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Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127845
ROAD RACE AMAIMBNA SUPERBIKE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP (Left) Mat Mladin (66) didn't waste much time In getting to the front of the AMA Superblke National at New Hampshire International Speedway. Mladln Is chasad here by Doug Ohandler (1), Aaron Yatss (20), Steve Orevler (14) and Miguel DuHamel (17). (Below) When all was said and done, Mladln had won his second successive AMA Superblke National and his third of the season. The victory also moved him to second In the championship point standings. By Henny Ray Abrams Photos by George Roberts LOUDON, NH, JUNE 15 ast by Ferracci's Mat Mladin cele" bra ted the halfway mark in the season by thrusting himself squarely into the championship chase with a decisive win in the MBNA Superbike race on a beautifully sun-drenched day at the 74th annual Loudon Oassic. By winning .his third race in five tries, and his second in two weeks, Mladin jumped 'into second place in the championship standings, 19 points behin.d the defending champion and current points leader Doug Chandler, the Muzzy Kawasaki rider who dropped to fourth today after choosing a rear tire which was too hard. ''I'm going to have to win every race if I want to catch up, but with Doug's (Chandler) fourth place today, we've closed up a little bit more than what I expected," Mladin said after his flag-toflag win in a most,lY processional race before a crowd of 34/100. "I expected Doug to be in the top three, and we got a ljttle bit of a points break back on Doug today and we closed up to Within 18 (actually 19) points, so it's looking a little bit better as long as we can keep t'-... the motorcycle going and keep our 0\ momentum going." 0\ The win didn't come easily. Mladin ""': had crashed his number-one bike in l!) practice on Saturday, setting it on fire, N after the team had spent all of Friday ~ night doing a complete rethinking of the ::l Ducati from front to rear. ....... "We rebuilt the motorbike with a totally different geometry and different setup - one we thought might work," F e ~ 6 Mladin said. "And we sort of stumbled across something that obviously worked pretty well." Well enough to qualify second to Chandler on the Michelin-shod FBF Ducati. When the flag dropped, the 25-yearold Australian got the jump on the field, squirted past Chandler into turn one, and quickly set a pace no one could match. Yoshimura Suzuki's Aaron Yates came closest, before tailing off at the end to finish 6.530 seconds behind. "After halfway, I tried to kind of get going again; I just couldn't go any faster than I was going," Yates said. "Mat (Mladin) was kind of slowly inching away. My left arm got pretty tired, tensed up or whatever. At this track, you've got to brake really hard, and you've got a lot of weight on the inside handlebar there." Smokin' Joe's Honda's Steve Crevier was able to move into third at the halfway point, and rode steadily to take his first podium spot since late in the 1995 season. '1t's great," the jubilant Crevier said. "I just never really remembered it being this much work. I just ran as consistent a race as 1 could. 1 don't think 1 was particularly blazingly fast, but got a good start and got up front." Then came Chandler, slipping and sliding after finding out in the opening laps that his rear-tire choice was off. '1 went with the' harder tire, thinking that if 1 could come up and run close, I'd have something at the end, and it never came around," Chandler said. "About the third or fourth lap, it kind of started going, and my thing was already spin-