Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Round 9: Sugo, Japan "I struggled with setup problems and a lack of horsepower," said Gobert. Edwards reported no problems besides the mistake of choosing his "old" bike instead of following Nagai's example of riding the newer bike. Crafar finished 10th. RACE TWO One of the more exciting moments of the second heat race happened an hour or so before the start of the race. At that point it started to rain and the promoters decided to grant the riders an extra 15 minutes of free practice in the wet before giving them the green light for the start. As soon as the practice session was over, it was Fogarty and Nagai storming to the front. After some questionable moves from the Japanese rider, Fogarty finally got ahead at the end of the first lap - and he wouldn't give it back for the rest of the way. The battle for the remaining two ros\ (Lett) Yasutomo Nagai (25) put his Yamaha out front In the first race at Sugo; he's being cha8ecI by Troy Corser (11).and World Champion Carl Fogarty (1). (Balow) Race one turned Into an epic battle between Aaron Slight (3), Nagai (25) and Corser (11). In the end n was Corser taking the win. By Johan Vandekerckhove Photos by Gold & Goose SUGO, JAPAN, AUG. 27 ucati's Carl Fogarty made a rare mistake as the World Superbike Championship ventured to the Land of the Rising Sun, but the championship points leader was able to make amends for his firstrace crash by going out and winnfug the second race - despite the best efforts of a throng of local talent and the very best of the World Superbike regulars. The winner in the first race was Promotor Ducati's Troy Corser, the Australian getting the better of Castrol Honda's Aaron Slight and Yamaha's Yasutomo Nagai, with the three crossing the finish line less than half a second .apart. But the second race belonged to Fogarty, with the Brit managing to hold off Nagai to eventually win by some five seconds. The surprise of the second race was Kawasaki's Katsuaki Fujiwara, who finished third in the second race after finishing 17th in the first race. American Colin Edwards ended the day with a sixth-place finish in the first race and a 10th in race two; the Texan spent mqst of the day bat.tling with young Australian Anthony Gobert on the Muzzy Kawasaki, with Gobert finishing one spot ahead of Edwards in 'both races~ Despite his first-race crash, Fogarty' finished with a 128-point lead over Corser, who only erded up gaining eight points on his rival in the fight for the World Championship. II RACE ONE 20 Local hero Yasu~omo Nagai did exactly what the 30,000 spectators expected from him - he led from the getgo, putting his factory Yamaha in front of Corser, Fogarty, Slight and Gobert. Fogarty was the charging the hardest at this point, clawing his way back to second and then to the front on the fifth lap. Unfortunately, for the Brit that is where it all went wrong. Exiting from the first comer after the start/ finish, the rear end went away and Fogarty was thrown high in the atT. "I don't really know what happened," the World Champion said, nursing a badly bruised right ankle, elbow and wrist. I had a slightly different line than most other guys at that place. Perhaps I hit a bump with the rear suspension fully compressed." After Fogarty's retirement, Nagai and Corser seemed set to escape, even though local rider Takuma Aoki was moving forward in impressive fashion. The !fonda rider ended up setting the quickest lap of the race on the sixth goaround, only to crash in exactly the same spot as Fogarty a lap later. The next one to close in on the lead duo was Slight. And the Kiwi was able to stay aboard his factory Honda. Even better - as Corser took over the lead after 10 laps, Slight got into the slipstream of Nagai and looked ready to begin a tactical race, watching the leaders' every move from his third position. Behind this threesome, another fierce battle raged on with Kawasaki's Keiichi Kitagawa, Gobert and Edwards. Simon Crafar rode around in 12th place,. after having been rammed twice by Italian Fabrizio Pirovano. Ten laps before the end, Corser lost his lead to Nagai exiting the chicane. But it was only five laps later that things really started to heat up in front. Slight took command and looked to be the logical choice as winner of the race. But it was not to be. On the last lap, in the chicane, Nagai tried a Kamikaze move to get on the inside of the Castrol Honda. Nagai went straight, Slight almost came to a -standstill, and Corser took the two by surprise in the middle of the chicane, stealing the victory. "At the beginning of the race, I was sitting comfortably in second place behind Yasu (Nagai)," Corser said. "After Carl's (Fogarty) crash, I knew . that I could make up a lot of ground on him in the point standing if I went nice and easy. But then I noticed Aaron (Slight) getting closer. He got past me, and then I knew that we'd have a fierce battle on our hands. I stayed in third and was planning to have a go at the lead in the last chicane. But still it didn't quite happen the way I expected." Slight was understandably very disappointed about the win that got away. "That was really a banzai move from Nagai on the last lap," he said. "I knew that he would have a go there, and I'd kept the door closed very tightly there. I don't know how mu€h track you must cover to keep that guy behind. Earlier in the race, I'd lost more time when Carl (Fogarty) and Aoki went down just in front of me. Especially, the first crash cost me two full seconds. It was a hard decision for me whether to brake or to run him over." Gobert came home fifth, after a racelong battle with Edwards and Kitagawa, who ended up fourth. trum places was also settled early in the race. Nagai stayed in second, with young Kawasaki rider Katsuaki Fujiwara settling into third. The real battle was for fourth position - between Slight and Aoki. Corser, meanwhile, was having a rough time on the same bike he had taken to victory on just a few hours before. The Australian had to settle things with Wataru Yoshikawa, Kitagawa, with Gobert, Edwards following closely. In the end, Aoki had lost some places due to his error on the last lap. Fogarty was a happy winner after having a terrible day that began with a bolt breaking on his bike during warmup, which sprayed the track with oil and caused the warmup to be interrupted for 15 minutes, and a crash in the first heat. "At first, I didn't expect to be able to ride this heat," the Briton said. "But everything went well right from the start. I could use the same bike 1 had crashed a couple hOUTS before, and it felt okay. The only trouble I had was with

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