Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

ROAD RACE WORLD SUPERBIKE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES riders who had 'dominated the first race were on their own again as both Yanagawa and Corser had to let them go, neither rider able to maintain the pace that had been set . Slight and Fogarty took their battle all the way to'the line, fighting tooth and nail for the top podium spo t and the full points that wen t wit h it, but in the end, Slight would not be denied and the Hond a rider tZx,k his second win of the day. "That was an incredible race," Slight said. "Carl and me just rod e the wheels off the bikes in the closing stages. It' s a mazi ng how fas t w e were go ing on tires that were worn out. I came to Austria 30 points behind Troy a nd I would have been happy if I could have closed the gap to 15 point s tod ay, so to be this close is fant astic - even thou gh we kn ew that Troy would be struggling here. The ,..... 0\ ;.... (]) ..0 E (]) ..... 0... (]) Cf) 14 Consid er ing his con dition after h is cras h at La guna Seca, Yanagawa 's ret urn to raci n g w as a s u c ce ssf u l one, w ith the Japanese rider taki n g a pair of fourth -p lace fini s he s. again in order to get a stronger position in this champions hip again. contract s wi th th eir r esp ective factorie s. tho ugh no signatures We are no t wil ling to make a rider rich for ju st 'riding our bike have been put to paper as of yet. A s for the other factory riders. around - even if he is a fonmer World Champion . " anything could still happen . There is great uncertainty 'with regard to D ucati . A s things look 'now. .the Italian com pany looks set to Su';uki is in the" - fort unate - situati on of bei ng able to choos e ente r only a single official team for the 1999 senes (an intention At Zeltw eg. the FIM distributed an official release about the t echfrom three model s to enter into the W orld Superbike fray. Out on they have uttered just abo ut every yea r). A nd surprisingly, not nical regulations for the W orld Superbike Championship as of the longtim e ..home team " manager Virgulio Ferrari but Davide the track. however. thi ngs don ' t look so 'ro sy as the sit uation Jarruary 1. 2001. The text was a re sult of several meeting s Tardozzi co uld be the man to ' lead the team. The riders are likely might suggest . The carbu reted version o f the GS X-R is only slow between the four Japanese manufacturers and top-bras s rep reIy making progress, and official team manager Lester Harris admitto be Troy Corser and Carl Fo garty . Pier-France sco C hili' s situasentatives from Apri lia and D ucat i. the first of which took place in ted that the 'injectio n bike will no t even make its debut at Sugo , t ion is a bi~ more delicate . even thou gh it wo uld seem unlikel y N ov ember of last year. Th e text is st ill subje ct to the FIM ' s that D ucati would fire the only.Italian nder In their fold. In addition . the last race o f the year. The Briton also canceled his trip to approval at their autumn cong ress later this year . but it is expect J apan a~er th e Brand s .Hatc h race , where he wou ld taik about Chi li' s contrac t states that he w ill auto matica lly be offered a faced no major changes w ill be introduced . The text foresees no tory bik e in 199 9 if he gets into the top three at the end of this next season and their obvious sw itch .to the injection G5X·R . ' changes for the minimum p roduction quantit ies fer hcmoloqatiori year. In t he impro bable ca se that Ch ili leaves Du cat i , Ap rili a "The Japan ese now have some ot her business to atte nd 'to. " he or the mi nimum w eigh t limit; even tho ugh ' ma nu f~cturers en teri ng said, referrin g to the financial cris is Japan is now facing . As to the mi ght be i nt eres t e d i n making use of his servic es . J am e s the championship for the fir st'lime will benefit dur ing the first year 1999 seaso n, A lst are 'C orona Extra .S uzuk i Su per sporttearn Whi tham and Peter Goddard stand a good chance of staying wi th from s pecia l hom ologa ti on cond iti ons regarding the numb er of S uzuki . but the fu ture is less certain for Neil Hod gson and Scott : ow ner Franc is Betta said that : he was consi dering ' staying in the ' vers ion of the pro to ty pe units to be produced . a watered-down fou r-strok e rac ing se ries only If · the Su persp ort champio nship Ru ssell,. Ya maha is ru mo re d to have beguri ta lks w it h Lu ca formu la' wh ich w as considered for so me time last yea r. M or e received official W orld Championship sta tus. If that happened. the ' Cadalora and Alex Barro s. amo ng other candidates. The whole "impo rtant is the int rod uction of the k.it·bike concept . which sho uld team wo uld not only enter bikes in the Superspo rtraces (with bring more parity between factory bikes and privateer bikes . The . ' scenario could . of cou rs e. be ut terly dismantl edil one of the - almo st signed " rid ers ge t te mpted by ano th er manufactu rer Fabrizio Pirovano and St ephan Chambon already co nfirmed). but manufac turers com mitted t hemse lves to making kits available. (Troy Co rser and Aaron Slight are rumored to have had offers als o in th e WoridSuperbike .C hampion ship , prob ably with the subject to homologation by the FlM . t o all riders interested , at a from Suzuki). if Suzuki and/ or Yamaha throw in a B·t eam. or if TL 1000R. For Balla. Anth ony Gobert was the first one on his list . maximum price (in current 1998 value) of $40.000 for four -cylinhaving proved his value on twin s as well as on ,four·cyli nder bikes. de; machines and $35 .000 for twin s. The minimum number of kit . one of the bet ter Grand Prix riders decides to have a go at th e W orld Cha mpionship series . A co mebac k by J oh n Kocinski on ' but Suzu ki didn 't eve n want to con sider this po ssibility. Me an· part s to be produ ced by eac h manufactu rer will be 30 sets , and the' C ast rol Honda team s eems to. be unlik ely . even though he .white. .the TL 1000R's de vel opment program wa s sta rte d one the frequency o f upgr ading the kit part s will be twi ce per year. The week ago . with Stephane Mertens makinq the first laps 'aboard was heard to have mentioned t~ iS opti?n rece ntly . validity of kit part s will be for a maximum of five years . but it will the offi cial bike. Because of too-soft suspensio n, developme nt will end together wi th the motorcycle homologat ion peri od. Noth ing Gattolone to race Yamahas next year? This posslbllity is not so have to '";Ieit a few more we eks for the factory to send new equip. may be modified ' on the kit parts . including the degree to which ment ove r. Balla is hoping for. w ord from Suz uki by the 'end of unlikely as itseems. The Italian team. 'which is ow ned byAndrea the part s are polished. The propesal was met with enthu siasm by September about eithe r its. four -stroke. or tw o-st roke racing pr~· Merioni , put Pier-Francesco Chil i (;>n a Ducati a couple of years ago nearly everyone , eve n if post race technical cont rol might now take gram .for next year, si nce he has also offered to run the 500c c and was thereaft er pro moted to the status of " sernl-official" Ducati . an hour and a half instead of the roughly 45 minutes' it takes' now : Grand Prix team. If he -doe sn't receive word, Batta said he may team before being. dumped by the Bologna. factory in favor of the Though' the 'new rules will definit ely narrow the gap between the switch to Grand Prix racing and anot her rnanufacturer that has new D ucali Performance. team run by Davide Tardozzi. This year , privat eer s and the factory rid ers. t he latter group will prob ably recently made an offer to him for the GP series . Gattol one had to settle .for a private Ducati and rider Alessandro keep the edge over the competition. because several other things Gramigni. "We do not get the results we had hoped for with Alex: " can still make the diffe rence ; suspension. tires. elec tronic engine declared Merloni , who is also the owner of the Benelli marque. management, and the material the eng ine co mponents are made " Things will have to change for next year, in order to keep our of. At the meeting , the idea of introducing a Supe rspert ' 1100 catspe nsors happy .- Merl oni already tried to run an offic ial Yamaha egory (wi th treaded tires and very limited tuning possibiliti es) was last year. after they had lost Chili to Ducati and Scott Russell and also discussed . to be open for yo ung riders only (wi th an age limit N orlyuki Haga had signed with Yamaha. "When it became clear of 24 years). that Coli n Edwards was not going to get a 500c c Grand Prix sea t, Am ong t he several ra c i ng guests at Yamaha W S B te am m ana g er Zell\iveg (which included Ralf Waldmann Davide Brivio asked us if we were an d T er ry Vance, as we ll as W ay n e i n tere sted in runnin g t he thi rd Rainey' s and Kenny Robert s' legal advisYam ah a; C o li n w o uld th en j o in ers) w er e B illy D avidson (s ha ki ng Haga 'in the official team, with Scott ' . hands with Scott RusselD. A rt G o m p riding the official Gattolone Yarnaper and Steve S che ibe (m iddle) ha, Bu t then C olin got the Honda from Harley-Davidson . Offi cially, they o ffer ." A coup le o f w e ek s ag o , were ..enjoy ing the race and the Aus trian Merloni started looking for alternaThe Supersport W orld S e r i e s race was marred by a massive beer ." It is. however. a public secret that cras h at the start . involVing fou r riders . Wh " n the light s turned tives to another year with a private Harley-Davidson is still very muc h inter· green , Yves Briguet's D ucati brok e d own (t he pr im ary drive .. Ducati (bu t definitely w ith anoth er es te d in ente ri ng the World S uperbi ke broke) and the luck less Swi ss rider was left on the grid ~th the rider). He started talks with Honda, Ch ampionship. and that it had used this engin e rewing hard. but in a tot," ly sta tio nary bike . Kirk M cCarthy but principals there explained that weekend - the only W orld Superbike race and Belgians Albert Aert s and Alain Kemp ener coul dn 't -avoid there we ren't enough resources to wee kend that wasn 't a co nflict w ith the Brigue t and went down. M cCarthy wa lked away unhurt. while build bikes and parts for a third offiAMA series · to have a clos er look at the Briguet and Kempen er were luc ky to e scape with so mew hat cial Hon da ri der. Ya maha is stil l world racing scene. It is understood that minor injuries - a broken ankle for Briguet and some broken fincons idering the Gattolone offer to the VR proj ect will continue. but that Harley will have to develop run a third factory bike. " I wo uld like to get an answe r in Septemge rs and a bro ken collarbone for Kempener. The condition of the bike into a W orld ·ievel contender in order to justify the devel Sunday evening, he was still in a coma, sufA erts was worse . ber ," the Italian busines sman said. " M aybe we will know more at opment costs . " The chassis is working extremely well. - they said. fering fro m at leas t a co ncussion and seve ral internal bruises. The the Mu nich mo torcycle fair. where the new 750cc Yamaha will be - But we need to get more grunt from the engine and get the aerodoc tors worried most abo ut his spine being injured but believed presen ted . Right now. we are talking to (Gregorio) Lavilla. (Pere) dynamics of the bike right. The reliability of some minor part s , Riba and (Vittori o) Guareschi about next year, and we will probably his lifewas no longer in danger. After a delay of nearly an hour.. w hich cause d the bike to retire a cou ple of times th is yea r, should th e ra ce was re start ed , and it · lo oked to belong to Cri stian o also talk to Sc ott Russell in the next couple of weeks. But if we be.taken care of . But the engine concept is good , as is proven' by can' t get an offic ial Yamaha. we prefer ·to continue with a private ' M igliorati. the Italian team mate of Br iguet . But going into the final the very similar concept which is now used by. Apri liafor their Ducati. because that is the only bike a private team can have some lap. the Ducati grou nd to a halt on the front straight due to an Mille s uperbike racer . " g'ood resu lts with.Apart from that, we also have ' to be realisti c . empty fuel tenk - th e team had forg ollen to ref illthe tank afte r the ' start crash earlier. Fabrizio Pirovano (8) profited and won the It is expected that mo st of the rid e rS ' contracts wi ll be signed ' abo ut the bud get we wa nt to spe nd onthe W orl d Superbik e long battle with his teamma te .Stephane Ch ambon: Champi onship. This year we will have managed with about st mi~ race after by the end of September. Right now , ' only a few riders know lion; thanks also to the fact thai the rider's salary is ' only a small W ith this result, the Italian also secured the title. He dedicated it wh at co lor bike they will ride next yea r. Ak ira Yanaqaw a has. a percentage of the total budget. For us. it is very impo rtant for the to his fathe~, who had traveled with hirn on the racing circuit for year left on his two-year deal. wh ile N orlyuki Haga . Aaron Slight many years but wa s killed in a traffic accident three weeks ago. rider to be motiva ted ; we want to start fighting for race victories and Cohn Edward s II are all apparently close to renewing th~i r Briefl 00 0\ 0\ last tw o races are run on circuits which shou ld suit me and the bike well, and the bike is now workin g better than it has eve r d one.Bo I feel very confident for the end of the season." Fogarty had learn ed his lesson after race one an d thanked his team as soon as he got off the bike. "The boys looked at the computer in between the races , and changed the sus pension ," Fogarty said. "I honestly don't know wha t exac tly they changed, but it worked perfectly . On ce the tire we nt off, I was s ti ll able to go fa s t. A t one moment, I thought I was lead ing with a four-second lea d , as I had o n ly se en Fra nk ie's pit board bu t not Aaron's. I started to pa nic when Aaron got past me. I still tried to get back to him, but I co u ld n' t. Aa ro n just went a bit fas te r toda y. But I hop e to get my revenge at ••• O n a

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