Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

SBI Superbike World Championship Silverstone, 6reat Britain Results: May 2B, 2002 QUALIFYING: I. Troy Bayliss (I :47.729); 2. Colin Edwards (1:47.883); 3. Steve Hislop (1 :47.902); 4. Noriyuki Ha9a (1 :48.561); 5. Michael Rutter (1 A8.567); 6. Pier·Francesco Chili (1 :49.001); 7. Ruben Xaus (1 :49. t 08); 8. Neil Hodgson (1:49.127); 9. Lucio Podereini (1:49.523); 10. Shane Byme (1:49.629); 11. Chris Walker (1:49.687); 12. James Toseland (1 :49.732); 13. Ben Bostrom (1:49.783): 14. Glen Richards (1:49.923); 15. Gregorio Lavilla (1:50.136): 16. Steve Martin (1:50.309); 17. Eric Bostrom (1:52.266); 18. Dean Ellison (1:52.541); 19. Juan Borja (1:52.578); 20. Mauro Sanchini (1 :52.616): 21. Marco Borciani (1 :52.890); 22. Serafino Forti (I :53.405); 23. Peter Goddard (1:53.509); 24. Ivan Clementi (1:53.753); 25. Aiesslindro Antonello (1:53.908); 26. Broc Parkes (1 :54.249); 27. Mer!< Heckles (1 :54.370); 28. Jiri Mrkyvka (I :55.529). RACE ONE: 1. Colin EdwlIrds (Hon); 2. Noriyuki Haga (Apr); 3. Neil Hodgson (Due); 4. Pier· Francesco Chili (Due); 5. Troy 8lIyliss (Due); 6. MlIrk Heckles (Hon); 7. Ben Bostrom (Due); 8. Ruben Xaus (Due); 9. Shane Byrne (Due); 10. James Toseland (Due): 11. Eric Bostrom (Kaw); 12. Mieheel Rutter (Due); 13. Peter Goddard (Ben); 14. Chris Walker (Kaw); 15. Mauro Sanchini (Kaw); 16. Dean Ellison (Due). Time: 43 min. 27.508 sees. Distance: 63. t6 miles Average speed: 87.20 mph Margin of victory: 7.358 sees. Fastest lap: lep 2. Troy Bayliss, 2:05.551 RACE TWO: 1. Troy Bayliss (Due); 2. Colin Edwerds (Hon); 3. Ruben Xaus (Due); 4. Chris Walker (Kaw); 5. Shane Byrne (Due); 6. Neil Hodgson (Due); 7. Juan Borja (Due); 8. Ben Bostrom (Due); 9. James Toseland (Due): 10. NoriyukJ Haga (Apr); 11. Pier-Francesco Chili (Due); 12. Broe Parkes (Due); 13. Alessendro Antonello (Due); 14. Gregorio Ulvilla (SUI); 15. Peter Goddard (Ben); 16. Eric Bostrom (Kaw); 17. Jiri Mrkyvka (Due); 18. Ivan Clementi (KlIw); 19. Steve Martin (Due). Tune: 41 min. 20.474 sees. Distance: 63.16 miles Average speed: 91.67 mph Margin of victory: 4.909 sees. Fastest lap: Ulp 18, Troy Boyliss. 2:02.145 WORlD SQPERBIKE C'SHlP POINTS STANDINGS (After 6 of 13 rounds): 1. Troy Boyliss (260/9 wins); 2. Colin Edwards (231/2); 3. Neil Hodgson (157); 4. Noriyuki Haga (129); 5. Ruben Xaus (120); 6. Ben Bostrom (119); 7. James Tosehmd (81); 8. Chris Walker (73); 9. Gregorio Ulvilla (60); 10. Juan Bo~a (53); II. Hitoyasu hutsu (47); 12. MakOla Tamada (45); 13. Pier-Francesco Chili (38); 14. Lucio Pedercini (27); 15. Eric Bostrom (26). Visibility wasn't good, with a blinding spray making the going rougho Upcoming rounds: Round 7 • Germany, June g Round 8 - San Marino, June 23 BRIEFLY••• The track action at Silverstone started two days earlier than usual . unofficially, of course - with an open test day organized to allow the World Superbike and World Supersport riders to familiarize themselves with the Silverstone circuit layout on the Wednesday prior to racing. Four Superbike sessions were held in wet. dry and half-and-half conditions. with the Supersport sessions following a similar pattern. Colin Edwards was the fastest man in Superbike, with Chris Vermeulen going qUickest in Supersport. Atrocious weather was forecast for the Silverstone weekend. with the notorious English 'summer' weather bringing alternate gales. violent rainshowers and bright sunshine, occasionally simultaneously from the first day of open testing to the end of qualifying. The very unpredictable nature of the admittedly bizarre climatic conditions was to play several parts in the race weekend but did not contribute to the crash totals, which were very low in all classes. Partly the easy-to·leam nature of the track was a contributing factor. although the wind should have accounted for far more riders than the total demonstrated. Such were the worries of the forecast SO-mph winds blowing away the SBK tented village that the cabs for the team trucks were brought into play, with the tents tied to ihem overnight. Despite official gale·force winds, nothing too drastic occurred and the village remained unmolested. The run up to the Silverstone race was a busy period, even for the teams not in the championship yet. The Foggy Petronas Racing Team, still in an intensive stage of development to get their bikes ready for the homologation deadline at the end of June. unveiled their impressively eqUipped and appointed headquarters on Tuesday. May 22. Situated close to both Britain's main North-South road arteries. the Burton-in-Trent facility runs to 100.000 square feet and features every possible piece of equipment required to compete at the top level of racing. including stand-alone dyno facilities, extensive machine shop. internal stor· age for all team vehicles, and a maze of offices and meeting rooms. There is even a Muslim prayer room, purpose·built in one end of the building. complete with a compass to orient the handful of Malaysian Petronas staff to their spiritual home of Mecca. Sufficient space is available for expansion of the team's operations. if required. The entire venture was completed within a 1O·week time frame, from first getting the keys to the last lick of paint· a minor miracle of logistics and willpower. If the bike is as impressive as the workshop. the FPl will be some tool. The status of development of the Foggy Petronas racebike, and the Petronas-branded streetbike, is as-yet unknown. with conflicting rumors being bandied about at Silverstone. Some say that Eskil Suter is nowhere near capable of producing the engines on time and counter rumors that the chassis side of the operation is behind schedule. Reports from Switzerland suggest that Suter planned to have the first engine ready by the end of April. although that and all other subsequent deadlines have elapsed and still there is supposedly no engine running, so far. The Fogarty team has. according to them. assembled a complete chassis and bodywork package and will be ready to produce the required 75 machines via project managers MSX for the roadbikes. The offiCial launch for the FPR team will be on June 11 in London. It is known that Fogarty only has a dummy engine to fit into his chas· sis right now, but according to the FPR personnel the engine is the only thing beyond their control. Silverstone has not had a happy reputation as a motorcycle track in recent years. being widely regarded as too tight in some places and too fast in others. and way too flat and featureless almost everywhere. The actual track layout during the first running of the venue as a full-on World Superbike venue was supposed to be the full Fl circuit. The actually one used for racing is 3.68· about a third of that, there was much more runoff than the exit of the chicane would allow to any rider who highsided off on the exit. Some riders, notably Ben Bostrom. complained that the large runoff area was still not enough to allow a margin of suitable safety for anyone who crashed right at the fastest part. The last corner is undoubtedly completely unsuitable for high-speed bikes. and yet because of its significance to setting a good lap time. has to be taken at full throttle. Ben Wilson, a wild-card Supersport rider, demonstrated the problem when he fell at the edge of the comer exit and went straight Into the Air Fence a mere few yards from the track edge. He went under the inflatable barrier and was not found on first inspection of the barriers by the increasingly worried and frantic marshals. The session was red-flagged, with all the personnel involved in the mini-drama within a few yards of passing hordes of flat-out motorcycles. Wilson himself appeared a few yards from his expected point of impact, under his own power, and went on to qualify for the race. Worry about this particular comer continued all weekend, although no other major incidents occurred. The Silverstone circuit was expected to be one of the fastest on the calendar, such is the simplicity of the basic layout. but although Bayliss made a lOS-mph average in qualifying, the megatop speeds at the end of Hanger straight were limited to 173 mph, as opposed to the well over 185 mph experienced at places like Monza and the oid Hockenheim. The riders grew to like it. if not the local weather. With the Italian Charity 'Emergency!' benefiting from the proceeds of an auction of rider memorabilia at the Monza race, it was the turn of Riders for Health to benefit from a charity auction scheduled for the end of the day on Sunday. and charity golf game on Friday. featUring teams of riders, media and sponsors. .James Haydon, in attendance at Silverstone (his local circuit. being that he's a Buckingham lad), was sporting a sling on his arm after an accident suffered while go-karting in the USA, a weekend before the launch of his team's premises. He had no sling and made no mention of his injury during the team launch before Silverstone. but came the race with his arm strapped up. helping his fractured right humerus heal. °It was news to us when we got here as well." said a team spokesman. The pre-meeting Thursday press conference for Silverstone was possibly an all·time low for the SBK International organizers. with the interviewer unable to recognize Gregorio Lavilla. who was sitting in front of him. with no clear knowledge of the subject mat· ter in front of him, and - as he himself indicated - out-of-date infor· mation to draw on. The nders to a man were unimpressed with the shabbiness of it all. despite the quality of the surroundings it was conducted in. Those nders who were asked to attend at 8:30 a.m. and were not even questioned by an interviewer who clearly did not know who they all were were even less impressed than the other top men, who at least got photographed and quoted for the local press. One American nder was heard to mention that he didn't care how much the fine for not appearing was set at. he was not going to go to the next one. No one present could blame him. It is understood that plans are afoot to find a more consistent and simply professional solution. Kawasaki is still casting around for a rider for the Eckl team's home race at Lausitzring, with Eric Bostrom unavailable, Akira Yanagawa not a definite and the fact that floating rider Giovanni Bussei has been recently signed by the British Superbike Rizla Suzuki team to contest the Snetterton on (June 2) and Brands Hatch (June 16) meetings which straddle the Lausitz event. Pier-Francesco Chili was not present at the pre-race test session on Wednesday, one of very few regulars missing. The reason was rumored to be financial. with one major sponsor still to cough up for the NCR team even after six rounds of the championship. miles long, and missed out one significant section of the circuit used by Bernie's boys . the chicane at Abbey. The reason was that. although the speed around Abbey is now flat stick instead of Every possible form of tire was in use at Silverstone in qualifying, from all-new-compound Dunlop full-wet rears to the stickiest qual- "" ifiers in the mad dashes to post grid times in between the ruinous showers. A track that dried incredibly rapidly in the wind and frequent bursts of bright sunshine made tire selection a difficult minute-by·minute affair for even those with seemingly limitless amounts of tires. One thing did come to light - Michelin has been using dual-compound tires as a rule. rather than the exception recently. which may go to explain why Colin Edwards for one has been much happier about his available rubber over the last few meetings than he ever appeared to be last year. The usual high numbers of British wild cards were somewhat reduced at Silverstone, but still ran to a healthy five. Part of the reason for the smaller numbers was the transition of British Superbike to 1000cc four-cylinder competition earlier this season, ruling out riders such as John Reynolds, Steve Plater or Simon Crafar. The British regulations only allow the liter fours to have a Supersport-Ievel engine tune. not a full Superbike tune. therefore they have been getting roundly thumped by the Ducatis so far in the UK. Three of the Silverstone wild cards have won British Championship races so far this year - championship-leader Steve Hislop (Monstermob Ducatil plus Renegade racing's Shane Byrne and Michael Rutter. Dean Ellison is also entered on a D&B Racing Honda, and UK-based Aussie Glen Richards was performing minor miracles on a Hawk Racing Kawasaki in practice. Rutter, who survived two crashes at the North-West 200 races in Northern Ireland, was fast in qualifying. especially as he had been recently competing at a track where riding at 100 percent is seldom an option, such are the risks. Having left his BKM Honda team at Sugo. by mutuai agreement, Robert Ulm was in the paddock at Silverstone. He came to England seeking proper Michelin Supermoto tires for his new role in racing life, plus to sort out some financial loose ends with his former employers BKM - and ended up getting a job to race as stand·in for Honda UK rider John McGuinness at the Lausitzring race. "They approached me here and all I came over for were some tires and to talk to the BKM team. I'm obviously very happy about it and I think this is a very good team - a very high-level team." Steve Abbott and Jamie Biggs took victory at Silverstone. round four of the Sidecar World Championship. after Steve Webster retired on lap 13 of the scheduled 16·lap race suffering an engine failure (two lost valves) whilst holding a commanding lead. Starting from pole position, Webster made a good launch and immediately began to ease away from Steinhausen, Abbott and Hanks. By lap three, Webster enjoyed a 5.3-second lead over the battle for third with only Steinhausen able to stay In touch with the fiying Englishman. Current World Champion Klaus Klaffenbock's moved up from a slow start into third but his challenge was short· lived. suffering from an engine failure on the Klaffenbock Racing Yamaha on lap four. His engine filled the oil catch tank and the oil overflowed all over Parzer's hands and platform. making it unsafe to continue. The following lap. Stelnhausen began to slow due to an overheating problem and Abbott was soon to react. setting his personal best lap of the race as he began to challenge for the position. With Steinhausen lapping two seconds off his early pace, Abbott was able to reel him in and make the pass on lap nine. With three laps to go, Webster retired. gifting the race win to Abbott. who secured his second victory of 2002 to take the lead in the World Championship standings. The fight for the sec· ond spot on the rostrum was finally settled on lap 14 with Tom Hanks and Phil Biggs, onboard the 1OOOcc Yamaha, hunting down and passing the struggling Steinhausen to take the best-ever result of their careers. Steinhausen continues his championship challenge, moving into second position in the standings in front of Klaffenbock in third and Hanks fourth. "The first four laps, the bike feit very good and I was able to follow Steve. We then had a problem with the bike and the temperature was up to 110 degrees and we were really struggling, " commented Steinhausen. ''I'm very happy to finish and think that we were lucky to get on the podium, - he added. U "" I • n • _ S JUNE 5. 2002 31

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