremy Demar also won a Steve Rapp replica helmet, compliments of Suomy, and was both delighted and terrified by his three fast laps on the specially designed passenger seat fitted to Rapp’s racebike.


Andreas Meklau – 7th
Andy Meklau had a good finish to his first season on the AMA Superbike series. The HMC Ducati rider was the first to stop for the mandatory pit-stop, which seemed to work in his favor.

“The crew did a great job with the pit stop,” said Meklau proudly. “Our strategy was to do 15 laps on one tire before pitting and when I rejoined the field I was on my own, which made the race hard. Finally in the last two laps Steve [Rapp] passed me coming off the straight and I had someone to battle with. I’d like to say thanks to my sponsors for allowing me to ride in the USA. It was a hard year for me with new tires and unfamiliar tracks, but an enjoyable one all the same.”


Steve Rapp – 9th
HMC Ducati rider, Steve Rapp, ran off the track just before he was due to pit, adding 20 seconds to his lap time. He fought hard to reclaim the lost time and finally finished in ninth position, taking him to seventh overall for the season.

“I was really happy with the performance of the bike, tires and team during the pit-stop,” he said. “I needed just a few more laps and I would have caught Tommy Hayden but I just ran out of time. It was confusing out there for a while, not knowing what position I was in, but I guess everyone was in the same boat. Thanks to the HMC Ducati team for a good first season.”


Larry Pegram – 11th
Competition Accessories rider, Larry Pegram, had a great start to the race, climbing as high as fifth before the wrong choice in front tire forced him to slow his pace.

“We hadn’t put enough distance testing the front tire I chose and I started losing grip,” said Pegram. “We were only set up to change the rear tire and it would have hurt us more in time to change the front. The start of the race I was right up there, running in fifth comfortably, but I was having trouble going deep into the corners and I started dropping back. I really thought I could have done better.”



Pro Thunder
Munroe Motors’ Tom Montano brought his Ducati home for an easy victory in the penultimate round of the AMA Pro Thunder Championship today. With a
strong points lead going into final round in Atlanta, Montano is confident of a Championship victory. AMS Performance Ducati rider, Jeff Nash, suffered a bad crash in yesterday’s heat race and was unable to compete today.

“That was a fun race,” said Montano after his second win of the season. “Dave [Estok] and I were going for it when his bike coughed and, committed to my line, I hit him. I’m amazed we didn’t both come off. Dave retired leaving me to coast around for an easy victory.” Montano won by 17 seconds.

Copyright 2001, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

By John Ulrich

The flashback came after I got back from the AMA Superbike National at Virginia International Raceway.

It was at VIR that AMA Pro Racing Operations Manager Gary Mathers told me that placement of additional sections of Air Fence in front of a bare steel barrier that Jamie Hacking hit during the Saturday-morning 600cc Supersport practice couldn’t happen before the lunch break, that the schedule couldn’t be interrupted, that practice would not be stopped. Hacking’s crash was a fluke, Mathers told me, nobody else had ever hit the barrier there, and nobody else would, because no two guys ever crash in the same place.

(In a conversation held a short time earlier, I had advocated immediately stopping practice and deploying some of the additional 12 sections of Air Fence AMA officials had held in reserve at VIR. Less than 30 minutes after Hacking’s crash, the excellent AMA crew had placed two sections of Air Fence in front of the steel barrier while practice continued. It was when I again approached Mathers, this time to thank him for the quick response, that Mathers–apparently not knowing the problem had been already handled by his staff–angerly told me that nothing could, would or should happen before lunch.)

Which brings me to the flashback.

It is 1998, and Gary Mathers is the manager of Team Honda.

Harley-Davidson’s Tom Wilson hits a bare concrete wall at New Hampshire International Speedway in Loudon, New Hampshire, and suffers unspeakable, career-ending injuries.

The word was that no-one had ever hit that wall in that place before, during the Speedway’s 7 or 8-year history.

The bolted-together rows of soft Indy-car tires used to cushion the walls in known impact areas at Loudon were all full of rain water from a recent downpour, and if tires were moved into place in front of the wall where Wilson hit, water would run across the track and further delay practice and Superbike qualifying.

Wilson’s crash was a fluke, and nobody else would hit the wall there, because no two guys ever crash in the same place.

To avoid further delaying the schedule, the decision was made to place tire stacks in front of the wall where Wilson hit later, at the end of the day, after all on-track activities were finished.

And during Superbike qualifying later that same afternoon, Team Honda’s Miguel Duhamel crashed, slid hard into the same wall that Wilson had hit, and suffered terrible injuries that put him out of racing for about 9 months.

Miguel Duhamel, riding for the team that Gary Mathers managed at the time, hit bare wall at Loudon that day because the schedule couldn’t be interrupted, and because practice would not be stopped.

And now, four years later, at VIR, that history lesson was forgotten, lost upon new-AMA-official Mathers, who was determined to keep to the schedule, no matter what, with blind faith that no one else would hit the same barrier in the same place that Hacking did.

We lucked out at VIR.

We may not luck out next time.

Those who ignore the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them.

And the safety of riders must take priority over the schedule, every time, every place, every year.

Three-time AMA Superbike Champion Mat Mladin and his wife Janine left Los Angeles International Airport Monday night on a flight home to Australia, where he will remain until December.

Mladin will return to the United States prior to Dunlop tire tests scheduled at Daytona in December, according to Yoshimura Suzuki’s Don Sakakura.

Two press releases concerning Mladin’s latest Championship follow, one issued by Mladin’s publicist, Steve Reeves on Sunday, and another issued by Suzuki’s world-wide racing press service on Tuesday.

From Mladin’s publicist:

MAT MLADIN–2001 AMERICAN AMA SUPERBIKE CHAMPION

Alton, Virginia, USA – Australian Mat Mladin has won his third consecutive American AMA Superbike championship after finishing a strong, but uncustomary, twelfth place in today’s final round of the 2001 AMA Chevy Trucks US Superbike Championship, held at the Virginia International Raceway.

Mladin becomes only the third rider in the history of the AMA Superbike Championship to have won three consecutive titles, joining Reg Pridmore (1976, `77, `78) and Fred Merkel (1984, `85, `86). He is also the second Australian to have won after Troy Corser’s victory in 1996.

“It’s been a hard year, that’s for sure,” said 29-year-old Mladin. “It wasn’t a perfect season as I did make a couple of mistakes, but the championship win was what we were after. This weekend wasn’t about me winning the race today. It was winning the championship for the whole team, Suzuki, Yoshimura and all of the guys. I’m looking forward to heading back to Australia in the next few days for a break before returning next year to see if we can make it four championships in a row.”

Mladin arrived at the Virginia circuit holding a 16-point lead over Team Kawasaki’s Eric Bostrom and stretched it to 17 at the end of qualifying after he took a record equaling ninth pole position for the season and the extra championship point. This also increased Mladin’s record tally of AMA Superbike pole positions to 24.

Mladin’s preparation for today’s event was disrupted when he fell during the morning warm up session and his Team Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R750 caught alight. He escaped injury but his number one machine suffered extensive damage and he was forced to use his spare bike for the race.

“I was pushing pretty hard during the warm up, just to see how hard I could go, in case I had to in the race,” added Mladin. “I pushed that bit too hard and lost the front and unfortunately the bike caught fire and was pretty badly burnt. My spare bike was set up the same as the race bike, but they still don’t feel the same and it took a few laps to get used to it.”

Mladin’s main attention during the 150km race was the position of Eric Bostrom. After dicing with the leaders early in the race, Bostrom ran wide and out of outright contention to eventually finish tenth, two places ahead of Mladin. With a total of 380 championship points, Mladin finished fifteen clear of Bostrom (365), with the pair followed by Nicky Hayden (340) and Doug Chandler (Team Kawasaki, 319).

“I cruised around in the early laps just behind the leaders and was happy with the pace of the race. I saw Eric (Bostrom) run off the circuit on about lap 15 and stayed ahead of him until the pit stop. From there on I knew where he was and all I had to do was finish.”

Today’s race win went to American Honda’s Nicky Hayden, who edged out Australian Anthony Gobert (Team Yamaha) by 2.09 seconds at the conclusion of the 42-lap race. The win made it four consecutive wins for the Honda rider.

Mladin became the third Australian rider to win a major international title in recent weeks joining Troy Bayliss (World Superbike Championship) and Andrew Pitt (World Supersport Championship).



The release from Suzuki’s press service:

SUZUKI MAKES IT THREE TITLES IN A ROW

AMA Superbikes, September 30, Virginia International Raceway.

YOSHIMURA SUZUKI’S Mat Mladin won his third consecutive American superbike championship with a measured ride in the final round of the AMA Superbike Championship at Virginia International Raceway.

The 29-year-old Australian became only the third rider in the history of the Superbike championship to win three titles in a row, and the first do it on a Suzuki.

“If this was the first race of the year we were fast enough to win the race,” Mladin said after finishing 12th. “At the start of the race I said: ‘We should go out and try to win this thing.’ I didn’t mean it, but I was saying we can win this race. It’s always hard to let them get away. Everyone’s worked so hard all year for me to go out there and make a mistake and cost these guys a championship for working so hard, I couldn’t bear that.”

The third championship didn’t come easily for Mladin. There was the challenge of a new Suzuki GSX-R750, there were a few rider errors, and a few machine errors, but the team persevered. The last of the errors came towards the end of the morning practice, the team’s last chance to fine-tune the Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R750, when he crashed. Mladin was pushing hard coming onto the front straightaway when both wheels slid off the track. The bike tumbled and caught fire, forcing the team to prepare his back-up machine for the race.

Up until then Mladin was in an enviable position. Consistent results throughout the 13-race season meant that he came in guarding a 16 point lead. He finished on the podium in nine of 12 races, winning four along the way. In control of the championship from his second consecutive win in the season-opening Daytona 200, Mladin never relinquished the role of front-runner. He helped his cause by taking eight pole positions in a row, a new record, and nine overall, another record. In American Superbike racing, the rider who earns the pole position gets a point, and fully half of Mladin’s points lead came from his ability to turn in the lone blistering lap on command.

Mladin showed up at his spot on the grid wearing a black helmet with an American flag on the side and a new set of green-accented racing leathers.

“The helmet was just a tribute to the people for the things that happened a few weeks ago,” he said. “I couldn’t believe what happened that day. I was glued to the television for three days. I couldn’t train. It happened in America but it happened to the whole world. It’s something that we all have to feel lucky to do what we do. It really put things in a perspective for me.

“I came here this weekend and I said to the guys ‘If I win I win, if I don’t win too bad.’ The helmet was just a little bit to pay some respect and some remembrance to the people who were lost in the tragedy. Green colors are the sporting colors of Australia.”

Because he had such a yawning lead, Mladin struggled to keep his concentration in the race.

“The first six or eight or 10-laps I was sort of there, but I wasn’t there,” he said. “The first five or six laps I was just hanging on the back of them. I had good speed today, but obviously it wasn’t a day to try to go out there and win.” Once he realized his closest pursuer wasn’t a threat, he backed off half a second a lap. “And then when he ran off the track it just gave me way too much time to think about what I’m going to do tomorrow and looking forward to flying home tomorrow night.”


Peter Doyle, Mat Mladin’s Crew Chief:
“At the start of the year we had to come in with a brand new bike and we worked out fairly early on that all of the information from the previous years was irrelevant. For someone to come in and win a series like this is a pretty good job. On the positive side, we know we can improve with everything we have. We know where there’s room to improve. Other than a few minor hiccups the year was great.”

Kevin Schwantz, 1993 500cc World Champion, Yoshimura Suzuki Team Advisor:
“It’s a lot of Mat’s confidence that makes him so good. I’ve never seen him when he’s anything but dead-set focused on doing his job, whether it’s the Saturday of a superbike double-header or on Sunday. And he doesn’t let anything distract him from it. He knows what his job is and he takes his job very seriously. Even within the Suzuki team, everyone realize that Mat’s the focus of the team.

“He’s got such a good head on his shoulders. He thinks ‘Championship, championship, championship.’ One-hundred per cent of the time at the racetrack and probably 100 per cent of the time away from the racetrack. He’s got a great bunch of guys around him. It seems like they’re always a step ahead.”

Masayuki Itoh, Technical Department Race Team Manager:
“Of course three titles in a row ties us with Honda. We’re looking forward to setting a new record of four in a row next year. It’s going to be tough, but my target is four. It was hard to watch the race today, but I thought Mat was always in control. I wasn’t worried.”

Copyright 2001, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

FIRST PERSON/OPINION:

By Glenn Le Santo

Sport is supposed to be the substitute for war, or so the philosophers say. But the truth is that the competitive spirit nurtured by sport is often little removed from war, and can sometimes erupt into violence–and anyone who follows football can vouch for that.

Supersport racing often resembles war; the competition is fierce and the on-track battles are often very physical! And Imola last Sunday, things got ugly after an incident when Paulo Casoli and Karl Muggeridge had a coming-together on the first lap of the World-Championship-deciding race at Imola, in Italy. Casoli’s hopes of winning the 2001 World Supersport Championship evaporated as he slid into the gravel trap after colliding with Muggeridge. The two riders tell contrasting versions of the incident and the Italian television director seemed unable to bring himself to show replays of it to the press gathered in Imola’s vast pressroom.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of the incident itself, it’s what happened after the event that brings the comparison of sport with war. Casoli stormed into Muggeridge’s pit garage after the incident, while Muggeridge was still out on track, and in a rather cowardly gesture, shoved Muggeridge’s petite girlfriend, Isabelle, aside. One of Muggeridge’s technicians gallantly rushed to her aid, threatening Casoli with either a fist or a workshop tool, depending on whose version of the scuffle you believe.

Now one would think that once Casoli’s rage had cooled that would be it, the riders would hate each other for a while, as Pierfrancesco Chili and Carl Fogarty did after a similar incident a few years ago. But no, Casoli being Italian couldn’t let matters lie, and his team called a press conference at which they more or less accused Australian Muggeridge of purposefully nurfing Casoli off to aid fellow Australian Andrew Pitt’s title chances. As it happened, Pitt rode to a cool-headed fourth and clinched the title from odds-on favorite Casoli.

Why Casoli thought he needed to be contesting a corner with a hard-riding guy like Muggeridge for a front position, early on lap one, in a 21-lap race, when he only needed a 10th-place finish to wrap-up the title, is anyone’s guess.

A few hours later Muggeridge’s burly team manager, the aptly named Francis Batta, marched into the Belgarda Yamaha hospitality area and invited Casoli outside (for a fight). The Italian might be a fiery type but he’s intelligent enough to know he’s no match for Batta, especially when Batta’s flanked by five of his biggest mechanics! But Batta wasn’t going to take no for an answer and flung himself at Casoli. In the resultant melee, which involved Casoli’s teammate Jamie Whitham, fists were flung, eyes were blackened and the local police were called.

When you’ve got sport, who needs war?

Copyright 2001, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

By David Swarts

Following Roadracingworld.com coverage of Chris Normand’s wrongful disqualification from a third-place finish in the AMA Pro Thunder race at Virginia International Raceway, AMA officials have reinstated Normand’s finish.

Normand was disqualified for being underweight, when in fact no minimum weight applies to his motorcycle, a Suzuki SV650.

Normand received separate phone calls from AMA Pro Racing’s Ron Barrick, Rob King and Merrill Vanderslice on Tuesday, October 2, and all three apologized for their mistake.

“Ron called me, Rob King called and Merrill Vanderslice called me,” laughed Normand in a phone call to Roadracing World headquarters. “They all called. Ron called me first and said, ‘We made a mistake. We don’t have an excuse for it, and we’re sorry.’ He said that they are writing me a check right now for the purse money, and they are working on getting the points straightened out. He also said that they are contacting Thomas (Fournier) on getting me my trophy.

“Rob King called me next and basically said the same thing, that he was sorry for the trouble. He said that he was blown away by it because the rule bulletin was by him and he didn’t even realize it at the time. He was also thanking me for being so nice and not raising a bunch of hell there at the track. At the track, I was like, ‘Well, if that’s the rule then I wasn’t playing by the rules.’ Because I didn’t read the rulebook or anything. I didn’t think you could cheat on an SV.

“Then Merrill called me up and just confirmed what Ron and Rob said. Merrill was the one who really made a big deal to say that there was no excuse and that they would put something into place so that this doesn’t happen again. ‘We made a mistake,’ was what he was telling me. He apologized too. All three of them apologized and congratulated me. He did seem like he felt bad about it. All three seemed very sincere in their apologies. I just didn’t think Merrill would call me. I mean, he’s the big guy, right?

“They didn’t say anything about the AMA putting out a press release about the situation. I didn’t ask, I didn’t want to seem like I was demanding an apology or anything. That doesn’t matter to me. I just want my little moonshine still back.”

Trophies at Virginia International Raceway were hand-made miniature replicas of old moonshine stills. Originally the AMA event was to be called the White Lightning 150 in reference to moonshine running that took place in the Southeastern U.S., according to VIR General Manager Jack Abbott. The “White” was dropped to make the name more politically correct but the moonshine-still trophies remained and were regarded by most podium finishers as a unique trophy worthy of keeping on display on the mantel.

In a message left on Roadracing World’s voice mail system at about noon EDT, Tuesday, October 2, Barrick said “You are correct. Tech made a mistake. We are correcting it. We are contacting the rider and apologizing.”

In a phone call to Roadracing World headquarters Tuesday afternoon, October 2, AMA Pro Racing’s Ron Barrick said that the October 2 post–an Opinion piece comparing what happened at VIR last weekend to what happened at Loudon in 1998–was not accurate or fair.

Barrick said that he ordered haybales to cover the wall that Tom Wilson hit at Loudon in 1998, immediately after Wilson was injured. No tire stacks were available, Barrick said, because they were being used to cover other sections of wall at New Hampshire International Speedway.

Barrick’s contention that no tire stacks were available directly contradicts NHIS Motorcycle Safety Director Jerry Wood’s version of the 1998 incident; Wood said tire stacks were available but were not immediately moved into position for fear that rain water that had collected in the individual tires would run across the racetrack and create further problems and delay practice and qualifying.

In his phone call today, Barrick admitted that the haybales he ordered did not arrive at Loudon prior to Miguel Duhamel hitting the same section of wall that Wilson had hit, with the same type of disastrous results.

Barrick also said, referring to our post dated September 29, that racer Jamie Hacking should have notified AMA officials that he had hit a bare steel barrier during testing at VIR; Hacking said Saturday that he had hit the same bare steel barrier during testing at VIR August 13-15 and told VIR General Manager Jack Abbott that the area needed Air Fence coverage.

And according to Barrick, Abbott said that Hacking did not hit the steel barrier in the same place on Saturday as he did in August, and the area Hacking hit in August was covered by foam blocks on Saturday.

Barrick said that the AMA was receiving an unfair share of criticism regarding Hacking’s two collisions with the bare steel barrier at VIR, given that other organizations had raced at VIR without padding in front of the bare steel barrier Hacking hit Saturday–including WERA and F-USA–and, in the case of WERA the weekend prior to the AMA National, well after Hacking hit the barrier in August.

“Hacking should have notified the AMA instead of the track manager,” Barrick said.

(The major point of the Opinion piece was that rider safety should always have priority over maintaining the event schedule.)

From a release issued by Andrew Stutzman, General Manager Rausch Creek Motorsports Park, via the Rausch Creek electronic mailing list:

“First the road course, things have definitely not been going as planned, but we are still 100% committed to completing the road course.

“Currently our engineers are resubmitting the drainage plan to the state. All the concerns of the Department of Environmental Protection have been met in the resubmit and we are now awaiting their inspection to allow our construction to proceed. This should be happening in the next few weeks.

“The original plan was turned down and the DEP mandated we stop track construction and will only allow work to amend the drainage plan until approved.

“In the down time from construction of the road course, we have solicited and gained support from local and state government for the project.

“Also the AMA has offered to support us in any way possible with future governmental issues we might incur. Thank you to everyone who has offered to support Rausch Creek.”

12:00 p.m. AMA Superbike VIR
1:30 p.m. FIM World Superbike Imola Race One
2:30 p.m. FIM World Superbike Imola Race Two

7:00 p.m. Bike Week
7:30 p.m. American Thunder
8:00 p.m. AMA Flat Track National Springfield, IL
9:00 p.m. AMA 600cc Supersport VIR
10:00 p.m. AMA Formula Xtreme VIR
11:00 p.m. Bike Week
11:30 p.m. American Thunder
12:00 a.m. AMA Flat Track National Springfield, IL
1:00 a.m. AMA 600cc Supersport VIR
2:00 a.m. AMA Formula Xtreme VIR
All times are Eastern Daylight Time.

Cruise America Grand Prix Racing’s Jason DiSalvo, 17, took a come-from-behind sixth place finish in the penultimate round of the European 250cc Championship series on Sunday, September 30, at Braga, Portugal.

According to a press release issued by DiSalvo’s team, the New York teenager got off the line well but suffered a big slide early in the final, ran off the track and dropped back to 11th. DiSalvo charged back up to fifth place but was repassed in the final corners of the race and ended up sixth.

DiSalvo’s next race will be the final round of the European 250cc Championship, scheduled for Sunday, October 7 at Cartagena, Spain.