Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

(Left) Pascal Picotte _ rode his HarleyDavidson VR1000 to a fourth-place finish at Phoenix. (Right) Gobert celebrates his victory by spraying some bubbly. Splitting the two was American Honda's Miguel DuHamel, the Daytona 200 winner's injured leg causing him more difficulty on this 1.5-mile race track than it did on the wide-open expanses of Daytona. Behind Oliver came the second factory Harley-Davidson, ridden by fill-in racer Mike Smith in the absence of Scott Russell, 'who is still recovering from facial injuries suffered during Bike Week at Daytona. The last of the factory riders followed, with Yoshimura Suzuki's Steve Crevier taking 11th, Fast By Ferracci's Matt Wait ending up 12th and the Muzzy Kawasaki pairing of Doug Chandler and Aaron Yates finishing 13th and 14th, respectively. Chandler had a frustrating day, as his Kawasaki never handled right, while Yates was running in the top five when he crashed. The Georgian remounted, pitted and still finished 14th. Ann Arbor, Michigan's Rad Greaves was the top-finishing privateer as he rode his King James Motors' Suzuki GSX-R750 to 15th. Notable nonfinishers include Yoshimura Suzuki's Steve Rapp, who survived a horrific crash on the opening lap that brought out the red flag and a complete restart to the race, and Mike Sullivan, who in his first outing on the Cliff Garrett-owned Ducati was running strong before crashing. Considering the nature of the circuit, attrition was fairly low. Although Mladin has had two closebut-no-cigar races, he's in exactly the position he wants to be in as far as the championship goes. After two of 13 rounds, the Australian has 65 points to DuHamel's 60. The Vance & Hines duo of Gobert and Bostrom are tied for third with 57 points, six points clear of Oliver in fifth place. Pridmore (50) is sixth, Mr. 59 Seconds Y oshimura Suzuki's Mat Mladin (right) was fast last year at Phoenix International Raceway. This year he was even faster, lapping under his qualifying record of a season ago to become the first man to ever circulate Phoenix International,Raceway in under one minute. The Australian turned in a near-perfect lap to earn pole position with a 59.994-second lap. Last year, Mladin proved to be the best man for the job when it came to qualifying, earning seven pole position in the 14 races. This year, he's proved to be equally adept, qualifying second at Daytona and earning his first pole of the season here in Phoenix. He was hoping to break Ducati's four-race win streak come Sunday, a streak he had been a part of by .winning in 1997 on a Fast By Ferracci Ducati. '1t's one of those things that's a reality," Mladin said. "The Ducatis are a little easier on tires and they've won every race here, so obviously they're going to be competitive come race time. Especially if it's hot - if it cools down a bit, then we've got a better shot at it, but it doesn't look like it's going to. Our bike is looking good. Our race-tire times have been good. Forty-three laps - it's one of those races where you can be going the fastest and get a couple of lappers, then they're back on your back wheel if they can hang, then they're there. It's one of those races. So far we haven't had a problem (with tires) at all this week." As for the lap of 59.994, well, it was pretty close to perfect. '1t was a pretty good lap, yeah," Mladin said. "I didn't really use the tire the best that I could have. The first lap was only like a 60.4, and that was actually the second lap on the tire. Usually, if you mess up the first lap on a qualifier, then you've given away the best that the tire's got. I was happy with a 59.9." Mladin knew the challenge would come from Ducati on the tight and twisty, l.5-mile combination oval/road course. And the Ducatis showed their mettle right away, with two of them joining Mladin on the front row - led by Australian Anthony Gobert, last year's Phoenix winner. "We found a good race setup yesterday (Friday)," with Pegram (46), Chandler (41), Yates (41) and Wait (40) filling the top 10. When the lights flashed to green to start the Superbike National, Mladin launched his Suzuki from pole position into the lead, followed by Yates, Bostrom, Gobert, Chandler and Picotte. it was all for nothing, however, as Rapp slammed into the wall entering the front straight and tank-slapped his way halfway down the front straight before ultimately losing control and crashing. By tl1e time he and the bike had come to rest, he'd traveled almost a quarter of a mile from where he'd impacted the wall. To nearly everyone's surprise, he was able to get to his feet and suffered only slight damage to one of his hands. Still, the havoc was more than enough to bring the race to a stop, with everyone entering pit road to prepare to do it all over again. On the next attempt at racing, Gobert Gobert said. "We put some laps on a race tire this morning and it felt good. I thought we could get pole position, but Mat was better on the go doing a one-La p thing. I'm on the front row and 1'll1 happy. I just have to get a good start tomorrow and be there. I feel confident that we'll be at the front somewhere. HopefulIy, it's on the top of the box by the end of the day. It's a long race here and there're a lot of riders, lapped riders, who can make a big difference. Hopefully, I'll get a good start, because it's pretty hard to pass around here. I'm gonua ride smart. It's still early in the championship, so I want to get these first few races out of the way and then start putting my head down a little gjt later on in the championship." Gobert lapped at 1:00.377 to narrowly lead his Vance &- Hines teammate Ben Bostrom on the final time sheets. "The Ducati's real nice because when you tuck the front, it comes back," Bostrom said. "These guys rode better than I did today. I tried to have a good race setup going, and did a bund1 of laps on race tires. I was going quick, but when I threw a qualifier on there to do some pretty ~uick laps, things didn't come out that goo~. I kept losmg the. front Th~ track. was pretty ~ot and .slippery ,today. I Just dldn t put It together like I wlsh. I could ve, but ~ did my best. The front row tomorrow 15 good. If you re or: the front row, you can get t~e ~oleshot, and on this tr~;J< It'S pretty hard to pass - I II JUst ~e

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