One week after wrongly disqualifying Chris Normand from third place in the Pro Thunder race at VIR for violating a rule which no longer exists, and five days after exonerating and reinstating Normand, AMA officials had still not corrected news posts on the AMA website nor issued a press release announcing Normand’s reinstatement.

As a result, news stories on the AMA’s own website and on other sites still say that Normand was disqualified because his Suzuki SV650 weighed less than 380 pounds, a minimum weight requirement which was actually eliminated from Pro Thunder rules last February.

Normand was reinstated after Roadracingworld.com posted a news story–complete with a link to the February 9 competition bulletin on the AMA website, which announced that the minimum weight rule had been eliminated for four-stroke single-cylinder machines and non-desmodromic, liquid-cooled, twin-cylinder machines displacing 600cc – 850cc.

Within two days, the official results of the event were changed on the AMA Pro Racing website to reinstate Normand’s third-place finish. But as of October 7, AMA Pro Racing had not issued a correction for a race report penned by AMA Pro Racing Media Relations Contractor Larry
Lawrence entitled “Montano’s Pro Thunder Lead Grows With VIR Win”, which still says that Normand was disqualified for being underweight. That story can still be found on the AMA Pro Racing website as well as on www.speedvision.com.

Normand’s name was also missing from results shown on Speedvision’s “Bike Week” show, aired two days after the race.

Pacific Grand Prix of Motegi

500cc Results
25 laps
1. Valentino Rossi, Italy, Honda, 46:32.600
2. Alex Barros, Brazil, Honda, -2.607 seconds
3. Loris Capirossi, Italy, Honda, -9.765
4. Norick Abe, Japan, Yamaha, -13.951
5. Tohru Ukawa, Japan, Honda, -21.994
6. Shinya Nakano, Japan, Yamaha, -22.279
7. Carlos Checa, Spain, Yamaha, -27.332
8. Kenny Roberts, USA, Suzuki, -27.602
9. Sete Gibernau, Spain, Suzuki, -33.822
10. Yukio Kageyama, Japan, Suzuki, -38.139
11. Alex Criville, Spain, Honda, -41.866
12. Garry McCoy, Australia, Yamaha, -50.419
13. Jose Luis Cardoso, Spain, Yamaha -56.204
14. Anthony West, Australia, Honda, -65.286
15. Leon Haslam, Great Britain, Honda, -1 lap
16. Barry Veneman, Holland, Honda, -1 lap
17. Brendan Clarke, Australia, Honda, -1 lap
18. Olivier Jacque, France, Yamaha, -7 laps, DNF, retired
19. Jurgen van den Goorbergh, Holland, Proton, -17 laps, DNF, retired
20. Haruchika Aoki, Japan, Honda, -18 laps, DNF, crashed
21. Noriyuki Haga, Japan, Yamaha, -19 laps, DNF, crashed
22. Max Biaggi, Italy, Yamaha, -20 laps, DNF, crashed
23. Johan Stigefelt, Sweden, Sabre, -21 laps, DNF, retired

500cc Points
1. Rossi, 250
2. Biaggi, 183
3. Capirossi, 163
4. Barros, 147
5. Nakano, 126
10. Roberts, 96


250cc Results
23 laps
1. Tetsuya Harada, Japan, Aprilia, 43:59.587
2. Emilio Alzamora, Spain, Honda, -7.559 seconds
3. Jeremy McWilliams, Great Britain, Aprilia, -8.024
4. Fonsi Nieto, Spain, Aprilia, -11.462
5. Roberto Rolfo, Italy, Aprilia, -11.733
6. Roberto Locatelli, Italy, -13.498
7. Naoki Matsudo, Japan, Yamaha, -19.937
8. Franco Battaini, Italy, Aprilia, -24.789
9. Taro Sekiguchi, Japan, Yamaha, -26.671
10. Nobuyuki Ohsaki, Japan, Yamaha, -33.671
11. Randy de Puniet, France, Aprilia, -37.114
12. David Checa, Spain, Honda, -40.478
13. Osamu Miyazaki, Japan, Yamaha, -41.670
14. David Tomas, Spain, Honda, -42.139
15. Lorenzo Lanzi, Italy, Aprilia, -42.568
16. Sylvain Guintoli, France, Aprilia, -42.806
17. Alex Hofmann, Germany, Aprilia, -43.379
18. Alex Debon, Spain, Aprilia, -45.790
19. Shahrol Yuzy, Malaysia, Yamaha, -46.181
20. Daisaku Sakai, Japan, Honda, -48.361
21. Hiroshi Aoyama, Japan, Honda, -48.507
22. Jay Vincent, Great Britain, Yamaha, -66.106
23. Riccardo Chiarello, Italy, Aprilia, -93.167
24. Luis Costa, Spain, Yamaha, -113.607
25. Diego Giugovaz, Italy, Aprilia, -1 lap
26. Katja Poensgen, Germany, Honda, -1 lap
27. Luca Boscoscuro, Italy, Aprilia, -10 laps, DNF, crashed
28. Cesar Barros, Brazil, Yamaha, -12 laps, DNF, retired
29. Marco Melandri, Italy, Aprilia, -18 laps, DNF, crashed
30. Daijiro Katoh, Japan, Honda, -18 laps, DNF, crashed
31. Stuart Edwards, Great Britain, Great Britain, -19 laps, DNF, crashed
32. David de Gea, Spain, Yamaha, -20 laps, DNF, retired
33. Sebastian Porto, Argentina, Yamaha, -20 laps, DNF, retired
34. Jeronimo Vidal, Spain, Aprilia, -21 laps, DNF, retired
35. Takayuki Onodera, Japan, Yamaha, -23 laps, DNF, retired

250cc Points
1. Katoh, 247
2. Harada, 223
3. Melandri, 169
4. Rolfo, 147
5. Nieto, 127

125cc Results
21 laps
1. Youichi Ui, Japan, Derbi, 42:01.711
2. Manuel Poggiali, San Marino, Gilera, -1.004 seconds
3. Daniel Pedrosa, Spain, Honda, -1.129
4. Lucio Cecchinello, Italy, Aprilia, -12.109
5. Masao Azuma, Japan, Honda, -23.147
6. Gabor Talmacsi, Hungary, Honda, -28.345
7. Mirko Giansanti, Italy, Honda, -28.387
8. Gino Borsoi, Italy, Aprilia, -29.678
9. Gianluigi Scalvini, Italy, Italjet, -29.898
10. Alessandro Brannetti, Italy, Aprilia, -30.026
11. Raul Jara, Spain, Aprilia, -30.268
12. Joan Olive, Spain, Honda, -35.692
13. Angel Nieto Jr., Spain, Honda, -45.543
14. Jaroslav Hules, Czech Republic, Honda, -36.170
15. Angel Rodriguez, Spain, Aprilia, -45.438
16. Pablo Nieto, Spain, Derbi, -45.543
17. Gaspare Caffiero, Italy, Aprilia, -45.997
18. Toshihisa Kuzuhara, Japan, Honda, -70.144
19. Jarno Mueller, Germany, Honda, -74.335
20. William de Angelis, San Marino, Honda, -74.887
21. Adrian Araujo, Spain, Honda, -89.415
22. Simone Sanna, Italy, Aprilia, -8 laps, DNF, retired
23. Eric Bataille, Andora, Honda, -10 laps, DNF, retired
24. Yuzo Fujioka, Japan, Honda, -15 laps, DNF, crashed
25. Yuki Takahashi, Japan, -16 laps, DNF, crashed
26. Alex De Angelis, San Marino, Honda, -16 laps, DNF, crashed
27. Toni Elias, Spain, Honda, -17 laps, DNF, crashed
28. Noboru Ueda, Japan, Honda, -17 laps, DNF, crashed
29. Max Sabbatani, Italy, Aprilia, -17 laps, DNF, crashed
30. Hideyuki Nakajoh, Japan, Honda, -19 laps, DNF, retired
31. Arnaud Vincent, France, Honda, -20 laps, DNF, crashed
32. Steve Jenkner, Germany, Aprilia, -21 laps, DNF, crashed
33. Jakub Smrz, Czech Republic, Honda, -21 laps, DNF, crashed
34. Shuhei Aoyama, Japan, Honda, -21 laps, DNF, crashed
35. Stefano Perugini, Italy, Italjet, -21 laps, DNF, crashed

125cc Points
1. Poggiali, 190
2. Elias, 178
3. Ui, 157
4. Cecchinello, 129
5. Borsoi, 113

From a press release issued by America Honda:

October 5, 2001

Torrance, CA — American Honda announced today that Honda Racing road racer Nicky Hayden will ride Honda’s CRF450R in this weekend’s Drag Specialties National Dirt Track Series at the Del Mar Fairgrounds in Del Mar, California.

Hayden is coming off of a four-race winning streak in the AMA/Chevy Trucks Superbike series.

Hayden will ride a White Brothers/Gary Jones-prepped Honda CRF450R during the Saturday, October 6 short track practice session of the Pro Single National Championship Series. If the practice session proves successful, the Owensboro, KY native will race the Honda 4-stroke motocrosser in the evening’s short track main event.

“I rode the bike yesterday and it felt great, said Hayden. “I plan to race the CRF in the short track Saturday. I’ll also race the mile Sunday. I don’t really have any expectations at this point, I will put my head down and do my best in both events.”

The Hayden family has a long history with the sport of dirt track racing. Nicky Hayden’s father Earl was once a professional dirt track competitor. Nicky’s two brothers –Tommy Hayden and Roger Hayden — compete full-time on the AMA road race circuit and have also competed in selected dirt track events.

Hayden underscored the family commitment to dirt track racing, adding, “My younger brother Roger will be racing on Sunday.” Roger Hayden has signed with Erion Racing to compete the AMA’s 2002 Pro Honda Oils 600 Supersport and Formula Xtreme series.

Henry Degouw has finalized the American team for the Macau Grand Prix, an annual race through the streets of Macau, a former Portugese territory recently returned to Chinese control.

Despite his recent retirement from AMA Pro Racing, Mark Miller will lead the American effort–last year Miller qualified second and finished third place finish in the event. Miller will be joined by Vincent Haskovec, both riding AMA Formula Xtreme-spec Attack Suzuki GSX-R1000s on Dunlop tires. The third rider will be CCS Florida stand-out Marco Martinez on his own Suzuki GSX-R750 Superbike.

The American delegation will leave November 10 with the race taking place on Saturday, November 17. The riders and teams will be treated to an all-expenses-paid, week-long vacation in Thailand following the race.

Degouw said that he originally feared that the annual Macau event would end after control passed to the People’s Republic Of China, but has found that the Chinese have put more into the promotion of the event than ever.

Final 500cc Qualifying for Pacific Grand Prix of Motegi in Motegi, Japan:

1. Loris Capirossi, Italy, Honda, 1:49.800
2. Max Biaggi, Italy, Yamaha, 1:50.248
3. Alex Barros, Brazil, Honda, 1:50.511
4. Valentino Rossi, Italy, Honda, 1:50.591
5. Shinya Nakano, Japan, Yamaha, 1:50.687
6. Kenny Roberts, USA, Suzuki, 1:50.944
7. Sete Gibernau, Spain, Suzuki, 1:51.108
8. Olivier Jacque, France, Yamaha, 1:51.210
9. Tohru Ukawa, Japan, Honda, 1:51.246
10. Jurgen van den Goorbergh, Holland, Proton, 1:51.370
11. Carlos Checa, Spain, Yamaha, 1:51.602
12. Alex Criville, Spain, Honda, 1:51.622
13. Garry McCoy, Australia, Yamaha, 1:51.630
14. Yukio Kagayama, Japan, Suzuki, 1:51.659
15. Noriyuki Haga, Japan, Yamaha, 1:51.664
16. Norick Abe, Japan, Yamaha, 1:51.789
17. Jose Luis Cardoso, Spain, Yamaha, 1:52.248
18. Anthony West, Australia, Honda, 1:52.259
19. Haruchika Aoki, Japan, Honda, 1:52.660
20. Leon Haslam, Great Britain, Honda, 1:54.253
21. Johan Stigefelt, Sweden, Sabre, 1:54.384
22. Barry Veneman, Holland, Honda, 1:54.972
23. Brendan Clarke, Australia, Honda, 1:56.805


Final 250cc Qualifying
1. Tetsuya Harada, Japan, Aprilia, 1:52.789
2. Daijiro Katoh, Japan, Honda, 1:52.813
3. Marco Melandri, Italy, Aprilia, 1:53.115
4. Jeremy McWilliams, Great Britain, Aprilia, 1:53.564
5. Emilio Alzamora, Spain, Honda, 1:53.834
6. Fonsi Nieto, Spain, Aprilia, 1:54.158
7. Randy de Puniet, France, Aprilia, 1:54.392
8. Roberto Rolfo, Italy, Aprilia, 1:54.501
9. Roberto Locatelli, Italy, Aprilia, 1:54.575
10. Naoki Matsudo, Japan, Yamaha, 1:54.584
35. Katja Poensgen, Germany, Honda, 1:59.679


Final 125cc Qualifying:
1. Youichi Ui, Japan, Derbi, 1:58.603
2. Manuel Poggiali, San Marino, Gilera, 1:59.288
3. Masao Azuma, Japan, Honda, 1:59.546
4. Toni Elias, Spain, Honda, 1:59.622
5. Lucio Cecchinello, Italy, Aprilia, 1:59.625
6. Mirko Giansanti, Italy, Honda, 2:00.018
7. Daniel Pedrosa, Spain, Honda, 2:00.124
8. Noboru Ueda, Japan, Honda, 2:00.126
9. Gabor Talmacsi, Hungary, Honda, 2:00.338
10, Max Sabbatani, Italy, Aprilia, 2:00.356

Times from the Sunday-morning warm-up practice for the Pacific Grand Prix of Motegi, in Motegi, Japan:

500cc
1. Rossi, H, 1:50.795
2. Haga, Y, 1:51.222
3. Barros, H, 1:51.386
4. Ukawa, H, 1:51.505
5. Kagayama, S, 1:51.573
6. Abe, Y, 1:51.589
7. Nakano, Y, 1:51.593
8. Capirossi, H, 1:51.651
9. Checa, Y, 1:51.825
10. Biaggi, Y, 1:51.876
11. Jacque, Y, 1:51.894
12. Roberts, S, 1:51.971
13. Criville, H, 1:52.245
14. Gibernau, S, 1:52.254
15. McCoy, Y, 1:52.406
16. West, H, 1:53.194
17. Cardoso, Y, 1:53.244
18. Aoki, H, 1:53.468
19. v.d.Goorbergh, P, 1:53.554
20. Haslam, H, 1:55.075
21. Stigefelt, Sa, 1:55.427
22. Veneman, H, 1:55.533
23. Clarke, H, 1:57.276

250cc
1. Katoh, H, 1:53.544
2. Harada, A, 1:53.927
3. Nieto, A, 1:53.968
4. Melandri, A, 1:54.296
5. Alzamora, H, 1:54.300
6. Locatelli, A, 1:54.514
7. McWilliams, A, 1:54.906
8. Rolfo, A, 1:54.948
9. de Puniet, A, 1:55.163
10. Sekiguchi, Y, 1:55.320
33. Poensgen, H, 2:01.277

125cc
1. Ui, D, 1:59.181
2. Borsoi, A, 1:59.390
3. Elias, H, 1:59.482
4. de Angelis, H, 1:59.691
5. Pedrosa, H, 1:59.785
6. Sanna, A, 1:59.787
7. Cecchinello, A, 1:59.822
8. Rodriguez, A, 2:00.200
9. Scalvini, I, 2:00.204
10. Jenkner, A, 2:00.231

Dr. Rob Tuluie has announced that he will skip the F-USA/CCS Race of Champions weekend at Daytona International Raceway October 17-21 and instead take his Tul-aris 780 back to the lab for continued development over the winter.

A press release issued by Tuluie stated: “Our next goal is to continue off-season development on the power valve engine. Once assembled, we will begin tuning this new motor at Hot Seat Performance on their engine dyno sometime in November. Using Hot Seat’s dyno will allow us to make use of their extensive experience as well as allow quick engine configuration changes. We will focus on setting up the Polaris-supplied power valve solenoid, complete with an adjustable electronic controller, custom-made for us by Jim Hubert of DCM Services. Thereafter, we will continue with minor porting, cylinder head, crankcase, exhaust pipe and ignition curve modifications in order to have a reliable and powerful package ready for Daytona 2002. The goal will be to arrive at a stable engine configuration that will not have to change during the next racing season. This should reduce the mid-season work level substantially. Final verification of this engine configuration will occur on Doug Lofgren’s dyno at Manley Cycle sometime in the December time frame, with a possible off-season test date somewhere warm and dry.

“A dynamic handling computer model of the Tul-aris is undergoing an expansion to a full 3-D simulation. Previously, we had been able to simulate fully non-linear 2-D events, such as riding the virtual motorcycle straight up over a bump (a 2×4!) and similar planar maneuvers. We compared the simulated result (it took 4 hours of PC crunching time to compute a 30-second simulation!) and the measurement from an actual test and found excellent agreement. Now we will include cornering events. We already have all measurements for the Tul-aris chassis stiffness, hysteresis and damping, as well as the standard suspension damping and kinematics. A few measurements remain, for which we will use MTS equipment during the off-season. Our previous model was Pro-Mechanica based, but right now Greg and I are looking into converting it to ADAMS instead. The goal is to have the first true motorcycle racing dynamics simulation software, fully validated on actual test equipment. The last point (the one about validation) is very important if these simulations are to mean anything, else you’re just playing games and hoping your software’s answer is right. Once we have this and perform independent lab tests on the MTS equipment to make sure the model predicts the correct dynamics, we can perform racetrack set-up evaluations on the computer before having to try them out on the track. Since we’ve gathered quite a bit of track data this year with our PI system, we can hopefully start comparing model data to real data sometime this winter.”

Tuluie says that he is also working on an agreement to gain use of an East Coast University’s wind tunnel over the winter. However, Tuluie is still looking for a cash sponsor to help defray their travel costs associated with racing the Tul-airs 780 in the Formula USA Unlimited Grand Prix National series in 2002.

A missing word in a story on the Take Back The AMA campaign creates the wrong impression that campaign contributions are tax deductible.

The offending line of text, appearing on page 10 of the November issue of Roadracing World, mailed today, reads “Tax-deductible campaign contributions to offset the cost of printing and mailing election brochures are being accepted by the Roadracing World Action Fund, P.O. Box 1428, Lake Elsinore, CA 92531-1428, (800) 464-8336.”

The line of text should have read, “Non-tax-deductible campaign contributions…”

No campaign donations have been received to date as a result of the story, and anyone who contributes after the issue entered distribution (today) will be contacted and given the option of having the contribution returned.

We regret the error but hasten to point out that–unlike what the AMA typically has done in cases of making an error–we made the mistake public ourselves, accepted full responsibility, and took steps to correct the situation before issues containing the error reached readers.

Friday 500cc Qualifying Times:
1. Kenny Roberts, Suzuki, 1:50.944
2. Alex Barros, Honda, 1:51.007
3. Loris Capirossi, Honda, 1:51.141
4. Max Biaggi, Yamaha, 1:51.778
5. Valentino Rossi, Honda, 1:51.785
6. Noriyuki Haga, Yamaha, 1:51.858
7. Sete Gibernau, Suzuki, 1:51.938
8. Shinya Nakano, Yamaha, 1:52.079
9. Olivier Jacque, Yamaha, 1:52.085
10. Carlos Checa, Yamaha, 1:52.367
11. Norick Abe, Yamaha, 1:52.440
12. Garry McCoy, Yamaha, 1:52.629
13. Jose Luis Cardoso, Yamaha, 1:52.768
14. Tohru Ukawa, Honda, 1:52.883
15. Jurgen van den Goorbergh, Proton, 1:53.319
16. Alex Criville, Honda, 1:53.668
17. Haruchika Aoki, Honda, 1:53.718
18. Anthony West, Honda, 1:53.827
19. Yukio Kagayama, Suzuki, 1:54.367
20. Leon Haslam, Honda, 1:55.695

Friday 250cc Qualifying Times:
1. Tetsuya Harada, Aprilia, 1:52.945
2. Daijiro Katoh, Honda, 1:53.365
3. Marco Melandri, Aprilia, 1:53.910
4. Jeremy McWilliams, Aprilia, 1:54.104
5. Roberto Locatelli, Aprilia, 1:54.575
6. Naoki Matsudo, Yamaha, 1:54.629
7. Alex Debon, Aprilia, 1:54.859
8. Emilio Alzamora, Honda, 1:54.970
9. David Checa, Honda, 1:54.976
10. Fonsi Nieto, Aprilia, 1:55.057
11. Franco Battaini, Aprilia, 1:55.150
12. Randy De Puniet, Aprilia, 1:55.230
13. Nobuyuki Ohsaki, Yamaha, 1:55.412
14. Roberto Rolfo, Aprilia, 1:55.413
15. Sebastian Porto, Yamaha, 1:55.527

35. Katja Poensgen, Honda, 1:59.714

Friday 125cc Qualifying Times:
1. Toni Elias, Honda, 2:00.383
2. Youichi Ui, Derbi, 2:00.464
3. Masao Azuma, Honda, 2:00.709
4. Mirko Giansanti, Honda, 2:00.758
5. Alessandro Brannetti, Aprilia, 2:00.800
6. Lucio Cecchinello, Aprilia, 2:00.900
7. Manuel Poggiali, Gilera, 2:00.937
8. Angel Nieto, Honda, 2:00.983
9. Gianluigi Scalvini, Italjet, 2:01.197
10. Daniel Pedrosa, Honda, 2:01.214

From a press release issued by Steve Clark’s Tight Squeeze Racing, which runs the TSR Injury Fund:

Due to the recent attacks on the World Trade Center Towers and the Pentagon, the TSR Injury Fund is going to donate all the proceeds from our 2001 contribution drive to the New York Times 9/11 Neediest Fund.

More information about the fund can be found at http://prodpub.wavesys.com/cw/donations.asp?charity=neediest911

TSR understands that this drastic measure is not what we have advertised throughout the course of our contribution drive, and are willing to offer refunds to anyone, provided they return their original ticket stub. We feel that at this time and magnitude of need, that this is the correct course of action to take.

Please note that the items that have been donated to the Injury Fund will still be given away as the Raffle prizes, and the drawing date has not changed. It will still be held on Oct 28th, during the WERA GNF, at Road Atlanta in Braselton, GA, and winning ticket holders do not need to be present. A listing of these prizes is available on the TSR website at http://www.tightsqueezeracing.org/raffle.htm.

In addition to those listed on the website, we would also like to recognize the following pledges that we received at the WERA VIR National event:

Thermosman Suspensions (http://www.thermosman.com/)
-One Penske 8900 Rear shock, $1300

Team INA
-One Poulan 2375LE, 18-inch, Gas Chain Saw, $150

TSR will continue accepting donations for the 9/11 Fund until the end of the 2001, then we will resume our normal operations for 2002.