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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127730
(on yet ano ther Ducati ) had settled in a lonesome fourth place. There was more en thusiasm for fifth place as Muzzy Kawasaki's An tho ny Gobe rt and Reynolds ha d d ecid ed th at the position belon ged to the m. But the two Kawasa ki r id ers were so b u s y minding their ow n business, that th ey d idn 't n o tice th e arriva l of D ucatimounted Fabriz io Pirovano. On lap eight, Lucchiari clawed back a t Foga rty, w ho was starti ng to have engi ne problems. "All of a s ud den, m y engi ne los t power," th e Briton explained . "I even considered pullin g in as I th ou ght the bike could sto p any m omen t. Aft er a few la ps, th in g s went bett er again in that de pa rtment, but th en the tires we nt off, and the bike started wobbling very badl y at some places." These problems pushed the num berone rider back to third, albeit for only a (Right) Coli n Edwards II had mechanica l trou bles that led him off the track at one po int . The Texan sits 12th in points. (Below) Another tr oubled Am erican was Scott Russell, finishing 14th and ninth, repe ctively. in the two races. Fogarty earns p-"..-ol_e_ M few laps. All suspense in the battle for the top fo u r positions ended 10 laps fro m the e nd: Lucchiari was leading with ease, and Foparty di dn't seem too wo rri ed about Corser in third. Chili was a lonely fourth, and the ma in interest was fo r fifth pl ace - with a cha rgi ng Pirovano ahead of th e tw o Ka wasak i rid ers, Gobert and Reyn olds. For Lucch ia ri, the victory co ul dn' t have com e at a better place: "It is always nice to win before the home crowd, but it also pu ts you un der a lot of pressure. I go t r eally nervou s w hen some backmarkers got in the way in the last couple of laps. Bu t fortunat ely everything we nt well." Fogarty crossed the line two seconds behind Lucchiari , himself being followed closely by Corser. For the Australian, the resul t was a fine revenge after a disastrous Hockenheim weekend, "For the first time this yea r I had no major proble ms," he exp lained. "Of course, tire selection proved to be very critical here, bu t everybody was sliding around so I should n't be comp laini ng." In the closing stages, Russell had lost a place in the top 10 when he got tired of trying to ma ke u p lost ground due to the lack of power - and he d rop ped to 14th. For Colin Edwards II, things were even worse. The yo ung Texa n h a d retired after havin g run off the track on two occas ions when he hit a false neu tra l d ownshiftin g fro m fou rth to th ird gear. "Bu t that wasn' t the main problem ," th e Yamaha rid er sa id. "Firs t th e rear tire lost grip; I tried to compensate by p ushing the fron t a little bit harder, but t hat a lso brought trouble. Five la ps before th e en d, I decided to call it a d ay." Dou g Polen had been riding arou nd in the 20th spot, finishing 17th at th e end of the race. He blamed a not-so-perfeet gearing choice for the meager resul t. '1 hit the rev limiter in several places and go t in betw een two gea rs in othe r places," the Texan said. "This, combined with so me tire problems, resu lted in a careful race." One of the most unhappy men in the Misano paddock was Aaron Slight. "I've lost confidence in the front end of the bike," said th e New Zealander, who crashed on the same track a few weeks before during the official preseason test. [o chen Schmid, who spent most of the first heat in the slipstream of the New Zealander confirmed Slight's im pression of the bad-handling Castrol Honda. The German, who went so well on his home track in Hockenheim, moved past the Honda on the last lap to ta ke the final World Championship point. . RACE TWO The s tea mroller victory of the Ducatis in the first heat - with five of the Itali an twins ta king th e top five positions - had severe effec ts on the other tea m s betw een the tw o heats. Most of the Japa nese teams had their mechanics working in overdrive, in a differen t effort to the coun terattack which would take place a few hours later. A different e ngi ne was t h ro w n in to Russell's Kawasaki, radical chan ges were made to os t of the leading teams had spent some testing days at Misano at the end of April d uring th e official pre season tests. And that's why most expected to have their bikes set up pretty easily for the second race of the year . How wrong th ey w ould be . First of all , the weather didn't help as changing conditions during practice on Friday and Saturday made things even more complicated than normal. The first official practice was run under a dark sky and there was only a 15-minute window of opportunity for a good time. Troy Corser took advantage of the situation, and grabbed (provisional) pole position on Friday in front of Mauro Lucchiari, Fabrizio Pirovano and Yasutomo Nagai. Italian privateer Luca Pasini was the biggest surprise, riding his Ducati 916 to fifth place, in front of Piergiorgio Bontempi, [ochen Schmid and Aaron Slight. Endurance World Champion Adrien Morillas also went pretty well on his Ducati, leading the charts at one point. Not so for Carl Fogarty (13th), Doug Polen (14th), Pier -Francesco Chili (lSth), Scott Russell (18th) and Anthony Gobert (26th). Some riders crashed while trying too hard on the half-wet track: Fogarty, Gobert and Paolo Caso li were among them . Things were even more hectic on Saturday afternoon. when the track was completely d ry and everybody seemed very anxious to go a lot fast er than the da y before. Most bettered their times by a full two seconds. Corser did n' t keep his po le posi tion for very long as he was a crasher . "I don't kno w what caused the crash," he said. "1 lost the front and that was that. I returned to the pit on the bike, whi ch had only a damaged throt tle and footpeg. I lost some time w hen my mechanics fixed it and quickly checked the rest ofthe bike. 1 didn't wa nt to go out on my second bike, as it was slower . A few minutes before the end, I went out again, but unfortunately I didn't have enough time to try to better my own best time." Corser would eventua lly drop back to fourth place on the starting grid . Lucchiari had taken over command for a few minutes, but in the d osing stages of the session he saw his nam e drop to second pla ce - behind Fogarty. "The bike was set u p exactly the same way as during the preseason tests in Apri l," the World Cha mpion said. "And that seemed to work out pretty well. In .some comers I had some trouble to keep the front wheel on the right track, but that wasn't really a big pr oblem." Chili was third quickest and Colin Edwards ,II was fifth. "I set this time on my backup bike," the you ng Texan said. "A few minutes after the beginning of the second session I got tangled with a slower rider, and that 's why 1 had to make do with an engine with a narrower powerband for the rest of the session." Several top rid ers saw their chances to perform well on Sunday severely compromised becaus e of a bad practice time. Gobert took 13th (despite two crashes). And he led And reas Meklau (l 4th - several problems), Russell (15th - lack of power and some chassis problems), Slight (I9th - suspension) and Nagai (20th ). Doug Polen was 23rd, after having lost a lot of time in the pit due to a fuel line that had come loose.